Hi! I thought it worked well, given the context of the episode that we were given. If it had just been a choice between two harmless items, yeah, then it would have been a jerk choice, but I never saw it as âa Jedi can never have Mandalorian things and a Mandalorian can never have Jedi thingsâ, but instead that it was specifically about what weâre told of Grogu in the episodeâthat his heart isnât really in the path that heâs trying to walk. And why that is so important.
You absolutely have to have your heart in it if youâre going to be a Jedi, and I really like the way a recent High Republic comic put it:
âThe Force can send your mind across the galaxyâto the past, to the future. Connect you with others. Â Let you talk to beasts. Â Make you the best warrior anyoneâs ever seen. Â And much more. Â Itâs the greatest power in the universe. Do you think learn to use it should be easy?â
Further, itâs also a connection to the foundation of what it means to be a Jedi and why itâs so important. Yoda is a character that is all over this episode, not just because Grogu is from the same species or because Grogu was from the same Jedi Temple that Yoda was, but because Yoda was Lukeâs first teacher, Yoda was the one who showed Luke truly what the Force was and how Jedi interact with it.
And now that Luke is teaching Grogu, he must pass on what heâs learned.
So what did Luke learn? This is the very basic building block of what it means to commit to the life of being a Jedi, because as Elzar points out aboveâthose abilities a Jedi is granted through this life, theyâre serious. They shouldnât be a trivial, easy thing to learn.
Youâre connecting to so much life, youâre going to have physical and mental power over other beings, you absolutely do need to take this seriously. This is something all Jedi taught (you can see it in both the High Republic and the prequels Jedi), that you canât just half-ass your training as a Jedi, because youâll hurt yourself and others.
Being a Jedi takes discipline, something that is really hard to do and requires a lifetime of it. The dark side is a powerful, seductive thing and thereâs a reason we see nearly every Jedi struggle with it at the mid-point of their training. We see Obi-Wan struggle with the dark side against Maul on Naboo. We see Anakin struggle with the dark side when his mother dies on Tatooine and he murders the Tusken men, women, and children. We see Dooku and Sifo-Dyas struggle with it repeatedly in Dooku: Jedi Lost, like six different instances. We see Ezra struggle with it in season three of Rebels. We see Luke struggle with it on Dagobah and again on the second Death Star. We see Rey struggle with it all throughout The Rise of Skywalker.
Jedi are taught this from an early age:
   Qui-Gon whispered, âThe dark side?â He knew it was a thing all beings carried within them, a part of himself he would learn to guard againstâthe crèche masters had taught him all that. âMaster & Apprentice
The dark side is something thatâs always there and the only way to rise above it is:
   âOnly way to overcome the dark side is through discipline.â âGeorge Lucas, The Clone Wars writersâ meeting
Thatâs why Yoda says this, one of the first and most true things we know about Jedi, that this isnât just a part-time thing, that it requires a lot more than that, from The Empire Strikes Back:
âA Jedi must have the deepest commitment, the most serious mind. This one a long time have I watched. All his life has he looked awayâŚto the future, to the horizon. Never his mind on where he was. Hmm? What he was doing.â
Thatâs exactly what Grogu is doing!
Heâs looking to the horizon, because he misses Din, because he canât stop thinking about him, canât stop missing him:
Luke and Ahsoka both comment on this in the episodeâAhsoka tells Din that Grogu is having a difficult time letting go of his attachment to Din, that if he sees Din, itâll only make it more difficult for him. Luke says to Ahsoka that heâs not sure Groguâs heart is really in this. Which is important because of the transitional nature of all of what Groguâs going through, something vital for a Jedi to understand and accept:
   âThe core of Anakinâs problem is that Jedi are raised from birth so they learn to let go of everything. Theyâre trained more than anything else to understand the transitional nature of life, that things are constantly changing and you canât hold on to anything. You can love things but you canât be attached to them. You must be willing to let the flow of life and the flow of the Force move through your life, move through you. So that you can be compassionate and loving and caring, but not possessive and grabbing and holding on to things and trying to keep things the way they are. Letting go is a central theme of the film.â âGeorge Lucas, Star Wars Archives 1999-2005
The entire scene of Din wanting to see Grogu in that episodeâwhich Luke is aware of, he sensed the Mandalorian on the planet and likely felt his motivations, because Jedi are psychic empathsâis a reflection of that and another foundational quote from George Lucas:
   â[Jedi Knights] do not grow attachments, because attachment is a path to the dark side. You can love people, but you canât want to possess them. Theyâre not yours. Accept that they have a fate. Even those you love most are going to die. You canât do anything about that. Protect them with your lightsaber, but if they die they were going to die. thereâs nothing you can do. All you can do is accept that fact.
