Bo-Katan's Showdown With Axe Woves In The Mandalorian Season 3 Was An Emotional Experience

Season 3 of "The Mandalorian" took Bo-Katan (Katee Sackhoff) to new heights and lows as she fought to unite all of the remaining Mandalorians under one cause. That's no easy task, especially given the bad blood between the old-school Mandos who never remove their masks and the more modern ones who let their skin breathe occasionally, and it's made all the more difficult because of her past interactions with her former Mandalorian crew. In episode 6, "Guns for Hire," Bo-Katan and Din Djarin (Pedro Pascal et al.) end up doing some mercenary work in order to find the Mandalorians Bo-Katan was traveling with back in season 2. Once they finally catch up with the other Mandalorians, led by Axe Woves (Simon Kassianides), they aren't exactly glad to see her. Woves is pretty upset about her losing the Darksaber, and he isn't willing to listen to her plea for the Mandalorians to unite. 

Bo-Katan handles things the Mandalorian way, challenging him to a battle for leadership. She's already gotten the approval of the Armorer, who has agreed to meet with those she considers heretics, so it's a step in the right direction. The two have a nasty battle that ends on a good note, but bringing it to life was a tremendous challenge for everyone involved. Not only was it a serious task for the stunt performers, but it was an emotional experience for the actors, too.

In an interview with PopSugar, Kassianides delved into the difficulties of creating such an intense fight sequence with such high stakes. It was a matter of combining the experience of the stunt team with director Jon Favreau's storytelling ideas, then getting involved as much as possible as a performer:

"The stunt guy is going to town, and you step in as much as is possible to do safely. Katee and I are very mindful and we care a lot, and what I'm really proud of is that a lot of the emotional weight that we put into the fight, it felt layered. It felt like it was emotionally charged on both sides. And you see that in the build of the fight emotionally, not just the one, two, three steps of fights. We were outdoors, banged, bruised, the really amazing stuff was done by the stunt guys and the stunt team. When that happens, you just make sure you are there to watch and just applaud them and just think, 'My word. I'm definitely not going to take credit for that.'"

The fight itself is incredible, with Bo-Katan and Axe slamming into one another with their jet packs and fighting as only two Mandalorians could. There's some fantastic stunt work and Sackhoff and Kassianides' performances sell the personal stakes of their fight. They're not just fighting for leadership, they're also potentially fighting for their lives, and as former allies, that's pretty unfortunate. It's never fun to be involved in a battle to the death with a former friend. 

Both Sackhoff and Kassianides have both done some battle work in other projects, but it's probably pretty safe to say that "The Mandalorian" required the most in-depth fight choreography (except for maybe Sackhoff's run on "Battlestar Galactica"), and you can tell they really put in the effort to make the battle between these two titans look as fierce as it needed to be. There are plenty of moments where we're close enough to see their faces, and they have to act and convey expressions while also remembering the choreographed fight moves, which is pretty impressive. Bo-Katan ends up defeating her former friend but does not kill him.

Woves also refuses to submit to her because she lost the Darksaber, but then ole Djarin steps in and informs everyone that technically the saber should be hers because she defeated the creature that took it from him, thus becoming its rightful owner once more. It all works out in the end, but for a minute there, two of the best Mandos were really at one another's throats, and the actors really made it feel emotionally and physically brutal. They may have had some bumps and bruises, but our hearts were the ones left feeling black and blue. 

"The Mandalorian" is available to stream on Disney+.