Doctor Who: Series 14 (Season 40)

The Thirteenth Doctor has regenerated into the Fourteenth, but the new Doctor is shocked to find himself wearing the same face as a prior incarnation. Returning to Earth, he is immediately reunited with former companion Donna Noble, and plunged into a sequence of events hinting at the arrival of a terrible old enemy. That threat resolved, the Fifteenth Doctor arrives to take over the mantle, and solve the mystery of Ruby Sunday.

It's fair to sat that the Chris Chibnall years of Doctor Who, spanning Series 11 - 13 of the "new" era, were divisive at best. His first season was weak, with variable writing and some dreadful episodes. Things improved, until his final run of episodes (the Flux mini-series and the splendid specials Eve of the Daleks and Power of the Doctor) was respectably solid, dragged down only by the awful Legend of the Sea Devils. But plunging ratings and dwindling audience appreciation saw the BBC decide to regroup and go in a new direction.

And that new direction was, er, an old one. Showrunner Russell T. Davies, who had brought the show back from the abyss in 2005, returned. He brought back David Tennant, the most popular of the new Doctors, with him, and also reintroduced Catherine Tate as Donna. The Doctor-Donna pairing helped make Series 4 arguably the strongest of Davies' original run.

This back-to-basics approach was hugely popular with the BBC but also appealed to Disney, coming on board as international distributor for the first time. It also helped celebrate the show's 60th anniversary in 2023 without having to resort to a "multi-Doctor special," something Davies was not keen on, despite the success it had last time out. Disney also seems to have been keen to try to get the show back to a clean slate to appeal to new viewers.

These three specials are...okay? They're certainly not the resounding back-to-form smash hit successes I think anyone was hoping for, but they're a long way from disastrous. The Star Beast - somewhat randomly - adapts a 1980 comic book story where the Doctor has to help the cute-and-helpless Meep, who turns out to be more than he seems. The result is a fun knockabout adventure, though it has to be said the forced comedic beats are torturous at best (and makes one recall that the first Davies era could have some of the cringiest humour you'd ever seen in your life, but you can overlook it for spectacular episodes like Human Nature or Blink).

Wild Blue Yonder is the trilogy's most "standard" adventure, with the Doctor and Donna arriving on an abandoned spacecraft and encountering some really odd creatures. This is an episode that, at its best, is eerie and discomforting in the way the best Doctor Who can be, and early on feels like a classic in the making. Unfortunately. the episode is let down by the idea not really being strong enough to fill 54 minutes, and some of the effects are downright woeful considering that the Disney influx of cast reportedly doubled the show's budget (the show looking cheaper visually than during the Chibnall era, despite having more resources, becomes a recurring problem). As a result the episode feels like a lot of unfulfilled potential.

The Giggle sees the return of old-school villain the Celestial Toymaker, now played with charismatic relish by Neil Patrick Harris, as he takes on the Doctor with the fate of reality at stake. The Doctor has to join forces with UNIT to take down this most cunning of opponents. This is easily the strongest of the three specials, thanks to Harris's superb performance and Davies giving him some terrific dialogue, with a deadly battle of wits between the Toymaker and the Doctor. Unfortunately, a promising and disturbing episode peters out at the end, with Davies feeling a little too clever in himself in coming up with the idea of "bigeneration," allowing the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Doctors (the latter played Ncuti Gatwa) to coexist and team up to take down the Toymaker. The end of the episode is well-intentioned with some nice lines on mental health and a brand new start for Fifteen, but it's also a bit vague and confusing. It feels like the need to introduce the Fifteenth Doctor through an unnecessary gimmick dilutes the episode of its power. Still, Gatwa makes an immediate, positive impression as the Fifteenth Doctor.

