I love how his Legends and current Canon story have tried to redeem him after being just an exploding prop. His story in From A Certain Point of View ANH was also one of my faves and I'm glad he came back in Mando and is being utilized. I hope Season 3 won't forget him and I especially hope he won't be killed off.
I really love that they made him an anti-R2-D2 of sorts, scared and apparently not made for big adventures, even though he played his part in rescueing the galaxy. Makes the upcoming dynamic with Mando and him all the funnier
When I was a child, R5-D4 fascinated me, because aside from R2-D2, he was the more prominent astromech. I had the R5-D4 action figure from Kenner, and I often played out stories where he was fixed and had new adventures. Then when he popped up in Chapter 5 of "The Mandalorian", I was cheering! Even more so when he appeared in Pelli Moto's hangar! When "A Certain Point of View" came out and told R5's story, I had a true respect for this unsung hero of the Original Trilogy. Now that he's in the spotlight, it is, for me, a childhood dream come true.
Its the redemption for the entire R5 Line of droids, since their lore background, was that they were bargain basement trash-bots, known only for how unreliable and badly made they were, all because the first one we saw on screen, blew its motivator. Now it's R5's time to shine and redeem himself and all of his kind
As someone with an R5-D4 action figure on display on my desk, its nice seeing R5 show up in the Mandalorian. If anything happens to this droid though... R5 is the true hero.
Last we saw R5, he was monitoring Grogu and Bo-Katan entering the ruins on the ship's sensors. It would be a blast to see him next observing Din, Grogu and Bo-Katan running for the ship ... followed by a big baby duckling Mythosaur ambling after its oblivious mommy.
R5-D4 was the first of all the Star Wars figures I had, back in the 70’s. (I wanted R2, but my mom didn’t know the difference.) Since then, I’ve loved finding him wherever he’s popped up.
I love when Pelhi said he was "destined for adventure" or something like that. R5 was so, so close to being destined for adventure but that had to go to R2. Now he's finally getting that adventure.
As kid I had this droid as a toy. For years I want a r2d2 unit. And not just the red one with a bad motivator. But I was a kid and it was my parents who buy it (from jawas). I did loved him and tell many story. I was super happy to so him pop on some legend material (Skippy the Jedi droid is a must) and I am still happy to see him back for a certain point of view and now mando. He is a hero of the rebellion
R5-D4 is one of the toys I got from the Kenner line when I was growing up. For some reason he was a missile launcher. But if you set off the missile without converting him it gave the appearance of him exploding like he did in a new hope. I hope he doesn't get destroyed in The Mandalorian or in any of the crossover shows.
Since my intro to Star Wars in '77, I've always remembered that droid, R5-D4, as just a dingy and worn piece of junk. Like most kiddie fans of that era, R2 & 3PO were the STARS. Now after reaching my 49th year in this world, I've gained a new and higher respect for R5...we've both come a long way in 46yrs🤗.
It is so great seeing R5-D4 back in action. I remember just before Revenge of the Sith came out there were four "preview" figures released, one was R4-G9, the gold R2 unit Obi-Wan got after his other one was lost. After that I kind of became obsessed with droids. I collected quite a few from eBay (they had the droids I was looking for). And I did get R5-D4. It even had a play feature where if you twisted the head the motivator would rise up from the back of the head. Plus while not explicitly stated he did also appear in the game "Jedi Academy." An early mission is to rescue an R5 unit from jawas because a moisture farmer had it record a conversation he overheard between Sith cultists. But he got nervous and sold the droid so you need to recover him before the jawas wipe his memory. I always like to think after they recover whatever they needed from him Jaiden (your jedi character) is allowed to keep R5-D4.
I bet they did, or at the very least R5 would have remembered R2, but R2 is also nice enough that I’m sure he’d remember a droid that sacrificed his own future to just help him
Here's the thing - R5-D4 has been 'my' Star Wars character since I was about 5, and I've worked him into just about everything, from being my pilot in the X-Wng games, to several different builds in TTRPGs. While my inner 8-year-old is VERY happy to see him get some actual adventures, it means that I've lost a degree of creative freedom.
I've fallen in love w/ R5 lately and I'm actively starting ro develop a personal project to make an animated short adapting The Red One with an epilogue of R5's Mando plot.
Ok I freaking LOVE the backstory for R5. Now, I always respected him. Because he has a cool head. But I never knew he INTENTIONALLY sacrificed himself perse for the greater good.
I think they've set something along these lines up, but probably more the other way around - the unreparable IG droid is a bit of a "Chekhov's gun" ("don't introduce it if you're not going to use it"), and they established a link between the two droids early on, with Djarin buying one as a substitute for the other. Thing is, R5-D4 is easily the second most merchandised "classical" astromech, and has been getting models consistently for decades, so I don't think they'll be doing that much to the character. I suspect that R5-D4 will either end up using the IG droid like a puppet, or ending up having its guns and targetting system installed into his existing body, which would be a throwback to the "Attack R5-D4" model that they made in the 90s, which contained a rocket launcher.
Man I think we need more droid protagonists. I think I'm in the minority but I really liked the D-Squad or R2 arcs in Clone Wars. And of course the story of how C-3P0 got his red arm. I just like droids man
I think they planned to use the D squad more and then Disney bought up Star Wars and they cancelled clone wars for some dumb reason before they could. So many stories didn’t get put on screen son of dathomir, dark disciple, Crystal crisis on utapau etc.
