Although it has been seen mostly as a film franchise since its debut in 1977, Star Wars has spent the last several years as more of a television franchise with several live action and animated series premiering on the Disney+ streaming service. So perhaps it is fittingly ironic that the first new Star Wars film to hit theaters in seven years is a continuation from one of its most popular television series. But as the franchise is already hard at work at more big screen entries, it is still keeping one eye firmly on its television output as well. Here is everything Star Wars that is coming to both a big and small screen near you in 226 and beyond.
The Mandalorian And Grogu
On May 22, Star Wars makes a return to theaters after a nearly seven year absence with The Mandalorian And Grogu. Spinning off from the popular Disney+ series The Mandalorian, this film features everyone’s favorite helmeted bounty hunter and his young protege/”adopted” son once again enmeshed in a new adventure that sees him in conflict with one of the Imperial warlords who have been causing trouble across the galaxy falling the fall of the evil Galactic Empire.
Pedro Pascal will be back voicing Din Djarin, the helmeted titular bounty hunter. For the film he will be joined by Sigourney Weaver and Jeremy Allan White, who will be voicing a new alien character, Rotta the Hutt, the son of the original trilogy gangster alien Jabba the Hutt.
The real test of this movie though will be if audiences will want to turn up at theaters for the continuation of a story they have previously watched at home on TV. And if they do show up at the theater, will series creator and film director Jon Favreau be able to deliver an adventure that transcends the spectacle that the streaming series has already excelled at offering?
Maul – Shadow Lord
Getting chopped in half with a lightsaber is not necessarily the impediment one would think it would be. At least, not in the Star Wars galaxy. Case in point, Darth Maul. The Sith apprentice certainly appeared to meet his final fate in the finale of Star Wars: The Phantom Menace. But as The Clone Wars and Rebels animated series would reveal, a hate-fueled Sith is hard to keep down. (Folks who only were watching the Star Wars films and not the animated series were certainly surprised when Maul popped up at the end of Solo: A Star Wars Story.) But between the Clone Wars and Rebels time frames is a whole lot of years that Maul was running around the galaxy. This upcoming animated series aims to explore some of that period, telling the story of Maul as he builds his criminal organization Crimson Dawn.
The show will be preceded by a five-issue comic book miniseries from Marvel, Shadow Of Maul, that starts in March. Does that schedule suggest that the Disney+ show won’t premiere until after the final issue is published, presumably in August? Or will it premier while the comic is still rolling out? We’ll see.
Visions Presents
One of the more consistently innovated Star Wars series has been the animated Visions, which has allowed animation studios access to the all the toys in the Star Wars sandbox without the constraints of making those stories lie within the accepted Star Wars cannon. The result has been a series of Star Wars-flavored stories told through the a variety of cultural viewpoints and storytelling traditions that are some of the most vibrant and often engaging animated Star Wars stories being told right now.
Announced earlier this year at Star Wars Celebration Japan, this first season will pick up the story that has already started to unfold in the two “The Ninth Jedi” shorts from Visions seasons one and three from anime studio Production I. G. The Visions Presents story-line will pick up from the second short as the Force-sensative Kara (voiced by Chinatsu Akasaki) continues on her quest to find her father, who had been kidnapped by the Sith.
As of now, there is no announced premier date for Visions Presents.
Ahsoka Season Two
At the start of the year, the scheduling fate of the second season of the Disney+ series Ahsoka remains unclear. The eight-episode second season just wrapped six months of filming in September. If season two has roughly the same ten-month gap between filming wrap and airing to allow for post-production, Ahsoka season two could conceivably premier as early July 2025. However, it seems likely that Disney would probably want to create a bit of space between the show and Mandalorian And Grogu‘s May release, so a premier later in the fall seems more likely.
What is also unknown is if Ahsoka season two is going to crossover with any of the storylines in Mandalorian And Grogu or not. And if they do, how? As noted above, The Mandalorian And Grogu will be dealing with some Imperial warlords, while Ahsoka season one saw fan favorite baddie Admiral Thrawn return to the Star Wars galaxy after being stranded outside of it for a couple of decades. As Ahsoka is a spin-off of the original The Mandalorian series, it does seem possible that there might be at least a little bit of intersection. And there is still a planned film from Dave Filoni that is will be the culmination of a number of story threads that have been spinning out in both The Mandalorian and Ahsoka, making at least a little bit of interconnectedness all the more likely.
2027 And Beyond
2027 is a big year for Star Wars, as it marks the 50th anniversary of the iconic franchise. And Lucasfilm is planning a yearlong celebration to mark the occasion. With no for-sure television announcements for the year as yet, it looks as if fans will get two chances to see some Star Wars on the big screen.
Lucasfilm is starting off the celebrations in February with a theatrical re-release of the original version of the film that started it all – Star Wars. And that’s not, Star Wars: Episode IV: The Special Edition. We are talking about the original, un-special edition version of the film that audiences saw in 1977. Creator George Lucas had often stated that after the release of the Special Editions of the original trilogy that the unaltered versions of the films would never be made available again. This was a decision we had greatly disagreed with, both from a storytelling standpoint and a film history standpoint. So this is a release we are greatly anticipating. It’s been literally decades since fans could go officially go to a theater and see how the whole saga began, so this is probably the best way to celebrate the franchise’s birthday.
After that, May 2027 will bring us Star Wars: Starfighter, starring Ryan Gosling and written and directed by Jay Levy. What is exciting about this film is that its story takes place about five after the events of the Sequel Trilogy and doesn’t seem to rely on any per-existing characters for its storyline. In a year where the history of the franchise will be celebrated, Starfighter could be a film that points the way forward for stories set in that galaxy far, far away. There are a number of other film projects that the studio has in development, so whichever one next gets the greenlight to go into production for a 2028 release, will probably point the way.