The Church on Ruby Road is the 2023 Christmas special, and the first Doctor Who Christmas special since 2017. The special introduces new companion Ruby Sunday, played with winning charisma by Millie Gibson. The storyline resolves around time-travelling musical goblins, which feels a bit random (though turns out to be part of a wider storyline about fantasy invading the scientifically plausible universe), but Gatwa and Gibson sell the hell out of it, resulting in a mostly watchable slice of nonsense. Davies also opens a mystery box about Ruby's origins, which (at this stage) intriguing and a bit eerie. However, there is a feeling here that we've done the whole "companion as a puzzle for the Doctor to solve" thing before with Clara, and that was done better. Still, an okay start to this Doctor - companion pairing.

That doesn't last long though. Space Babies is the first episode of Series 14 proper and is terrible. The Doctor and Ruby arrive on a spaceship and are chased around a bit by a terrifying monster. This is promising. They then find the spaceship is crewed by talking babies, which is...not so much. Cue lots of of horrible lip-synching and some over-enthusiastic voice acting, but it can't really overcome the weak script, poor dialogue and the laughable explanation for the monster. This is not a promising opening to proceedings.

The Devil's Chord fortunately sees an immediate improvement, with the Doctor having to face down the mysterious Maestro, an entity which can weaponise music. This intersects with a visit to 1963 where the Doctor and Ruby want to meet the Beatles and run afoul of Maestro. The ending of the episode is a little weak (despite the excuse for a fun musical number), but the deliciously evil performance of Jinkx Monsoon as Maestro strengthens the episode.

Boom sees the return of former showrunner Steven Moffat with what he does best, a conceptual episode. The concept is that the Doctor steps on a landmine and can't get off without killing himself, resulting in Ruby having to try to save the day solo. It's not Moffat's strongest work, but it's a solid enough piece about the commercialisation of warfare, with weightier themes than Davies' last few scripts.

By this point the new era of Doctor Who feels like it's off to an underwhelming start and needs a shot in the arm, and fortunately it immediately gets it in the form of 73 Yards. One of Davies' strongest-ever scripts, the episode see the Doctor vanish after stepping into a fairy circle, leaving Ruby alone, haunted by a woman who appears exactly 73 yards away from her. Whenever anyone speaks to the woman, they immediately flee in terror and disown Ruby, including her mother and members of UNIT. Unable to enter the TARDIS, Ruby goes on to live the entire rest of her life. As a high-concept piece, this is a rival to Midnight and Turn Left, falling short only because we never get a convincing reason why people scream and run away from the mystery woman, which feels like a rather large plot hole. Still, an eerie and strange episode with a great guest performance by Aneurin Barnard, and a totally dominant performance by Millie Gibson who was dropped in the deep end here (this was her first-filmed episode) and smashed it.

Dot & Bubble is another concept episode, this time the concept being that we're pretty much locked into the POV of guest character Lindy Pepper-Bean (a tremendous performance by Callie Cooke), a member of a species who spend their whole life locked in a literal social media bubble (a VR bubble that surrounds their heads with people messaging them, only rarely turning the bubble off). The metaphor is not the subtlest (though delivered a bit more cleverly than normal) but the setup makes for great tension as the Doctor and Ruby can only communicate with Lindy through IM and have to convince her of a looming alien threat and how to get to safety. The episode's concept is great, and it has an absolutely vicious sting in the tail that really caps the whole thing off, with Gatwa giving his best performance to date. The only reason the episode drops a note is that this is the second episode in a row which barely features the Doctor (an unfortunate side-effect of Gatwa's Sex Education Season 4 filming schedule overrunning), which feels a bit rough given we're still getting to know him.

Rogue is a Doctor Who-by-the-numbers story, a period piece set in 1813 with the Doctor and Ruby attending a period ball that's upset by shapeshifting aliens. There's a nice spin as a time-travelling bounty hunter (played with charismatic gusto by Jonathan Goff) shows up and thinks the Doctor is one of the aliens, leading to some tension as they try to prove their good intentions to one another whilst Ruby investigates the real aliens. The episode relies a little too heavily on the novelty of the Doctor and Rogue's flirtatious relationship (which is not as much of a novelty as Davies seems to think it is since, y'know, Captain Jack exists) rather than focusing on the primary conflict, but the pacing is good. The rest of the guest cast is outstanding as well, with Indira Varma giving a typically great performance and Camilla Aiko providing a winning turn.

