Will ‘The Mandalorian’ Overshadow ‘Star Wars: The Bad Batch’?
There’s always a bigger fish. March of 2023 is primed to be one of the busiest months in the history of Star Wars. In that month alone, we will see the releases of The Mandalorian Season 3, the latter half of The Bad Batch Season 2, Star Wars: Jedi Survivor, and its tie-in novel Battle Scars. While most would post the gif of No-Face from Spirited Away being consumed by a tidal wave to express how overwhelmed they are, I am ready to be saturated with quality Star Wars content. With that said, one aspect of this close-quarters scheduling has me a bit worried. That would be that The Mandalorian’s third season will be premiering while The Bad Batch is still airing its second season.
While I have softened on my previous position that different onscreen Star Wars projects shouldn’t be airing alongside each other, I still think having The Mandalorian and The Bad Batch debuting simultaneously is a bad idea, mainly in regards to The Bad Batch. As we’ve seen before, general audiences are likelier to engage with live-action content than animated content when it comes to major franchises such as Star Wars and Marvel. While series such as The Clone Wars Season 7 and Tales of the Jedi did manage to each climb to the top 5 most streamed series on Disney+, The Bad Batch isn’t quite on that level of viewership. Plus, with The Mandalorian the juggernaut that it is, I’m fairly sure that The Bad Batch will sadly be overshadowed.
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Now, of course, I’m hoping this isn’t the case. Star Wars animation has its own massive audience, and a tight schedule clearly won’t dissuade dedicated Star Wars fans such as myself from watching each series week-to-week. But in terms of the general viewing public, most folks at home will undoubtedly choose to watch The Mandalorian over The Bad Batch. As we saw with Obi-Wan Kenobi and Ms. Marvel, different series airing simultaneously can negatively impact their overall ratings. While I understand why Disney and Lucasfilm have made this decision with so much Star Wars content coming out this year, I still wish that The Bad Batch would air on its own without competing with one of the most popular series in the world.
At the end of the day, though, fans will watch what they want to watch. Though The Bad Batch’s ratings may pale in comparison to The Mandalorian’s, its core Star Wars animation audience will still be there to watch the Clone Force 99 do their thing, as well as Din and Grogu. Ultimately, we’ll have to see how well The Bad Batch fares while airing alongside the global phenomenon that is The Mandalorian. Even if there aren’t as many people to see the clones in action, it’s still guaranteed they’ll do their jobs well.
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