Given that Tatooine is a remote backwater planet on the Outer Rim of the galaxy, it's not exactly a convenient place to visit. You can't really swing by on the way to some other place, you know? So when our hero Din Djarin once again pops into Peli Motto's (Amy Sedaris) garage at the beginning of Chapter 18 of The Mandalorian, it initially felt like a bit of a stretch.

　　Warning. This article contains very light spoilers for Season 3, Episode 2 of The Mandalorian, Chapter 18.

　　But it turned out that the writers and Powers That Be on The Mandalorian had another reason for bringing the titular Mando back to Tatooine for yet another quick, casual visit. While the quest to bring back IG-11 ended here, Motto sold Mando on a different droid she had lying around: an astromech unit named R5-D4 that would prove immediately useful in this episode--and who will very likely remain on the series as the astromech unit for Din Djarin's old Naboo starfighter.

　　But R5-D4 isn't just some anonymous droid we've never heard of before. No, this guy is a Star Wars OG who previously had only a single claim to fame: he was the droid that Uncle Owen initially tried to buy from the Jawas instead of R2-D2 at the beginning of A New Hope. But after Uncle Owen told the Jawas he wanted R5, R5 blew a gasket (or something) and Uncle Owen ended up with R2 instead--and the rest is history.

　　In the current Star Wars canon, R5 has already gotten a little bit of love in the form of a previous (very brief) appearance on The Mandalorian and as the hero of a short story in the anthology collection From a Certain Point of View. That story, The Red One by Rae Carson, retcons R5's story in A New Hope to make him a bit more heroic. In the story, R5 and R2 talk to each other when they're both being held in the belly of the Jawa's massive sandcrawler--R2 tells him of his mission from Princess Leia and the stakes involved for the galaxy.

　　So when Uncle Owen attempts to buy R5, his little "accident" is actually an intentional act of self-sabotage so that R2 can continue with his mission.

　　How R5 ended up with Peli Motto isn't known, but considering his previous Mandalorion appearance was in the Mos Eisley cantina from A New Hope, it's likely he spent the intervening decade bouncing from owner to owner until he somehow landed in Motto's garage. But we can assume she didn't get him until after she restored that starfighter for Mando, else she would have tried to sell R5 then since the fighter has that slot for an astromech.

　　In this episode of The Mandalorian, though, R5 isn't just another reference to past Star Wars things. He's actually useful multiple times this week, repeatedly proving himself to be an indispensable new member of Din's burgeoning little crew.

　　In the space of a half-hour, R5-D4 has gone from being a minor factoid of old Star Wars trivia to a major character on a Star Wars TV show. Not bad.

　　Phil Owen on Google+