The Legend of Ruby Sunday sets up the season finale with some genuinely chilling moments, as the Doctor tries to uncover the identity of Ruby's mother with cutting-edge UNIT technology. The tension and mystery builds with relish until we get to an epic cliffhanger ending, the effectiveness of which is only let down by the majority of viewers having zero idea whom the surprise bad guy actually is.

Empire of Death takes the promise of Legend and pretty much flushes it away. Legend built up a sense of genuine dread through good pacing and some eerie setpieces. Empire is just bland, rushed, confusing, illogical and defeats the returning villain with extreme rapidity. Everyone does their best with a confused script, but the episode just feels like a huge letdown.

Series 14 and its attendant specials (***½) are okay, two outstanding near-classics let down by a generally more juvenile tone than the era immediately before, and the sheer awfulness of Space Babies and Empire of Death. This isn't Russell T. Davies strutting back onto the stage to save the day with the greatest hits, its more like to play his new, late-career album which is okay, bordering on solid, but sound a bit like a 60-year-old guy trying to get down with the kids a bit too hard. The best episodes in this batch are when everyone forgets they're trying to save Doctor Who, chills out and just writes good episodes. When anyone (especially Davies) overthinks it, things start falling apart. Still, a long way from being the worst season of Doctor Who in its history, or since its reboot, and the optimism is there that maybe we can get back to the franchise at its best.

• 14X1: The Star Beast (***½)
• 14X2: Wild Blue Yonder (***½)
• 14X3: The Giggle (****)
• 14X4: The Church on Ruby Road (***½)
• 14.1: Space Babies (*½)
• 14.2: The Devil's Chord (***½)
• 14.3: Boom (****)
• 14.4: 73 Yards (****½)
• 14.5: Dot & Bubble (****½)
• 14.6: Rogue (***½)
• 14.7: The Legend of Ruby Sunday (****)
• 14.8: Empire of Death (**)

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Marvel tries to lure the Russo Brothers back to the fold

The Hollywood Reporter has confirmed that Disney and the Russo Brothers are in talks about a return to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The Russo Brothers have apparently been offered the job of directing both The Avengers 5 and 6 (not the final titles), due in 2026 and 2027 respectively.

Anthony and Joseph Russo initially made their name as directors in television, helming episodes of Arrested Development (2003-06) before achieving critical acclaim as frequent directors on Community (2009-14). They established themselves in film directing Welcome to Collinwood (2002) and You, Me and Dupree (2006) before joining the Marvel Cinematic Universe and directing Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014), Captain America: Civil War (2016), Avengers: Infinity War (2018) and Avengers: Endgame (2019), as well as working on the TV series Agent Carter (2015).

The directors are credited with being instrumental in the success of "the golden age" of the MCU, running roughly from The Winter Soldier to Endgame, when the franchise's critical and commercial success were both at their height. Endgame was the highest-grossing movie of all time shortly after release, although it was subsequently pushed back down by a re-release of James Cameron's Avatar and then the release of its sequel.

The Russos decided to get out whilst the going was good and have focused on developing other projects, directing Cherry and The Gray Man and producing shows including Amazon's expensive flop Citadel. They are currently in post-production on a new film directed by them, The Electric State, for Netflix.

The MCU has carried on into a new era, but one that has been decidedly patchier than what came before, with both critical and commercial performances dropping significantly from the Russo era.

With both sides' post-Endgame performance being questionable, them joining forces once more makes a lot of sense. Marvel needs the Brothers' proven ability to shape complex stories with large casts into box office gold.

