Mandalorian season 3 reframed or what I think was the original story before executive meddling. Each paragraph is roughly one episode.
Season starts off with BOBF Chapter 5: Return of the Mandalorian and for the most part is exactly what happens in this episode, with the exception that Mando’s spear is not turned into chainmail. Whether this was meant to happen at the underside of Halo or not, who knows, but I’d say probably, since Mando isn’t very mobile at this point. Mando goes on a quest to redeem himself as he’s now an apostate. Because of his low interplanetary mobility, Mando takes the spacebus to Tatooine to visit Peli Motto and acquires the Hot Rod N-1, with R5-D4 as its astromech.
Mando goes to Kalevala to see Bo-Katan, as seen at end of Mandalorian s3e01. Nothing else is relevant from that episode, IG-11 plotline doesn’t exist, Grogu lives with Luke where he’s training his jedi powers, he’s not part of the show. Bo-Katan still sulks, but agrees to go to Mandalore just to prove a point about toxic atmosphere or whatever. Turns out the atmosphere isn’t toxic, but the planet is still all glassed and lifeless. Mando and Bo-Katan travel to living waters, Bo-Katan provides exposition similar to s3e02, Mando picks up a vial of water from Living Waters but does not baptise himself as there would be no one to prove it - remember, Mando is a cultist who plays by the rules.
Mando returns to Children of the Watch who now hang around in Space Australia. Mando proves Mandalore isn’t toxic and has visited the Living Waters with the vial similar to s3e03, but he is not redeemed yet as he didn’t baptise himself. Same goes for Bo-Katan, she’s not allowed into the cool kids club, but her value in this discovery is noted and she’s allowed to hang around. Kalevala is not bombed by TIEs, Dr. Pershing arc doesn’t happen, we don’t learn about double agents and spies.
s3e04 doesn’t happen at all. Bo-Katan won’t have a Mythosaur pauldron, as she didn’t see one, and didn’t lose her original either during the bat-bird-thing-chase, because it didn’t happen.
s3e05 doesn’t happen at all.
The Armorer states the desire to move Children of the Watch to Mandalore due to some birthright funkiness related to the whole cool kids club cult jamboree and asks Bo-Katan to help with transport which they are lacking. Bo-Katan tells she’s lost her clan and thus the fleet, but after roughly the events of s3e06 re-establishes herself as the leader and reacquires the fleet. This has the side effect of starting the unification of the clans, which Imperial Remnant spies on Plazir-15 take note of and inform Moff Gideon about. Bo-Katan will also get the darksaber as well.
Cool kids club and Nite Owls travel to Mandalore. s3e07 events happen for the most part, but the stranded mandalorians are from various clans and families. No Shadow Council/namedropping of Thrawn at this point. Another beat to the unification of the clans, and a kind of “Lets reclaim our homeworld!” moment. As in the s3e07 as well, they travel to the Great Forge and are just about to settle in/light it up when the Imperial Super Commandos attack. Some additional drama and exposition is provided since this is remnants of Clan Saxon, as originally intended and shown in released concept art. Fight fight fight. For two-parter beat the Mandalorians realize the planet is being used as hideout by Imperial Remnants, and Moff Gideon does walk into limelight after trapping everyone, similar to s3e07 ending, but Mando won’t be separated, he’ll be with others in the chamber. And a reminder, Grogu still isn’t around. Viszla’s sacrifice can still happen, although none of the story beats relating to his son are part of this alternate storyline, so maybe it’s just “named side character dies to fill the quota”.
Mandalorians do the same tactical retreat as in s3e08. Mando decides to go after Gideon. R5 helping, Mando pushing through the guards etc. happens as is. Imperial Remnant TIEs attacking the fleet on orbit also happens as is, so does Axe Woves’ parking of the Class 546 Cruiser up Gideon’s butt, which conveniently wipes out the entire Imperial Remnant cell. Good guys win, yay! In the aftermath the Great Forge is relit, and now it is time for Mando’s baptism with everyone around - yes, the baptism was meant for Mando, not Ragnar. Mando still does the dumb thing of tripping into the water in full platemail, and Bo-Katan leaps into action after him. Bo-Katan pulls Mando up, sees Mythosaur and has her epiphany, Mando is redeemed, this-is-the-ways all around. As prepping scene we see Imperial Shadow Council discussing loss of Gideon and related projects/materials, and the now rising threat of Mandalorians to Empire’s plan etc. etc. Mando talks to the Armorer, says he needs to stop this galaxy-changing stuff and go reclaim his foundling, please turn my spear into something useful for him. Beskar chainmail acquired.
