Watch out! This article contains spoilers for The Book Of Boba Fett.
The biggest problem in Fett is a side character in his own show. The problem, simply put, is too much emphasis on the shared universe aspect of Star Wars.
Shared universes in TV and cinema are not new. The best-known early example is probably the Toho Shared Universe, which contained famous kaiju like Godzilla, Mothra, and Rodan. The advent of television-based shared universes happened much more recently, arguably beginning with Expanded Universe, although most of this has since been rendered non-canon as Star Wars Legends.
With this in mind, it seems strange that The Book Of Boba Fett suffers so much because of its shared universe. However, the series contains so many shared universe references that it becomes over-encumbered by them, squeezing in so many other characters from various stories that it ends up suffocating its own central plot. It often feels as if the writers lacked confidence in their own original material and resorted to including well-known characters from other stories to try and build as much fanservice as possible, but the result is a lack of investment in what’s supposed to be the main narrative. The final product is a show which may please audiences who enjoyed tangentially related but popular shows like The Mandalorian but will ultimately frustrate people who wanted a story about Boba Fett. This feels strange to realize, considering Fett's name is in the show's title. However, this issue, while obvious in The Book of Boba Fett, is far from unique to the Star Wars spin-off.
How The MCU Perfected The Shared Universe Model
Even those who don’t like the Marvel Cinematic Universe and its stories can’t deny its success. Beginning with Iron Man 2, are often considered among the least memorable.
As the MCU has blossomed, it’s become much more normal to see characters from one story appear in another, but the MCU has largely remained faithful to its original premise of telling stories that are self-contained. Characters may appear without introduction, but only ever when it’s logical for them to be there. Doctor Strange showing up at the beginning of Doctor Strange is a wizard, his only goal is to protect Earth, and he’s otherwise a neutral party in the story. Once his role in the movie is over, he leaves and isn’t shown again. There's no reason to give him any more screen time than the story needs from him.
This is the golden rule that the MCU abides by in all of its stories — the writers never pull the focus away from the hero. There’s always a central character to be emotionally invested in, and the story always revolves around that character’s perspective. The Hulk is a major character in Thor: Ragnarok, but it never stops being Thor’s story. Doctor Strange is essential to the plot of Spider-Man: No Way Home, with its many villains, but the movie is always sharply focused on telling Spider-Man’s story.
Why Other Shared Universes Fail To Beat The MCU
Writers of other stories have, sadly, failed to replicate these core ideas and the most disappointing example is the DCEU. With iconic characters like Superman, Wonder Woman, and The Flash, the early DCEU movies had no right to be so weak. The problem with the weakest DCEU movies is an overemphasis on the expanded universe at the expense of telling a satisfying story. By far the most egregious example is Justice League movie and even its unmade prospective sequels. Wonder Woman feels awkwardly misplaced in the story, only serving to give exposition about future Justice League , and then take part in a boss fight she shouldn’t really have been involved in.
Peacemaker have been much better received. Continuing in this direction, and developing a style distinct from the familiar “quippy” Marvel dialogue which many viewers are starting to find tiresome, the DCEU is finally finding the success it deserves.
There are a few other shared universes ongoing in movies and TV, with notable examples being Sony’s Spider-Man Universe, where the the Ravencroft Institute, but didn’t waste time elaborating on it. A wise creative choice, because that elaboration would’ve been a distraction from the story being told.
Book Of Boba Fett Shows The Problem With Shared Universes
Unfortunately, in The Book Of Boba Fett, Star Wars has shown that it’s neither interested in telling self-contained stories, nor in keeping the focus on the main character. The shared universe takes priority over the story. While the idea of a shared universe is to make stories feel like a small part of a larger whole, squeezing too many disparate characters together into a single story has the opposite effect, making the entire story universe feel that much smaller.
First and foremost, Book Of Boba Fett is the opposite of self-contained. Nearly every major character already has an extensive history in the sprawling transmedia franchise of Star Wars. Where shows like The Mandalorian introduced and developed brand new characters who viewers became deeply invested in, Book Of Boba Fett relies almost exclusively on characters who at least some audience will recognize. At the same time, the story barely seems to care about its original characters. Two significant characters are killed off-screen, and two significant characters aren’t even given names. The Tusken warrior who’s so important at the story's opening falls into both of these categories.
The deeply interconnected nature of the story isn’t necessarily a problem in itself. The presence of characters like Fennec Shand or Star Wars: The Bad Batch, several Star Wars comics, and even Chuck Wendig's Star Wars: Aftermath trilogy of novels. By the time the finale arrives, early emotional investment in Boba’s story has been squandered, after most of the previous two episodes were literally set on different worlds.
Star Wars' Future Risks Making Its Shared Universe Problem Worse
One of the most successful collections of Star Wars stories is Clone Wars carefully focuses on few characters, and those characters take center stage until that story is finished.
Star Wars has an ever-increasing roster of stories across a variety of different media. While this gives a much greater potential to include tie-ins and cameos with characters from other stories, it also carries the risk of overloading stories with characters who don’t really belong there. 10 of the major characters from Book Of Boba Fett, including Boba himself, are exactly this kind of tie-in character. Their collective backstories span four movies, four TV series, three novels, and a plethora of comics. Between overloading the story with cameos and pulling the focus haphazardly between characters, important elements are overlooked or only hinted at. Cobb Vanth’s connection to Fett is barely referenced. Cad Bane feels like barely more than a henchman than a saga-spanning antagonist. Both die so quickly after their first appearances that their last-minute inclusion in Book Of Boba Fett feels utterly bizarre.
As the Star Wars TV shows seem inevitably headed towards team-up stories against major villains like the Pyke Syndicate and General Thrawn, they risk falling into the same pitfall which nearly killed the DCEU — giving the shared universe priority over telling heartfelt, compelling stories. Other much-anticipated Star Wars shows due for release in 2022 are Ahsoka and Kenobi, following the two lightsaber-wielding fan-favorite characters. With their shared history, it seems inevitable that the two will meet up at some point in their stories. As they do, writers need to be wary of making the mistakes that left The Book Of Boba Fett feeling so unsatisfying. Spending too much time returning to the same cast of characters risks shrinking both the universe and emotional investment in the stories being told.
Many of the elements and characters that The Book Of Boba Fett introduced early on held lots of potential and could have developed into interesting and unique new aspects of Star Wars canon. While many viewers know and love characters from stories they fondly, it’s important to that the best stories have always been about entirely new characters. Din Djarin and Grogu were introduced in The Mandalorian and are now widely loved. The fact that The Book Of Boba Fett didn’t introduce any new characters to them is a mistake that Star Wars writers will hopefully correct moving forwards.