However, the move may be seen as desperation on Marvel's part given the chaos that has recently engulfed their plans. Deadpool & Wolverine director Shawn Levy apparently turned down the gig after reading the draft script, whilst Destin Daniel Cretton (Shang-Chi) had previously been announced in the role of director but then withdrew to focus on a Shang-Chi sequel that has still not materialised. The two movies were being developed as one project, under the titles The Kang Dynasty and Secret Wars, culminating a story arc revolving around the character of Kang the Conqueror (Jonathan Majors). This plan had to be shelved quickly after Majors was arrested for assault and subsequently found guilty; Marvel terminated their contract with him. The two films are now apparently being rewritten to revolve around a new threat, with the intervening projects (such as Captain America: Brave New World, due in early 2025) being rejigged to set up this new storyline.

The Russos are not believed to have accepted the offer yet, and negotiations are in the early stages, but there seems at least a reasonable chance this might come to pass. If it does, expect the timeline to be changed and the movies probably dropped back whilst new scripts are put into place.

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever

The nation of Wakanda is in mourning after the unexpected death of its king, T'Challa, from illness. The destruction of the herb that is needed to create a new Black Panther has left Wakanda leaderless, with an interim council led by Queen Ramonda trying to hold the nation together. T'Challa's younger sister, technical genius Shuri, sets out to recreate the herb, but faces a rising threat in the form of the underwater kingdom of Talokan, lead the charismatic Namor. Conflict between the two nations appears inevitable, and Wakanda has never been more vulnerable.

2018's Black Panther was a breakout, smash success for the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Excellent performances and direction overcame traditional MCU issues (a weak finale, overreliant on CGI battles) to deliver one of the strongest films in the series. The continuation of some of these storylines through Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame confirmed there was a great deal of potential in the continued adventures of T'Challa and the Wakandans.

Unfortunately, Chadwick Boseman unexpectedly passed away from cancer in late 2020. The lost of one of his generation's most promising actors was a tragedy. It also - and far more trivially, of course -  created a major problem for Marvel, as they spent weeks agonising over whether recasting the role (an idea supported by some of Boseman's family) or proceeding in a different direction. Ultimately concluding that Boseman was irreplaceable, the decision was made to mirror his passing in the film series, and make the sequel about a completely different story, more about Wakanda itself and the quest to find a new Black Panther.

It's therefore hard to undersell the conditions under which Black Panther: Wakanda Forever was written, shot and released. Boseman's shadow hangs over every second of footage and I can only imagine the sheer difficulties faced by director Ryan Coogler and his team as they tried to course-correct in the most unpleasant of circumstances.

Unfortunately, those difficulties are discernible across most of the film. The general story arc feels a little muddled, as it wanders back and forth between internal Wakandan problems, issues with its relationship with the USA (there's a subplot about tensions in the CIA which feels detached from everything else) and, slightly randomly, France, and the rising challenge posed by Namor (a grumpily on-form Tenoch Huerta Majia) and Talokan. There's also the problems faced by Ramonda (an imperiously impressive Angela Bassett) in retaining authority. The film also ill-advisedly decides to do some setup work for later projects by also introducing Dominique Thorne as Riri Williams (aka Ironheart) and furthering the machinations of Valentina Allegra de Fontaine (Julia Louis-Dreyfus), which feels like the movie was putting more weight on its shoulders than it could really manage.

The film's biggest challenge is elevating Letitia Wright as Shuri to the role of the main protagonist. Wright was superb in a supporting role in Black Panther and the Thanos duology, but here the writing doesn't seem to be up to the task. The film tries to mine some tension over whether Shuri is going to become the new Black Panther, which is pretty much obvious from before you even start watching, and then over whether this would be accepted by other Wakandans and so on, none of which manages to be particularly interesting.

Better-handled is the personal relationship between Shuri and Namor, which moves from respect to enmity and back again. The film's problem is that everyone knows that Namor (aka the Sub-Mariner) is one of Marvel's longest-standing heroes, so he is clearly going to do a heel turn to becoming a good character at some point. This removes some tension and jeopardy, and the attempts to reinstate it (such as a fairly brutal attack on Wakanda's capital) only makes Namor's character arc less plausible. The idea is fine but I'm not sure I really buy how it unfolds.