Season halftime break. I believe the season was meant to be divided into two with first part being about the rise of Mandalore and unification of Mandalorians, and all other bits were originally meant to be the second half of the season but were instead sprinkled into
and other episodes because some exec wanted the cruiser parking to be the big beat of the season. Continuing from that,
Some time has passed. Maybe not a year, but still a bit. Mando goes to the planet where Luke is training Grogu on. BOBF Chapter 6: From the Desert Comes a Stranger mostly happens, excluding the stuff on Tatooine which is BOBF plot stuff. We see deepfake Luke float frogs and do mad flips etc. and Grogu’s Order 66 flashbacks. Mando arrives with the chainmail, but instead of being a by-proxy choice from Luke, the scene plays out with Luke and Mando both being present and representing the options to Grogu. Grogu rejoins Din Djarin, they leave the planet. Luke and Ahsoka reminisce and provide exposition for future worries.
Din and Grogu return to Nevarro (s3e01), turns out Greef Garga has really turned the place around. Din is asking for work, is offered the sheriff’s position, but Din isn’t interested, so the IG-11 plotline with Anzellans maybe happens, but possibly not. It’s not of much consequence, so lets assume it does. Pirate threat to independent planets is introduced. Whatever Din and Grogu are doing for a short while is up to anyone’s guess, what is required is that they leave Nevarro, so they can shoot down some pirates and we get introduced to the awesome pirate corsair.
Some traditional side quest adventures happen at this point, but we don’t know what because none of that was shown in an easily alignable way. Passage of time is also unclear, but there should be indication that it’s not like the next Monday after Friday’s big fight with Imperial Remnants. Possibly the life-sucking mechaspider thing belongs at this point, with Grogu being instrumental in rescuing Din Djarin. We can even stretch this so far that Grogu goes to Kalevala with aid of R5 to get Bo-Katan who isn’t sulking anymore (remember, the castle wasn’t bombed), so it could fit and positions Grogu and Din Djarin as guests in Kryze’s court.
Pirates attack Nevarro (s3e05), which puts the ball rolling with Greef contacting New Republic, getting effectively declined which leads to Rangers notifying Din Djarin through backchannels, and since he’s now hanging out with Bo-Katan, they grab a bunch of Mandalorians from Mandalore because they realize that having Nevarro as an ally is a great thing, because business there is booming and it’s an independent planet. Mandos rescue Nevarro, Greef Garga is overjoyed and offers a bunch of land and trading opportunities. Pirate corsair gets captured, possibly even for Mando. Option for the show at this point is to have a small posse going around with Mando, since the ship is big enough for that, and unlike Razor Crest, N-1 really isn’t fit for bounty hunting and general living on the go so the captured pirate corsair works as a new home away from home. Alternatively the corsair is transferred to Nevarro’s own defenses. Mando does visit the Rangers outpost similar to ending of s3e08, does the same under the table deal, and if you want to keep the IG-11 storyline in, Din Djarin and Grogu grabs the droid head and get IG-11 fixed. End of s3e08 plays out pretty much as it happened in the show, with Din Djaring and Grogu settling down at the hut on the outskirts of Nevarro. This is the true ending of the season.
Depending on how you slice that up, it’s about 6+4 episodes. Some explanations and omissions:
- About Bo-Katan’s Mythosaur pauldron - she simply doesn’t have that in the final episode. Seems in reshoots of reshoots this detail was missed. Bo-Katan getting the pauldron might happen in second half of my imaginary season, after losing the original to the mechaspider, but I didn’t want to include it in that since that’s just pure fanfic.
- Similar reshoot issue, Mando’s helmet is wet in the final episode’s baptism scene, which obviously means that when those were shot, he was also baptized, possibly even fully submerged. This is the main reason I reshuffled that bit, and IMO the plot flow better this way in any case.
- Grogu never receives the Mudhorn Beskar chestplate. Closer to “true end” of my reframing there could, however, be a similar scene with the full Order 66 flashback, and the chestplate would be somehow linked to Din Djarin’s adoption but again, couldn’t really flow it into all that properly so I left it out.
- The pirate plotline establishes that one pirate fleeing; this is important as that character is known to be a major player in The Acolyte, so he has to 1) exist and 2) stay alive. The pirate corsair surviving is admittedly pure fanfic, but at the same time Hot Rod N-1 simply doesn’t fit as a ship for a bounty hunter, so some kind of solution must be had 🙂