At one point in the show, I'd love to see R5-D4 floating because he is wearing hoverskates.... bringing Christmas in the Stars one tiny step closer to canon
Holy Wow! I am early! 8 seconds! Also, a part of me might believe that R5 might’ve fabricated some of the stuff that happened to him in the From a Certain Point of view. Like I’m gonna have the headcanon that his motivator did actually just break, but since he knew about R2’s mission, he just told everyone that he did it on purpose and helped save the Galaxy! I mean, he technically still did, but I’m just considering how scared R5 is, I’m gonna pretend he’s got a fear of death after having the equivalent of a near-death experience!
R5-D4 was one of the first Star Wars action figures I had as a kid, to me he is a Legacy character and they wouldn't dare do anything to hurt him (I say evey time something bad happens this season)
I was waiting for R2 & R5 to beep at each other. I can't believe they missed doing this. It would have been a deep cut but boy! What a moment for fans like me who were waiting for that interaction.
R5-D4 has a special place for me. It was my first Star Wars droid toy from the early 80s.. or actually, probably the late 70s?! It was an original from Kenner. I forget if I specifically asked for it or was it simply gifted. None the less, I just liked him more than R2-D2. I liked the colors and more conical cylindrical shape. I think I always had a thing for the lesser known or mainstream items, also. It's great to learn of its expanded story which makes it all the more lovable.
I was all for resurrecting IG-11 at first… but I think it makes more sense to have Din move on to trusting more droids. IG-11 is a symbol of his past, and the mandalorians as a whole have to learn to not live strictly in the past.
i knew it was the same droid that burned when Luke bought R2! Also.. i agree, now i'm gonna be upset when the droid sacrifices himself for Din and Grogu, like IG on 1st season :(
R2 has always been my favorite but now R5 D4 is becoming a close second if not equal! I can’t wait to see him in season four and yeah nothing bad better happen to him! :-)
0:37 ".... he was _in_ possession of the same Jawas that picked up..." Pretty sure you meant he was *the* possession of the Jawas..... although the idea of droids owning sentient beings is a frightfully intriguing image.
I too love R5D4. I was surprised that R2 & R5 didn't acknowledge each other when R2 brought Grogu back in the X-wing. I was shouting at the screen "it's the first time they have seen each other since A New Hope!"
He's gonna get blown up by pirates isn't he? The slight glimmer of hope though is we at least have some people on Nevarro that can put him back together if that happens.
If Din does keep him, I hope he'll take him somewhere to get some much needed maintenance. You know for a fact Peli was not taking care of him properly lol
I interpreted Pelli saying he was a “hero of the rebellion” as an endorsement of astromechs in general, since they were so frequently and prominently used by the Alliance.
You know in the video Game Rogue squadron 3 R5 is wedge's astromech and after they crash on genosis they find Obi wan's Jedi starfighter and he fixes it witch they use to escape
Ha, that is fun. I liked that it was called a bad motivator. I assumed R5-D4 simply didn't feel like it (not motivated) to be sold to moisture farmers. Basically the droid equivalent of faking a leg injury. Like calling in sick, or the blue flu, or "Darn, I just can't make it this time..." Maybe the smoke was like a middle finger? 😀 And, Maybe R5-D4 was right... "from a certain point of view" at being a Rebellion hero. He allowed R2 to get out, which in turn allowed R2 to go with Master Luke and help the Rebel Alliance directly... which would not have happened if not for R5-D4 letting R2-D2 take his place. 😁
Bruh, you didn't mention in one of the Legend, R5 had Jedi powers! It was to the point R5 saw the future if Luke pick him instead of R2 which result in the Empire winning therefore he sabotage itself to ensure R2 would be pick and the Rebel won the war!
I hope to hear more of his canonical backstory, and what befell him during The Galactic Civil War, to make him so shaky in temperament. I also hope to see him have more adventures with Din and Grogu, and that he gets to meet R2-D2 again, so they can regale each other with their experiences.
Maybe he's just a nervous wreck because Peli's always palling around with grubby Jawas and they always eye him funny whenever they're over. R5's jumpy from all those years of cowering and thinking, "I can't go back to the crawler. I can't go back to the crawler. I can't go back to the crawler."
I thought R5 was Jen Porkins’ droid that accompanied him on the attack on the Death Star. Was that a different droid? Cause I always wondered how he survived if they were the same droid
Yes, that was R5-D8 who had a strangely similar color scheme to R5-D4, although there was another one who shared his color scheme named R5-SK1. I like to think that due to the R5 series being cheaply made, there was a factory error which caused some R5 units to have R5-D4's color scheme.
This is 100% an overreaction but I think R5 has been my favourite "slowbuild" in Star Wars liveaction stuff in ages. We first saw him and people everywhere who probably care *too* much about Star Wars got a bit giddy and went "Wait... is that ...? Naaah.... is it?" and that snowballed through multiple seasons into "The second astromech droid we ever saw on screen is now kickin it with Din and Grogu for an episode" I love, love, love that escalation. Also shows that, despite all the people who desperately want to convince us of the contrary, Star Wars is still in the safe hands of fans who not only care about the franchise, but actually know what to do with it.