The movie even manages to fumble its naval battle ending, with some of the worst CGI I've ever seen in a professionally-made modern feature film. The last time I saw CG this bad in a major release was in The Mummy Returns, a film now twenty-two years old, and hints at a horrendously rushed production schedule.

Again, it's easy to forgive Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (***) for some of these problems given the huge cloud under which it was made. It has many great performances (with Angela Basset having the finest, and Lupita Nyong'o and Winston Duke being great in reduced roles), many of the ideas are excellent and the notion of making a film where the central character passed away before it even begins is powerful. But the writing is confused, the pacing is uneven, character motivations are not always clear and the effects are risible. The result is a film that is enjoyable, but you have to overlook a lot of issues along the way.

The film is available now via Disney+ worldwide.

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Avatar: The Way of Water

2170. Sixteen years have passed since Jake Sully aided the Na'vi in repelling the human incursion on Pandora, forcing most of them to return home to Earth. With the resource situation on Earth deteriorating, humankind returns to Pandora with a vengeance, establishing a major presence and using specially-grown Na'vi clones inhabited by personality downloads of Colonel Quaritch and his men to hunt down and kill Sully. Sully and his family relocate to the coastal Metikayina clan to seek refuge, but it's not long before the war comes to this new tribe.

Avatar was the most financially successful movie of 2009 and, indeed, all time (despite briefly losing the title to Avengers: Endgame, before a canny re-release saw it reclaim the crown). Remarkably, despite having voluminous notes for a sequel, director-writer James Cameron chose not to proceed immediately with more films. Instead, he spent a lot of time in pre-production, developing scripts and ideas. He eventually came up with plans for four sequels, beginning shooting in 2017 and filming all of the second and third films back-to-back, along with some material from the fourth film.

In the meantime, Avatar's legacy seemed to almost immediately dim. With no sequels, prequels or ill-advised spin-offs featuring minor side-characters, the movie fell out of the popular consciousness and the Marvel Cinematic Universe became the biggest thing at the box office. For many years Avatar has existed as a meme, its very name being mentioned inevitably resulting in immediate chortling references to Dances with Wolves and Ferngully, and how the sequels would inevitably crash and burn.

The Way of Water, the first up of this sequel series, perhaps inevitably crushed such predictions with ease, becoming the third highest-grossing movie of all time (and three of the top four are all James Cameron joints). "Never bet against James Cameron," became its own, rebutting meme instead.

Enough of the context, what of the film? Avatar: The Way of Water is very much "moar Avatar." If you hated the first film, there will be little here to change your mind. If you loved it, you'll probably love this one even more. For those who were middling on it, The Way of Water improves a lot of things about the first film to make it a somewhat stronger prospect. The visuals of the first film were incredible but advances in CG technology have just about managed to start taking the shine off some of them (even if 99% of movies still look worse, thanks to rushed production schedules). The Way of Water is effortlessly superior, the CG is photo-realistic in almost every shot, the visual design is sumptuous and Cameron uses excellent direction to make sure we read and comprehend what's going on in every frame. Cameron is also still the master of action, bringing his Aliens and Terminator 2-honed skills to bear in epic battle sequences which outshine anything in the first film and where everything from the geography of an undersea chase sequences to the choreography of a single combat scene are well-handled.

When it comes to story and character - things the first film was only adequate at - the movie is a bit more of a mixed bag. For the most part, it's fine. There's a lot of new characters to meet here, with Sully and Neytiri producing three children and adopting two more, and that's before we even meet the massive new water tribe. Cameron establishes character and emotion with brisk efficiency, although a few characters do get more development, particularly rebellious son Lo'ak and walking mystery box Kiri. The characters are solid enough to get the job done, and the performances are all pretty good. Neytiri is the one character sold a little short, with relatively little to do other than cry, hiss and occasionally do that jumping through the air firing her bow in slow motion thing. Even Stephen Lang's splendid scenery-chewing villain spiel is let down a little by his performance almost entirely being restrained to CG.

