I am not somebody who really takes any delight in the continued struggles of Star Wars, or who allows confirmation bias to make me hate-watch it. I quite enjoyed The Mandalorian & Grogu, even if it felt like 2.5 episodes of the series stitched together, and arrived about 3 years too late.
Skeleton Crew knew exactly what it was, so it worked. The first two seasons of The Mandalorian were worth my time. Andor is simply brilliant television and showed, frustratingly, what should be possible within the world of Star Wars if only somebody had the balls. Perhaps naively, I also hold a sliver of hope that Starfighter might be one of their increasingly rare creative successes.
So it is more with a resigned, weary, familiar sadness, rather than any kind of glee, that I greet the news of yet more Star Wars movies being expensively and flashily announced at some big event or Con, then just evaporating before our eyes. It was apparently all Kathleen Kennedy’s fault – but she is not around to blame anymore, so maybe the problems run deeper at Lucasfilm and Disney.
Well, more movies are failing.
A report at EW says James Mangold’s project has officially been put on hold. Mangold has circled Star Wars for years, originally being involved in the canned Boba Fett movie. Then, at Star Wars Celebration ’23, there was a big announcement that Mangold would direct a new film set many millennia before the prequels, covering the origins of the Jedi and the Force. Online, it was tagged as Star Wars: Dawn Of The Jedi.
Kennedy herself said that the script, by Mangold and his writing partner Beau Willimon, was “incredible” and “definitely breaking the mold”.
Well, not anymore. And that’s not all.
We recently reported that Jon Watts was in line to direct Star Wars Episode X, from a script by Simon Kinberg. Now he has decided to “step away” from the project.
Taika Waititi, Rian Johnson, Josh Trank, Patty Jenkins, Kevin Feige, Damon Lindelof, Colin Trevorrow, J. D. Dillard… the list goes on and on. This all begs one important question: Just what the hell is going on at Lucasfilm?
