Baby Yoda offers a cool link between The Rise of Skywalker and The Mandalorian
Major spoilers for the movie and seventh episode of the show here.
The Force is strong with Baby Yoda, as it is with the heroes of The Rise of Skywalker.
If you're hoping for a little synergy between this week's Star Wars releases, The Rise of Skywalker and the seventh episode of The Mandalorian beyond the sneak peek, the Force is indeed with you. It's the kind of link you'll likely catch if you're paying attention, but let's take a look at its impact on the events of the new movie and Disney Plus show.
Be warned, major spoilers for both are coming -- stop reading now if you're planning to watch either.
Baby Yoda may not show up in The Rise of Skywalker, but he, Rey and Ben Solo all use a Force power that we hadn't seen before in canon -- healing. Since The Mandalorian takes place about 27 years before the movie, let's talk about what happened there.
The Mandalorian
In Chapter 7, Baby Yoda seems to be in a dark mood and uses a Darth Vader-style Force choke on Cara Dune (Gina Carano). He later jumps to the other side of the Force when Bounty Hunter Guild boss Greef Carga (Carl Weathers) is poisoned by a slash from a wild bat-like creature and things are looking grim. His allies don't have the medical supplies to fix him up.
Greef Carga got a nice dose of Force healing, which likely saved his life.
However, Baby Yoda puts his little green hand on the wound and draws upon the Force to heal Greef. The move exhausts our wee pal, who sits heavily afterwards. Beyond saving Greef's life, the incident convinces him to abandon his plan to betray Mando (Pedro Pascal) -- Baby Yoda's use of the light side of the Force apparently made him listen to his conscience.
This ability was hinted at in the second episode, when he reaches out to Mando's less severe wound. Our bounty hunter hero thinks the young 'un is just messing around, and quickly places him back in his pod.
The Rise of Skywalker
Jumping forward in the timeline, Rey (Daisy Ridley) first uses this ability to heal an injured cave-dwelling serpentine creature instead of letting her trigger-happy buddy Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac) blast it. In doing so, they avoid a fight and uncover an exit to the cave.
Later, she heals Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) after stabbing him through the torso with her lightsaber -- starting him on the path to redemption as his old self, Ben Solo.
Rey and Ben Solo are both saved from death by Force healing in The Rise of Skywalker.
Finally, after Rey sacrifices herself to destroy the charged-up-on-the-dark-side Emperor Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid), Ben selflessly uses the ability to resurrect her and the effort kills him.
What does this mean for Baby Yoda?
Rey suggested that the act of healing another with the Force costs the user a little bit of their own life -- this likely depends on the severity of the injury. We don't know what it took from Rey, but did see that Ben had to give up his own life to restore Rey's.
Baby Yoda healed Greef from a seemingly fatal injury; could that have cost the little fella a significant portion of his life? His unnamed species is extremely long-lived -- the actual Yoda was more than 900 years old when he died in Return of the Jedi -- so his shortened lifespan might not be apparent to humans.
This isn't something the show is likely to explore in any major way, but it's fun to contemplate as we await the ocean of Baby Yoda merch coming our way in 2020 and worry about the little guy until the season finale of The Mandalorian hits Disney Plus on Friday, Dec. 27.