As a piece of storytelling art, The Way of Water will not be winning any major awards, but as a sheer visual spectacle and feast, it's highly compelling. The worldbuilding of Pandora takes a big step up here with the introduction of a second sentient species, and the underwater scenery whets the appetite for someone to make a movie version of subsurface video game masterpiece Subnautica.

Where the film enters shaky ground is its pacing. For most of its first two-thirds, this is pretty good, with the film rotating between action setpieces, character-building moments and worldbuilding vignettes in a fairly compelling manner (and better than the first movie, which had to slow down for its long-winded romance plot). What lets it down is longest, most drawn-out grand finale since Peter Jackson turned the concluding two-page battle from The Hobbit into an entire two-and-a-half hour movie by itself. This finale is divided into two parts, a massive battle sequence which segues into a tense disaster movie sequence. Both of these are brilliantly-directed and either would have made a great finale, but by putting them both sequentially into the film, Cameron over-eggs the pudding. Over a third of the movie's already-stupendous length is dedicated to this finale, which is definitely too much.

There is still a lot to enjoy here. James Cameron has built a career on building incredible worlds, delivering mind-blowing visuals, and orchestrating action setpieces you will remember for decades, and he delivers on all of that here. The story could be a little stronger and a little more original, and the ending could have been truncated by a good twenty minutes without losing much, and as Cameron sequels go, the placings of Aliens and T2 in the pantheon are not exactly being troubled by this movie, but it's still an enjoyable slice of epic cinema of the kind we don't see enough of these days.

Avatar: The Way of Water (****) is available to watch worldwide on physical media and streaming services. A third film is already in the can and will be released in December 2024.

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Damon Lindelof to write a STAR WARS movie

In interesting news, Damon Lindelof is reportedly working on a Star Wars movie script. The project, which is apparently very early in development, already has Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy (Ms. Marvel) attached to direct.

Lindelof is a well-known Star Wars fan from way back in the day, but had been reticent to work on the Disney version of the franchise due to his numerous brushes with fan backlashes. Lindelof rose to fame for his work on Lost (2004-10), which he co-created with J.J. Abrams and co-showran with Carlton Cuse. The show enjoyed critical acclaim and commercial success for most of its six-season run, but had a messy finale which remains somewhat controversial (although time seems to have been kinder to it than Battlestar Galactica's near-contemporary finale).

Lindelof then attracted much more negative press for his work on a batch of films from beloved SF properties: Star Trek (2009), Alien prequel Prometheus (2012) and Star Trek Into Darkness (2013), which were all slated to some degree. Lindelof's name was in danger of becoming mud, but he staged a major career resurrection with the HBO drama The Leftovers (2014-17) and the mini-series Watchmen (2019), which left his skills in demand once again.

The prospect of a Lindelof-written Star Wars movie is interesting as long as he brings the quality and class that he did from The Leftovers and Watchmen, distinctly less so if it's more at the Star Trek Into Darkness end of the quality line.

Eman Esfandi cast as the live-action Ezra in STAR WARS

Lucasfilm have announced that Eman Esfandi will be playing the live-action version of Star Wars character Ezra Bridger in their upcoming Ahsoka series.

The character of Ezra, voiced by Taylor Gray, was introduced in the first episode of Star Wars: Rebels in 2014. Ezra is a native of the planet Lothal, which has been occupied by the Empire. Ezra performs minor acts of rebellion and sabotage against the Empire before being recruited by Kanan Jarrus to join a rebel cell led by himself and Hera Syndulla. Kanan, an ex-Padawan, also discovers Ezra's budding Force powers and trains him in the ways of the Jedi, although Kanan's own incomplete training (and guilt for the death of his master during the Clone Wars) makes this a complicated affair. By the end of the series, Ezra has become an adept Force-user and a powerful ally of the Rebellion. In the final episode of Rebels, Ezra helps defeat the Imperial Grand Admiral Thrawn in a battle on and above Lothal, but in the process both Ezra and Thrawn disappear and have not been seen since. A post-Return of the Jedi epilogue reveals that Ahsoka and Ezra's good friend Sabine Wren are setting out to explore the galaxy to look for Thrawn and Ezra. Events in The Mandalorian suggest this search is still incomplete some five years later.