  âIn mythology, if you go to Hades to get them back youâre not doing it for them, youâre doing it for yourself. Youâre doing it because you donât want to give them up. Youâre afraid to be without them. The key to the dark side is fear. You must be clean of fear, and fear of loss is the greatest fear. If youâre set up for fear of loss, you will do anything to keep that loss from happening, and youâre going to end up in the dark side. Thatâs the basic premise of Star Wars and the Jedi, and how it works.
  "Thatâs why theyâre taken at a young age to be trained. They cannot get themselves killed trying to save their best buddy when itâs a hopeless exercise.â â George Lucas, Star Wars Archives 1999-2005
This is why Luke asks Grogu to choose between these two paths. Itâs not that he can never have anything that reminds him of Din, we have seen a ton of Jedi with connections to their birth worlds and itâs fine, itâs not attachment. We see Barriss and Luminara with headdresses and facial tattoos and even Barrissâ prayer statue. We see Shaak and Ahsoka with Togruta headdresses. We see Anakin with a room stuffed full of things from Naboo or a poster from the podrace he won on Tatooine. Etc.
Luke asking Grogu to choose isnât about the item itself, but about the tear in Groguâs heart. That heâs not actually serious about this in his heart, that this isnât what he really wants, and he needs to make the choice thatâs actually best for him. Both paths are worthwhile and good paths! Thereâs joy in either road Grogu can walk!
But Anakin Skywalker also refused to choose, George Lucas repeatedly said that Anakin fell because of his attachments (the inability to let go when itâs time, the fearful desire to hold onto someone or something because it soothes you, not because you want that person to be happy, because you canât accept that things come and go, that life is transitory), and of all people Luke Skywalker and Ahsoka Tano are very familiar with what it means when you havenât actually chosen your path in your heart. They know very well what happened to Anakin Skywalker.
So, yes, Luke asks Grogu to choose. And itâs not because a Jedi canât have things that are important to them or connections to other people, but itâs because Grogu himself is at a point where heâs struggling to let go and, if heâs going to be a Jedi, the kind of abilities that it will give him access to (including using the Force, which relies on your emotions and mindsetâlook at how Grogu choked Cara Dune because he thought she was hurting Din), he would need to make the kind of serious commitment it means to have that shit under control, so he doesnât lash out and really hurt people.
Lukeâs not asking Grogu to choose because Jedi and Mandalorians canât mix, like, we see that thatâs possible all over the place, including Tarre Viszla with the dark saber in this very series. Jedi didnât forbid that! But they do ask you to be serious about this, you have to deadass want this path, which is why most Jedi who leave seem to be around Padawan age, because they realized it wasnât the right one for them.
(Which, by the way, the Jedi Order was very open aboutâwe see the busts of those Jedi in the Archives in the Attack of the Clones scene, thereâs an entire scene in Dooku: Jedi Lost about how younglings ask about them, and Yoda and the other Masters take a moment to talk about how some people just choose another path, not for bad reasons, they usually go off to be leaders or teachers or just simply vanish to have some quiet life. Thereâs zero shaming of choosing another path, hell, the Jedi even speak warmly of Dooku in Attack of the Clones until itâs revealed that heâs heading up an army thatâs gearing up to attack the Republic.)
tl:dr: Luke asks Grogu to choose because Groguâs heart hasnât actually chosen yet and the shirt and the lightsaber are representations of those different paths, not ironclan rules of what you are/arenât allowed to have. It was forcing Grogu to make a real choice, not a half-measure of a choice, because thatâs what vital to what being a Jedi means, when youâre granted the abilities they have.