When Boba met Fennec: 'The Book of Boba Fett' finally gives us our favorite odd couple origin story

One question that The Book of Boba Fett had yet to answer thus far is why Boba (Temuera Morrison) decided to give up the complicated profession of bounty hunting to become a crime lord. Chapter 4 of the live-action Star Wars series gave us an answer to that question, while also giving us plenty of backstory for Boba and Fennec Shand (Ming-Na Wen). 

Put simply, Boba Fett is tired of working for idiots. He laid the tracks of his motives in Chapter 3, when he gave advice to Black Krrsantan: “Don’t work for scugholes.” 

***WARNING: From this point forward, there will be spoilers for Chapter 4 of The Book of Boba Fett. If you have not watched yet, then jetpack out of here right away.***

In another flashback dream (fresh off of the deaths of the Tusken tribe that adopted him), Boba finds Fennec in the sand. She herself is fresh off of being shot in Chapter 5 of The Mandalorian. He takes her to a cybernetic implant den where a ripper doc (who looks like they are straight out of Cyperpunk 2077) fills her stomach with implants and saves her life. 

They bond over both being left for dead in the sands of Tatooine, and she agrees to help him recover his ship from what was formerly Jabba’s Palace. After that, Boba says he is going to recover his armor and kill “the bloated pig” who double-crossed him, referring to Bib Fortuna. In the canonical comic event War of the Bounty Hunters, Boba was definitely treated badly by this "bloated pig." He also suffered the constant idiocy of those that he was working for, which leads into his next conversation with Fennec. 

She asks him why he wants to stop his life as a bounty hunter to be a crime lord. His response: “I’m tired of working for idiots who are gonna get me killed.” He mentions the Tusken tribe, and says that when he was with them, he was ready to leave bounty hunting behind. 

Boba and Fennec proceed to recover Boba’s ship. They also lay waste to the Nikto speeder gang that has been causing so much trouble, and also drop a seismic charge into the Sarlacc’s mouth while they look for Boba’s lost armor. During another campfire scene following all of that, Boba goes into further depth about his motives. 

“How many times have you been hired to do a job that was avoidable?” he asks. “If they only took the time to think. How much money could have been made? How many lives could have been saved?” Fennec points out that this would leave them both out of work, but Boba counters with, “I’m tired of our kind dying because of the idiocy of others. We’re smarter than them. It’s time we took our shot.”

Boba offers Fennec something that no crime boss has ever offered her, which is loyalty. She remarks that his time with the Tuskens has made him soft, but he doesn’t agree. 

“It’s made me strong. You can only get so far without a tribe,” he says. Fennec is the first member of his new tribe. When we revert back to the present, he recruits the Wookiee Black Krrsantan. He makes an offer to the ruling families of Mos Espa that they can’t refuse, and the war against the Pyke Syndicate is almost upon us. 

Win or lose, Boba is not throwing away his shot.

Photo: Marvel Comics

Speak Freely

-Boba refers to his ship as his “Firespray gunship.” Canonically this is the model of his famous ship, but not the name. He does not refer to the ship as Slave I (which is still it’s canonical name), but he doesn’t rename it.

-Aside from a Chef Droid and a Sous-Chef Droid, the palace also has a LEP Droid, aka a “bunny droid” that was often seen in Star Wars: The Clone Wars. This is the first time we’re seeing one in live-action. 

-The Palace hangar bay looks exactly like it does in the Star Wars: Battlefront video games.

-Fennec Shand moment of the episode: the look on her face before the ramp of Boba’s ship closes up. 

-Boba using his ship to lay waste to the Nikto speeder gang (the Kintan Striders, we assume) was very, very satisfying. Screw those guys. 

-It’s also satisfying to see Boba and Fennec take out the Sarlacc, with Fennec again taking a win with the line, “fire in the hole.” 

-The armor itself is confirmed to be what saved Boba from the Sarlacc’s acid, likely because it was confirmed to be made of strong stuff. Legends stories have sometimes said that the armor was made of durasteel, but now we know for certain that the Jango/Boba armor is made of beskar. 

-Boba’s love of creatures continues with his love of the bantha. When he finally sends it away, he gives our favorite Boba line of the episode: "Find other banthas. Make baby banthas.” 

-The bacta tank healing sessions are now complete, so any further flashbacks (possibly to when Boba was very young on Kamino) may have to come in a different fashion. 

-Black Krrsantan does what Chewbacca never did: he takes a Trandoshan and rips their arms off. Chewie only did this to Unkar Plutt in a deleted scene from Star Wars: The Force Awakens. That scene isn’t in the final movie, so Black K takes the win here. 

-The build-up to the moment is wonderful too, as Garsa Fwip (Jennifer Beals) gives Krrsantan a long monologue to calm him. It almost works… until it doesn’t. 

-Boba and Fennec are ready to hire some additional muscle at the end of the episode. Fennec says, “Credits can buy muscle if you know where to look.” Right after she says it, we hear an unmistakeable musical riff from The Mandalorian, one that is always reserved for Din Djarin (Pedro Pascal). The series may have just let us know that Mando is going to come visit his pals sometime soon. 

The Book of Boba Fett streams on Disney+ every Wednesday.