Esfani is a relative newcomer, having built up a steady stream of stage credits and appears in shorts, as well as in the film The Inspection and recent biopic King Richard. He has also directed several short films.

Esfani will join Rosario Dawson as Ahsoka Tano (reprising the role from The Mandalorian) and Natasha Liu Bordizzo as Sabine Wren for the cast of Ahsoka, with Hayden Christensen also poised to return as Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader, presumably for flashback scenes. Ivanna Sakhno, Mary Elizabeth Winstead and Ray Stevenson have also been cast in undisclosed roles. Rebels characters Hera Syndulla and psychotic droid Chopper are also due to appear, but their casting has not been announced so far (it is possible that Ahsoka writer-producer and Rebels creator Dave Filoni will return to "voice" Chopper, as he did throughout Rebels).

Star Wars: Ahsoka is due to air on Disney+ in 2023.

Disney in talks to acquire overseas streaming rights to DOCTOR WHO

Disney is in discussions with the BBC about picking up the overseas streaming rights to Doctor Who. The deal would not involve Disney creatively with the franchise in any way.

New Doctor Ncuti Gatwa and returning showrunner Russell T. Davies

At the moment, Doctor Who is wholly owned by the BBC and, apart from the 1996 TV movie (a one-off co-production with Fox), has been filmed inhouse by the corporation. For a series of specials airing in 2023 to celebrate the show's 60th anniversary, production is moving to an external, independent production company, Bad Wolf Studios. Bad Wolf is owned and run by former Doctor Who executives. Bad Wolf was also recently acquired by Sony, although that has no bearing on the rights situation: the BBC still owns Doctor Who and Bad Wolf are making the show for them on contract. This kind of independent production deal is commonplace in British television and is especially useful for BBC shows, as it allows profits be put back into the programme, whilst the profits from inhouse shows are sometime used to subsidise other, less successful programming. This approach has been problematic for Doctor Who, which like most BBC dramas has been on a tight budget squeeze ever since the 2008 financial crisis, ultimately leading to a reduction in the number of episodes filmed per season and growing chasms of time between seasons.

At the moment, the American rights to Doctor Who are held by HBO, who stream the show in America on HBO Max. Disney is bidding to acquire the streaming rights for the international market. If successful, this would allow Disney to add the show to their Disney+ service. Disney believes that Doctor Who, which has a strong adult-children crossover audience, would be a worthy addition to their franchises chasing the same audience, such as Marvel and Star Wars.

HBO and the BBC struck a deal in 2020 to host the show on HBO Max. Although no timescale was announced, rumours since they have suggested that the deal extends to Series 15. Next year's specials will be followed by Series 14, probably airing in early 2024, with a Series 15 likely to follow in 2025. As a result, if Disney's negotiations are successful it will still be several years before they bear fruit, unless they want to buy out HBO's deal early, which would be very expensive.

Disney would not have any creative say in Doctor Who's production, and Doctor Who would continue to air on the BBC and the iPlayer streaming service in the UK.

At least three specials for the 60th anniversary are currently shooting in the UK, and will see David Tennant return to the role of the Doctor as he re-teams with previous companions Donna (Catherine Tate) and Wilf (Bernard Cribbins) to face several new foes, including a flamboyant villain played by Neil Patrick Harris. Series 14, which sees Sex Education star Ncuti Gatwa take over full-time as the next incarnation of the Doctor, is set to start shooting in the autumn. Former Doctor Who showrunner Russell T. Davies is returning to helm and write the show with the new specials.

