Photos: 'The Mandalorian' Props Take Inspiration From Strange 'Star Wars' History

New The Mandalorian photos recently released by executive producer Jon Favreau are going to send Star Wars fans deep into the Wookiepedia archives.

The first Star Wars live-action streaming series is set to explore the galaxy in the time period between the fall of the Empire and the emergence of the First Order, but it will do so by going back in history. The props seen in the new The Mandalorian photos suggest that some elements of Favreau's series could have ties to The Empire Strikes Back and a Star Wars video game.

Jon Favreau shared two photos from the set of The Mandalorian depicting two props that hint at two extremely deep cuts in Star Wars lore. The first refers to a background character in The Empire Strikes Back who has spawned his own backstory and nickname thanks to fans' obsession with the strange white object that he carries for the 5 seconds he's on screen. A white object that looks just like the one that Favreau posted.

Yes, Star Wars die-hards, this is a Willrow Hood alert. The background character seen running around Cloud City in The Empire Strikes Back was given the backstory of a miner employed contracted by the Rebellion in the expanded universe thanks to his rise in popularity as the "Ice Cream Guy," "Ice Cream Maker Guy," or "Ice Cream Man" because of the prop that he holds in his hands. According to Wookiepedia, the object has been revealed to be "a computer's memory core." So could this prop suggest the return of Willrow Hood? Or is this yet another computer memory core that plays a pivotal part in The Mandalorian? We'll have to wait and see.

The second prop nods to a more recent Star Wars property: the 2008 video game Star Wars: The Force Unleashed. While the game is not canon today, The Mandalorian could be pulling inspirations from the expanded universe of Star Wars content to built its world.

MakingStarWars.net notes that the gun that Favreau posted bears similarities to the Amban phase-pulse blaster in The Force Unleashed, which could additionally hint at a character named Ambu Fett. The outlet writes:

As far as the Amban phase-pulse blaster goes, the named Amban might be derivative of the sleep aid Ambien. But I do remember back in the day, Lucasfilm registered a bunch of URLs for Attack of the Clones. In those URLs was a character named Ambu Fett. I've tried to get answers about Ambu Fett and it seems like most who were there back then don't remember much about it. Either way, Amban reminds me of Ambu and Ambien and I hope we see the gun make some bad guys sleep forever and forget they were ever born. (Update: Wookiepedia says the gun was named in his character key for the animated segment of the Holiday Special which means the Ambu/Amban link via Lucas might be possible).

It's all very intriguing and it gives us something to think about until The Mandalorian hits the Disney streaming service in 2019.