Spoiler alert: the following story will have very light spoilers for episode 3 of The Mandalorian.

The third episode of The Mandalorian marks the first time a live-action Star Wars property has ever been directed by a woman.

Deborah Chow, who's previously worked on shows like Mr. Robot, Better Call Saul, and Fear The Walking Dead, directed the episode, and is attached to direct the upcoming Obi-Wan series as well.

The episode has heavy western influence, and at times is a marvel to look at.

It's wild that even 42 years into the Star Wars franchise, it's still capable achieving a 'first' anything, but with the release of the third episode of The Mandalorian, here we are. The episode, titled "The Sin," was helmed by Deborah Chow, who has previously worked on shows like Better Call Saul and Mr. Robot, and is connected to direct Ewan McGregor's upcoming Obi-Wan Kenobi series; this makes her the first woman to ever direct a live-action piece of Star Wars anything.

Chow joins a not-super-long, but not-miniscule-either list of Star Wars directors, including George Lucas himself, Irvin Kershner, Richard Marquand, J.J. Abrams, Ron Howard (replacing Phil Lord and Chris Miller), Gareth Edwards, Rian Johnson, along with Dave Filoni and Rick Famuyiwa, who directed the first two Mandalorian episodes. Johnson is attached to eventually helm a separate Star Wars trilogy, and Game of Thrones showrunners D.B. Weiss and David Benioff recently stepped away from their own Star Wars projects. Now with an episode of The Mandalorian under her belt, Chow joins this elusive boy's club.

Chow was interviewed a few weeks ago on the red carpet of The Mandalorian's premiere, and noted just how excited she was about this specific Star Wars project; she seemed particularly excited with the freshness of this idea. It is a space western, after all. "One of the really interesting things about the project is that it was different," she said in a video posted to the Fab TV YouTube channel. "It's a new period, and it's new characters. So, even though it feels like we know so much, everything was original and new, and that was really exciting."

And she's absolutely right; as much as The Mandalorian has definitively felt like Star Wars, and existed in a Star Wars world, the show has still felt fresh and new at every turn, and perhaps none as much as in this episode. We knew the show was going to have Western vibes, but at a few moments in "The Sin," there were times that felt quite literally like a shot of Clint Eastwood facing off with some sorry guy looking for a duel.

This moment was particularly felt when The Mandalorian (Pedro Pascal) had a face off with Greef Carga (Carl Weathers). Even take a look at some of the shots:

Disney

Disney

Even prior to this 1-on-1 stand-off, there were more western vibes, when Carga's bounty team surrounded The Mandalorian in the middle of town; the The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly vibes were strong—until all the other Mandalorians showed up, turning the battle scene into something it feels like we haven't ever seen before in Star Wars.

While Chow is the franchise's first ever live-action female director, she'll have company as soon as next week—Bryce Dallas Howard is the director of The Mandalorian's third episode. You know Howard from movies like the Jurassic World series and her great Black Mirror episode, but she's also the daughter of a guy you may have heard of: Ron Howard, who knows a thing or two about directing (and with Solo, is part of the Star Wars family as well).

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All being said—this episode of The Mandalorian was a marvel to look at. And while it's not great that it took the Star Wars franchise 42 years to have a live-action property directed by someone who wasn't a man, at least this episode can be solid proof for the future—and that the Obi-Wan series is in a supremely-talented set of hands.

Evan Romano Evan is an associate editor for Men’s Health, with bylines in The New York Times, MTV News, Brooklyn Magazine, and VICE.

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