Giancarlo Esposito on Returning as Moff Gideon in ‘The Mandalorian’: “They Haven’t Called Me”

Giancarlo Esposito, who we frequently see in the role of a villain, is one of the most notable characters in ‘The Mandalorian’ TV show, as he embodied Moff Gideon, one of the main villains of the overarching storyline in all three seasons of the show.

We know that the story of Mandalorian and Grogu will continue but in the form of a live-action movie. Several weeks after the SAG-AFTRA and writer strikes ended, industry-wide rumors started swirling around about ‘The Mandalorian’ Season 4 getting booted completely and turned into a movie. Then, those rumors got even more legit when we recently heard that Pedro Pascal won’t physically return for ‘The Mandalorian’ due to his commitments on ‘The Last of Us’ Season 2 and 2024’s new ‘Gladiator’ film.

Instead, he’d only provide Mando’s voiceover. The rumors were confirmed several weeks ago when it was announced that a movie focusing on The Mandalorian & Grogu is in development. This new movie, directed by Jon Favreau and produced alongside Kathleen Kennedy and Dave Filoni, is scheduled to begin production in 2024.

Recently Giancarlo took part in GQ Magazine’s Segment where he answered fan questions on the internet and the topic of his upcoming appearance in ‘The Mandalorian’ project was brought up. Here’s what he had to say about it:

I love the Star Wars universe. I don’t have any plans because they haven’t called me.

We know that Esposito’s character was seemingly killed in the last episode of ‘The Mandalorian’ season 3. Moff Gideon sets a trap for the Mandalorian and Grogu after their escape from Imperial captivity. It’s revealed that Gideon’s motive was to create a Force-sensitive army using a secret cloning project with Dr. Pershing.

The Mandalorian destroys the clone embryos, leading to a confrontation with Gideon. Meanwhile, Imperial forces engage Bo-Katan’s Mandalorian army. Gideon isolates Grogu and fights the Mandalorian and Bo-Katan. The battle intensifies until Axe Woves drops an Imperial cruiser on the base, causing Gideon’s apparent demise in a blaze of fire. This is why Giancarlo was asked about the various theories on how might return, he had a pretty interesting answer:

I came back to the third season. I didn’t have a mustache, then you see all these clones. Put it together.

It seems that the fan theory that the Moff Gideon who was killed in the last episode was a clone was correct. The dead giveaway was the fact that the clone didn’t have facial hair, just like Esposito pointed out.

Even if ‘The Mandalorian’ Season 4 isn’t happening, we’re pretty sure that Moff Gideo will return at some point in the movie. Esposito became quite a fan of the fantasy universes, recently he also commented how he would like to play Professor X in the MCU, but would like to avoid being in a wheelchair as he still isn’t “that old.”

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