The Mandalorian: Why Baby Yoda Is Obsessed With The Silver Ball

Ever since he was first brought onboard the Razor Crest, Baby Yoda has been obsessed with a silver ball from one of the ship’s levers – and his Jedi training is probably the reason why. The Mandalorian season 2 has finally revealed some details about Baby Yoda’s past, including the fact that his name is actually Grogu and he trained at the Jedi Temple on Coruscant prior to the issuing of Order 66 and the rise of the Empire.

Though Grogu may look like a baby, he’s actually 50 years old at the time The Mandalorian takes place, which means that he was alive during the events of the Star Wars prequel trilogy. Before the Jedi were purged they numbered in the thousands, and were training many younglings to be the next generation of Jedi. Baby Yoda was one of these younglings, but he was rescued from the temple before Anakin Skywalker arrived to slaughter the rest of the children.

The reason why Baby Yoda fixated on the silver ball out of everything else on the Razor Crest is likely because it’s familiar to him. Though Mando repeatedly tells him that it’s not a toy, to any youngling trained by the Jedi it would look like the remote training droids that the younglings use to hone their connection to the Force. Luke Skywalker was seen practicing with a remote combat droid in Star Wars: A New Hope, wearing a blinding helmet so that he would have to rely on the Force, rather than his eyesight, to sense where the remote was. In Star Wars: Attack of the Clones, Master Yoda was seen training a group of younglings with blinding helmets and remotes on Coruscant.

In The Mandalorian season 2, episode 6, “The Tragedy,” Mando explains to Grogu that he cannot train him, because he’s not a Jedi. Unknowingly, however, he has actually been replicating the little Jedi’s formal training. In the previous episode, “The Jedi,” Mando at first tried and failed to get Baby Yoda to use the Force to pull a stone towards him. It wasn’t until he tried again with the silver ball, however, that the child responded and successfully used the Force to call the object towards him.

In “The Jedi,” Ahsoka Tano said that Grogu had trained with “many Masters” during his time at the Jedi Temple, so there’s no question that he would recognize a training remote – or something that looks like one. Grogu’s memories become dark after the Empire fell and he was taken from the Temple, but in a frightening world full of unfamiliar things, the silver ball is something that reminds him of his home – and his connection to the Force.

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Hannah Shaw-Williams
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Hannah has been with Screen Rant since 2013, covering news, features, movie premieres, Comic-Con and more! You can follow her on Twitter @HSW3K

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