Star Wars: The Force Awakens opens this week and with its release, Star Wars mania is in full effect. People are dusting off their lightsabers and Stormtrooper outfits, and will head to the theater in droves. The film has already broken presale records and many expect it to be the highest grossing film of all time.
So the hype is real. Disney recognized the crazy demand and justifiably plans to release a Star Wars film every year as long as the demand is there. As Adam Rogers writes in WIRED, the studio envisions this series continuing and thriving far beyond our lifetimes.
“The company intends to put out a new Star Wars movie every year for as long as people will buy tickets. Let me put it another way: If everything works out for Disney, and if you are (like me) old enough to have been conscious for the first Star Wars film, you will probably not live to see the last one. It’s the forever franchise.”
Some may be perturbed by this news. But for Star Wars fans who have waited decades in between trilogies, you’re going to get all the galactic space warfare you can handle. Here’s what’s coming after The Force Awakens.
Rogue One: A Star Wars Story is next on the docket, and is the first standalone Star Wars film. Directed by Gareth Edwards (Godzilla), the film will tell the story of the rebel fighters who steal the plans for the Death Star in the events between Episode III and IV. Rogue One has a stellar cast including Felicity Jones, Diego Luna, Riz Ahmed, Ben Mendelsohn, Mads Mikkelsen and Alan Tudyk. The film is currently in production and due out Dec. 16, 2016.
Following Rogue One will be Star Wars: Episode VIII. There haven’t been many plot details dropped so far as it would spoil The Force Awakens, but Rian Johnson (Looper) will both write and direct. Johnson mapped out the trilogy with Force Awakens director J.J. Abrams to make sure the saga tells a collective story, but allows creative freedom. Benicio Del Toro will star as a villain in the film while a handful of actresses including Tatiana Maslany and Olivia Cooke were reportedly auditioning for parts. It’s due for release May 26, 2017.
Another anthology film follows that, as Phil Lord and Christopher Miller (21 Jump Street) will direct an untitled Han Solo film, written by Lawrence and Jon Kasdan. The film will tell the story of a young Han Solo and how he became the smuggler we’re familiar with in the original trilogy. Lord and Miller sounded incredibly enthused to be working on the project.
“This is a dream come true for us,” Lord and Miller said in a press release. “And not the kind of dream where you’re late for work and all your clothes are made of pudding, but the kind of dream where you get to make a film with some of the greatest characters ever, in a film franchise you’ve loved since before you can remember having dreams at all.”
Lord and Miller are two of the brightest young directors in Hollywood, so if anybody can bring a new iteration to the character, it’s them. Nobody has yet been cast as Han Solo. The film is set for a May 25, 2018 release date.
The final film in the new trilogy is Star Wars: Episode IX. There’s obviously not much known about the project, considering it’s not due to be released for another four years. But Colin Trevorrow (Jurassic World) will direct, while Rian Johnson is writing the story. The Trevorrow announcement was met with mixed reactions, given how polarizing Jurassic World turned out to be (I liked it), but given his success with science fiction in storytelling (his first film, Safety Not Guaranteed, involved time travel) and big budget action, it’s a logical fit.
“Colin is someone I’ve been interested in working with ever since I saw Safety Not Guaranteed,” Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy said in a press release. “The power of that film paired with the enormous success of Jurassic World speaks volumes about his abilities both as a storyteller and skilled filmmaker.”
Those are the sure things so far, but there are other projects coming up the pipeline. Josh Trank (Fantastic Four) was set to direct a Star Wars anthology film before getting fired off the project due to reported behavioral problems. Trank was set to direct a Boba Fett story, which is still in development and set for release in 2020.
Disney seemed to recognize soon after dismissing Trank that they can’t keep hiring white guys with glasses and needed to be more inclusive.Trevorrow misguidedly suggested that top female directors prefer to tell stories that “don’t necessarily involve superheroes or spaceships or dinosaurs.” But the studio recently announced it was working with female directors and screenwriters on future Star Wars films. Regardless of gender, I don’t think anyone would turn down the chance to work on Star Wars.
So whether you like it or not, a lot more Star Wars is coming. Really, anything is possible with these stories. Well, maybe not a Watto anthology film. But the universe is ripe to explore, telling as many stories as possible until it is rotten and decaying, and that’s fine by me. Star Wars used to be a decades-long gift, now it’s an annual holiday.
