He melted hearts when he made his on-screen debut in season one of the beloved Star Wars spinoff, but how old is Grogu in The Mandalorian? Turns out, the adorable character—who everyone referred to as Baby Yoda—isn’t such a baby at all. At least, not by human standards.
The Mandalorian premiered in 2019. The series is set five years after the events of 1983’s Star Wars: Return of the Jedi and stars Pedro Pascal as Din Djarin, also known as The Mandalorian, a lone bounty hunter who goes on the run to protect the Force-sensitive child, Grogu. The show was nominated for Outstanding Drama Series at the 72nd Primetime Emmy Awards in 2020 and won seven awards at the Primetime Creative Arts Emmy Awards that year.
“The Mandalorian is some kind of hybrid in terms of voice and body. There’s this really interesting, collaborative, takes-a-village kind of way of executing this character. To be so economical about the character’s face, I think protects me in a way that wasn’t necessarily part of my plan or anyone’s plan, but it’s just something that kind of happened,” Pascal told Vanity Fair in 2022. “In terms of my own psychological makeup, if I wouldn’t be able to hide in the helmet, as far as the popularity of this show is concerned. I can remain a little oblivious in terms of how much people are taking this in and how much I’m a part of that. Maybe I’m a little bit of a commitment-phobe, because the coolness of it really, really excites me, and the lifespan of it really intimidates me.”
How old is Grogu in The Mandalorian?
How old is Grogu in The Mandalorian? You might be surprised to learn that Grogu, aka Baby Yoda, is 50. By human standards, he should have gone through a mid-life crisis by now but in the context of what 50 means for his mysterious species, it makes sense that he’d still be an infant. The OG Yoda, after all, lived to 900 so they have a remarkably long lifespan. Grogu certainly behaves like a toddler. He moves around in a stroller, coos adorably and wants to put everything in his mouth—including those controversial eggs from season two of The Mandalorian.
Baby Yoda, The Mandalorian. Image: Disney+/Lucasfilm
If you need a reminder, episode two of season two sees Mando giving passage to a Frog Lady (seriously, that’s her character’s name) and her hopefully future children. You see, Frog Lady is carrying a mysteriously glowing container of eggs that remain unfertilized—her plan is to get to her husband, who is on the estuary moon of Trask, so that the eggs may be fertilized before the equinox. In exchange for passage, Frog Lady promises to offer Mando information about where he might find other Mandalorians. Before embarking from Tattoine, it is revealed just how important this mission is to Frog Lady: Her eggs are her last remaining hope to continue her family’s ancestral line.
So, suffice it to say, these eggs are pretty serious. But The Mandalorian‘s writers had Baby Yoda do something to these eggs that was so unspeakably horrible, or darkly comic, depending on how you interpret it. Several times over the course of the episode, The Child is caught slipping his grubby little baby hands into Frog Lady’s egg pod, only to make a meal out of her unborn children. As the episode continues, Baby Yoda eats more and more eggs, whittling down her progeny—and her family’s chance of a future—with every snack. Eek.
There are lots of theories as to Grogu’s larger purpose in The Mandalorian, too. One is that he was created by The Force itself. This theory requires a little bit of previous knowledge about the Star Wars universe and timeline, but we’ll keep it simple for those unfamiliar. The main thing you need to know is that the Force—a.k.a. the power that “force-sensitive” beings like Baby Yoda use—requires a certain balance in the universe to exist. That’s where we get “the Dark Side” and the “Light Side” of the Force, often practiced by the Sith and Jedi respectively. Some fans believe that Baby Yoda is the answer to restoring the balance between these sides, and thus, he is a product of the Force itself.
As for how that works, we can take a look at Anakin Skywalker’s own origin story for a clue. It’s understood that Anakin was conceived by midichlorians (the organisms that create Force-sensitive beings) all in an effort to end the Sith. But instead of serving the Light, Darth Plagueis and Emperor Palpatine ultimately lured Anakin into the Dark Side, only for him to become the franchise’s infamous villain, Darth Vader. Some are convinced that Baby Yoda is the Force’s key to restoring the balance disrupted by this exchange. If the Dark Side got Anakin, perhaps the birth of The Child can set things right in the universe if he becomes a practitioner of the Light.
Is Grogu Yoda’s son?
We don’t know much about the reproductive abilities of Yoda, let alone much else about his alien species. But we do know that he had one female counterpart in all of the Star Wars universe: Yaddle. We met Yaddle during Episode I: The Phantom Menace, and based on the timeline of that film, it’s been more or less 50 years by the time the events of The Mandalorian are taking place.
Baby Yoda, The Mandalorian. Image: Disney+/Lucasfilm
Are you thinking what I’m thinking? If Baby Yoda is roughly 50 years old, it’s possible that he was conceived during or around the time when Yoda and Yaddle were in contact on The Phantom Menace. Of course, as Jedis, this lovemaking meant they broke a code. But exceptions might have been made if the pair were attempting to save their species with this final child.
He could also be Yoda’s clone and if you’ve watched Star Wars: The Clone Wars, you’d know that this theory isn’t as far-fetched as it sounds. Reddit user pw4lk3r suggests that The Child is a direct clone, because, well, “It seems unlikely that the Force would will a second Yoda and coexist them at the same time with similarly impressive abilities, seemingly entirely untrained.”
The Mandalorian season 3 is available to stream on Disney Plus. Here’s how to watch it for free.
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