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Lucasfilm defends Baby Yoda's troubling meal in Mandalorian's latest episode

The scene on Disney Plus was "intentionally disturbing, for comedic effect," says a Lucasfilm executive.

Gael Cooper
CNET editor Gael Fashingbauer Cooper, a journalist and pop-culture junkie, is co-author of "Whatever Happened to Pudding Pops? The Lost Toys, Tastes and Trends of the '70s and '80s," as well as "The Totally Sweet '90s." She's been a journalist since 1989, working at Mpls.St.Paul Magazine, Twin Cities Sidewalk, the Minneapolis Star Tribune, and NBC News Digital. She's Gen X in birthdate, word and deed. If Marathon candy bars ever come back, she'll be first in line.
Expertise Breaking news, entertainment, lifestyle, travel, food, shopping and deals, product reviews, money and finance, video games, pets, history, books, technology history, generational studies. Credentials
  • Co-author of two Gen X pop-culture encyclopedia for Penguin Books. Won "Headline Writer of the Year"​ award for 2017, 2014 and 2013 from the American Copy Editors Society. Won first place in headline writing from the 2013 Society for Features Journalism.
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Gael Cooper
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Lucasfilm/Disney Plus

Warning: Spoilers for The Mandalorian season 2, episode 2 ahead. 

In Friday's episode of The Mandalorian on Disney Plus, Mando (Pedro Pascal) and Baby Yoda end up traveling with Frog Lady, an amphibian who's trying to get her (unfertilized) eggs safely through space to help her species survive. But to Baby Yoda, the future of the Frog Lady's species simply looks like a bar-side jar full of tasty treats. Baby Yoda's been known to eat some weird things, but it's a little troubling to see him wolfing down a species' future hopes.

So troubling, in fact, that Phil Szostak, Lucasfilm creative art manager, felt the need to tweet a defense.

"For the record, Chapter 10 of The Mandalorian makes it clear that the Frog Lady's eggs are unfertilized, like the chicken eggs many of us enjoy," he wrote. "But obviously, chickens aren't sentient beings and the Child eating the eggs is intentionally disturbing, for comedic effect."

Szostak followed up with a second tweet, writing, "Fans of horror know that disturbing things make some of us laugh and some of us squirm, or both. Your mileage may vary."

But some fans still objected. 

"For the record, the frog lady was very adamant about the fact that her eggs were important to her, and that it was her last and only chance to have kids," one Twitter user wrote. "So it's actually closer to fucking up someone's IVF, which would be incredibly upsetting for a wannabe mom. it's not funny."

But The Mandalorian is not exactly a kids' show, another fan pointed out.

"Where's the sympathy for the poor ice-spider mom whose young Baby Yoda also ate and then got lasered/incinerated along with the rest of her brood for trying to defend it?" the Twitter user wrote. "(Point being this is Star Wars , not My Little Pony.)"

Disturbing or not, there's also a Funko Pop figurine featuring Baby Yoda with the Frog Lady's egg canister -- and he doesn't look to have learned anything from Mando's constant warnings to steer clear.

See also

Star Wars Vintage Collection Baby Yoda could join The Mandalorian's Razor Crest set

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