How The Mandalorian finale sets up season 4

As the divisive third season of The Mandalorian concludes with an episode largely taken up by battle scenes, heads are already turning towards the future.

A fourth season of the Star Wars spin-off has been in development for over a year already with showrunner Jon Favreau revealing in May 2022 that he was already writing scripts.

Nearly a year later and the third season of The Mandalorian has wrapped, Ahsoka is set to premiere this summer and Disney have announced that Dave Filoni will direct a film that will wrap up all of these interconnecting stories.

Read more: Everything we know about Dave Filoni's Star Wars movie

While much of the third season of Din Djarin and Grogu's adventures has been met with significantly more criticism than earlier runs, particularly with regards to its plotting, episode lengths and lack of development, the finale ended definitively, setting the duo up for more adventures.

After seemingly defeating Moff Gideon once and for all, the Mandalorians restart the Great Forge and Djarin formally adopts Grogu as his son and retires to a homestead courtesy of Carl Weathers' Karga.

As a result, Grogu will now begin training under Djarin and take on the moniker Din Grogu.

Read more: The Mandalorian: Fans wowed by three A-list guest stars in new episode

Djarin also agrees to become a bounty hunter for the New Republic, seeking out the last remnants of the Empire in the outer reaches of the galaxy, setting up the character's plot line for season four.

The move is a pretty clean reset for the show after eight episodes that have gone neither here nor there and have largely been for people who did not watch The Book of Boba Fett which concluded with Grogu choosing to follow the way of the Mandalorians rather than the Jedi.

Aside from Moff Gideon, season three was also light on the body count meaning Bo-Katan, Greef Karga and Carson Teva are all likely to appear in future seasons. It does however look like we have finally seen the last of Giancarlo Esposito in the show.

Wherever The Mandalorian goes in the future, most fans will be hoping it is to more exciting places than season three which received criticism for feeling unsubstantial compared to prior seasons.

Many fans also didn't like the more episodic nature of the season that saw storylines largely start and wrap up over the course of a single episode. The humour of episode six that featured Jack Black, Lizzo and Christopher Lloyd was also polarising.

The Mandalorian is available to stream on Disney+.

Watch below: Lizzo cried all day when she was offered a cameo role in The Mandalorian