The season two finale of The Mandalorian delivered a huge surprise: Luke Skywalker. The iconic Star Wars character appeared in “The Rescue” to, well, rescue Din Djarin, his allies, and Grogu. The episode built up the character’s reveal. The mysterious figure arrived in a lone X-wing with an astromech in the back. He wore a black robe and wielded a green lightsaber. Then we watched the character, clearly one Luke Skywalker, handily dispatch Moff Gideon’s dark troopers in an epic hallway fight. It took a minute to process my excitement the first time I watched the episode. And while composer Ludwig Göransson did a gorgeous job with the music, YouTuber Abraham Ignacio, who goes by “A,” edited in some music that’s a little more recognizable.
We learned about this edit with John Williams music from Boing Boing and wow is it effective. Watch:
The music matches Luke’s fight scene pretty perfectly. It’s most familiar from the first trailer for The Rise of Skywalker but it plays up elements of Star Wars‘ “Main Theme.” That’s Luke’s music. And then it all ends with “Binary Sunset.” That piece is technically Obi-Wan Kenobi’s theme. However, we mostly associate it with Luke anyway. Hearing it in the moment he comes face-to-face with Grogu works so well.
Here’s Göransson’s piece for Luke from the episode, titled “A Friend.”
Göransson talked to Insider about the music and said, “I basically wrote a new theme for Luke there because I wanted the reveal to be a surprise, I didn’t want to hint at anything.” Totally understandable.
Lucasfilm
We don’t know when The Mandalorian‘s third season is coming to Disney+ yet, but we do know it’s not soon enough.
Amy Ratcliffe is the Managing Editor for Nerdist and the author of The Jedi Mind, available now. Follow her on Twitter and Instagram.
