10 Years After The Force Awakens, Lucasfilm Has Officially Fixed its Biggest Star Wars Problem

by

As a lifelong Star Wars fan, the last ten years have been really tough to watch. I remember when Disney bought Lucasfilm, and it turns out there wasn’t much of a plan for future movies. Bob Iger, Disney’s CEO, even talked about this in his book. It explains a lot why things felt so chaotic – we heard stories about tons of projects getting scrapped, and the movies we did get often felt rushed or troubled. It just hasn’t felt like the Star Wars I grew up with, and it’s been frustrating to see.

Tony Gilroy, the director of the highly-regarded Rogue One, recently discussed the troubled history of recent Star Wars films. He described an early version of his own film as being in very bad shape. The production of Solo faced even bigger problems, with the original directors, Phil Lord and Chris Miller, being replaced late in the process. Lucasfilm then brought in Ron Howard to reshoot much of the film, nearly doubling its budget, but it still didn’t make money. After the disappointing release of The Rise of Skywalker in 2019, Lucasfilm paused big-screen Star Wars projects, but now appears to be on more solid ground.

Lucasfilm Has Completed Two Star Wars Movies Without Any Drama

Reports surfaced in 2023 that Disney asked Lucasfilm to significantly increase the number of Star Wars films being made, and this quickly proved to be true. Star Wars Celebration 2023 highlighted future movies more than TV shows, and now there’s only one live-action Star Wars series confirmed to be in the works. Since then, Lucasfilm has quietly finished filming two new Star Wars movies without any major issues—films that, surprisingly, weren’t even revealed at the Celebration event.

The project began with Jon Favreau’s The Mandalorian and Grogu, a continuation of the popular Disney+ series. Officially announced in January 2024, it’s rumored that the story evolved during the writers’ strikes, potentially using ideas from scripts originally intended for The Mandalorian Season 4. Filming started quickly in June and finished by December. Because Favreau is a well-respected director with a strong working relationship with Lucasfilm, the production process went smoothly.

So, the latest news is Shawn Levy – you know, a solid, reliable director – wrapped up filming on Star Wars: Starfighter! He started chatting with Lucasfilm back in late 2022, and they officially announced the project at Star Wars Celebration last year. Everything seems to be on track for the May 2027 release, which is great. It’s cool because Lucasfilm now has two new Star Wars movies fully finished without any reported hiccups. As a huge fan, that’s really reassuring!

Lucasfilm Has Learned to Trust Filmmakers

This suggests Lucasfilm is now more willing to give its directors creative freedom. While Jon Favreau and Shawn Levy aren’t exactly unconventional picks – both have worked with Lucasfilm before (Favreau on The Mandalorian, Levy on Star Wars Rebels) – it’s a positive sign. There was some post-production work on The Mandalorian and Grogu, including re-recording some of Pedro Pascal’s dialogue, and we can expect the same for the upcoming Starfighter film. However, these quick production timelines are fantastic news overall.

It seems like Star Wars is becoming an annual movie tradition, with a new film being made each year followed by over a year of editing and finishing work. This is a really efficient way to operate and should work well. While we’re not sure how The Mandalorian and Grogu will do, Starfighter is planned as a major part of the 50th anniversary of Star Wars, so we can expect a big marketing push. This film feels like a fresh start for the whole franchise, which is great news. Looking beyond Starfighter, it’s hard to predict what the future holds for Star Wars.

What do you think? Leave a comment below and join the conversation now in the ComicBook Forum!

https://comicbook.com/gaming/feature/all-3-new-star-wars-projects-that-have-just-been-announced/embed/#

Read More

2025-12-19 18:14