Perhaps not since the days of Steven Spielberg’s famous E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial has an alien puppet been so adored as The Mandalorian‘s Baby Yoda. And The Mandalorian executive producer Jon Favreau revealed in a recent interview with Deadline that Dave Filoni, who played a significant role in the creation of the iconic new character, had an E.T. moment when he came up with his first sketch for the Child. Favreau also drew some parallels to Michelangelo’s famous “The Creation of Adam” painting. Both, of course, feature fingers nearly touching. And season 2 does seem like it will focus on contacting the child’s home, though presumably not with a phone.
“Dave had done a sketch of kind of a Michelangelo/E.T. moment, and that was a source of inspiration,” Favreau said. “Then, Doug Chiang and the whole art department started generating drawings of it, and the Legacy [Effects] people built it.”
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Favreau went on to explain the difficulties they had in working in such a vast universe like the Star Wars one.
“To have a way to create a freshness, while still being respectful of what came before, I think is one of the challenges of storytellers in this moment, because we’re inundated with so much content,” he added. “Now, everything’s at the touch of a finger, so everybody has a tremendous cultural context…You know, everybody’s checking your work.”
He concluded by comparing himself and the rest of The Mandalorian crew to mere DJs who are “playing Beatles songs.” George Lucas, meanwhile, is The Beatles.
What were your thoughts during the first scene of Baby Yoda? Did you see the resemblance with Spielberg’s alien? Let us know in the comments section below.
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