The Mandalorian and Grogu Super Bowl Ad Lands Dead Last as Jon Favreau Teases Big-Screen Epic

Jon Favreau popped up unannounced at the Star Wars: Most Wanted event and did what you want a filmmaker to do a few months out from release: sell the movie. Smart timing, too, after The Mandalorian and Grogu stumbled out of the Super Bowl with an ad that got people talking but didn’t exactly light up the engagement charts.

The stakes are big, the push is on

This is the first Star Wars feature to hit theaters since The Rise of Skywalker. Translation: there’s a lot riding on Din Djarin and his tiny scene-stealer. A Super Bowl spot promised fresh footage, which we got, along with a loud debate about how that footage played. The bigger headline, though, was the data that came after.

The Super Bowl numbers were... fine, not flashy

An analytics firm that tracks ad engagement by what people do next online (site visits, searches, etc.) placed The Mandalorian and Grogu around the middle of the pack. That’s not catastrophic, but when you stack it against other entertainment ads from the game, the gap shows.

• The Mandalorian and Grogu landed at No. 43 (around the median)
• The Super Mario Galaxy Movie placed at No. 32
• Peacock’s The Burbs series hit No. 18
• Minions & Monsters nearly topped the list at No. 2 and drew about 900% more engagement than Mando and Grogu

Also worth noting: Steven Spielberg’s quick Disclosure Day teaser had people buzzing, while the Mando spot couldn’t hold that same heat. Some of this makes sense. The Mandalorian and Grogu has been in the spotlight for a while; Minions & Monsters used the moment for a title reveal and a first look, which naturally juices curiosity.

Favreau’s big-screen pitch

If Favreau’s worried, he didn’t show it. On stage, he leaned hard into why this specific story belongs in a theater and what they’re doing to earn your drive, ticket, and overpriced soda.

"We gotta up our game now for the movie theater, and that means taller aspect ratios for IMAX, building sets that take full advantage of that. We have to notch everything up and then the storytelling as well. We want to take you on an adventure, and that adventure has to fill up the screen and has to be something where people at this moment in time when so much is competing for your attention, that you're gonna stop what you're doing and you're gonna go to a movie theater. You're gonna sit down in that movie theater, you're not gonna be able to pause it and you're not gonna be able to eat the food out of your refrigerator. And you have such a good experience, that you say [so]."

That’s a clear promise of bigger scale: IMAX-friendly framing, purpose-built sets, and a story designed to feel like an event, not a stretched-out TV arc.