I honestly don't think they're gonna tackle Thrawn at all in mando, even though he was mentioned. Bringing him in would kinda require bringing Ezra in and Sabine and probably most of the remaining Rebels cast, which would just turn the entire show into a Rebels sequel series lite. I feel like if anything it's just setting up a Rebels sequel series in the next couple of years. Not to mention Thrawn is a big enough villain that he would overshadow Moff Gideon the second he shows up, so I have a feeling they'd have to kill off Gideon entirely if they ever wanted to bring Thrawn in at all, which doesn't seem to really be in the cards, at least for a long while.
Thrawn could be the true big bad over Moff Gideon heading into season 3 easily. I think that the likely scenario is that Moff is a puppet to Thrawn and after we get a tease of Thrawn in this series (possibly just the mention of him), they spin-off to his own live action show.
I’m all for them to explore Luke a bit more though if they cast Sebastian Stan as Luke from this time period.
I’m all for them to explore Luke a bit more though if they cast Sebastian Stan as Luke from this time period.