Mandalorian director Bryce Dallas Howard on the Baby Yoda soup meme: "We wanted to do a zillion takes"
Episode 4’s director explains how the soup scene could have been very different
Every week, there seems to be a new Baby Yoda meme dominating the conversation around The Mandalorian. This week, it’s the green critter silently sipping some soup while Mando and Gina Carano’s tough-talking, even-harder-hitting Cara Dune duke it out. The director of the episode – Bryce Dallas Howard – has spoken about ‘directing’ Baby Yoda during that scene, including some ideas for alternate takes we would have loved to have seen.
“That day was all about that brutal fight,” Howard told Variety. “Gina and Mando’s stunt double were just destroying each other. And then it gets to Baby sipping his soup and everything else goes away, all these amazing feats of athleticism and martial arts, and all this stuff just becomes Baby with soup and all we wanted to do was a zillion takes of how Baby was going to drink his soup.”
So, other than the motherly cupping of the drink, how else could Baby Yoda have downed that broth? Howard played around with several different ideas: “Would he drink it with one hand? With two hands? Sipping it a lot? Sipping it a little bit?... A Baby sip, a hearty sip, we had so many options to contend with. Baby just wins every scene he’s in.”
There’s no need to wait until Friday to get another taste of the Baby Yoda Experience. Not only does he star in an incredible fan video, featuring a lightsaber battle with Darth Sidious, but you can now pre-order a Baby Yoda plushie from Walmart. Soup not included.
Keep tabs on when you can see Baby Yoda next with our Mandalorian release schedule
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I'm the Senior Entertainment Writer here at 12DOVE, focusing on news, features, and interviews with some of the biggest names in film and TV. On-site, you'll find me marveling at Marvel and providing analysis and room temperature takes on the newest films, Star Wars and, of course, anime. Outside of GR, I love getting lost in a good 100-hour JRPG, Warzone, and kicking back on the (virtual) field with Football Manager. My work has also been featured in OPM, FourFourTwo, and Game Revolution.