Before all of that, one single last episode from the current Jodie Whittaker era is set to air in October, and will see the Thirteenth Doctor join forces with former companions Ace (Sophie Aldred) and Tegan (Janet Fielding) to fight the Master (Sacha Dhawan). The episode will see the end of the Thirteenth Doctor's era.

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness

Doctor Stephen Strange has helped save the universe from Thanos, but finds his life at home unsatisfying. He has renounced the title of Sorcerer Supreme in favour of Wong to focus on research. The arrival of a young woman, America Chavez, who can travel between dimensions at will, sees Doctor Strange seek the help of Wanda Maximoff, only to discover that she is now the Scarlet Witch, a magical being of incredible power, who wants America's power to be reunited with her children. Horrified, Doctor Strange must take part in a desperate battle to save America and, if possible, Wanda from her new alter-ego.

Way back when, the powers that be very nearly let Edgar Wright direct Ant-Man but then bottled it, apparently scared that Wright's idiosyncratic, highly-identifiable style would be out of keeping with the Marvel Cinematic Universe's fairly pedestrian directing paradigm. Since then, the Marvel movies have kept to a fairly solid "house style" that allows moments of flair or entertainment, but little in the way of identifiable soul.

Until they hired Sam Raimi, that is. The horror auteur behind the Evil Dead trilogy (and its spin-off television series), numerous one-off hits, the Hercules and Xena TV shows and the OG Spider-Man trilogy, Raimi is known for his terrific visual flair and alternating moments of gross-out horror and laugh-out-loud comedy (sometimes in the same scene). And it's abundantly clear here that absolutely nobody was going to put training wheels on Sam Raimi. The 62-year-old director very clearly had an absolute blast making this film, with a riotous energy that harks right back to his forty-year-old horror classic, The Evil Dead.

Marvel do manage to keep the film within the MCU mythos, with writer Michael Waldron doing his best to tie elements from the original Doctor Strange with the Infinity War/Endgame duology with the recent Disney+ show WandaVision, which was still shooting when work on Doctor Strange 2 began. He also wrote and produced Loki, another show which helped introduce the concept of the Multiverse into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. And of course he also has to keep the film comprehensible to the casual audience who like seeing Benedict Cumberbatch magic bad guys into oblivion but don't want to keep the MCU Wiki on standby on their phone to look up obscure lore every few minutes.

This combination of Waldron's continuity-heavy script and Raimi's deranged directorial style, somehow, works well. The heavy-hitting cast do excellent work, with Cumberbatch as accomplished as ever as Strange and returning hands Chiwetel Ejiofor, Benedict Wong and Rachel McAdams all bringing their A-game. Newcomer Xochitl Gomez also gives an infectiously enjoyable performance as America Chavez, despite getting lost in the mix in the latter part of the movie.

The visuals are impressive and in fact work on two levels. The film employs imaginative and impressive CGI (the goofy-but-lethal monster Gargantos is entertaining) but Raimi also sees nothing wrong with grabbing a handheld and hiding behind the bannisters like he's a 20-year-old kid making a movie in a cabin in the woods with his friends. The sheer number of shout-outs to the Evil Dead trilogy borders on silly at times (with zombie versions of the main characters, the signature "dead rising" hand move and the traditionally welcome Bruce Campbell cameo), but the visual style elevates Multiverse of Madness into the upper tier of Marvel movies.

The horror scenes might be a turnoff to younger viewers, though, and I wasn't quite prepared for how dark and grim the film was prepared to go with some concepts and ideas. The film usually peppers comic interludes through the story to lighten the mood, but I'm not sure how much help that will be with very young kids. Some parental advisory is warranted here for those who'd normally let their kids watch the latest Marvel project without any qualms at all.

I can see how the film's crazy and unique directorial tone may have put off some who'd gotten used to the MCU's predictability, but it's to the franchise's credit that even twenty-eight films into the series (putting it ahead of James Bond even including the non-canon films) that they're willing to take a risk here that pays off. Indeed, the film's main weakness is maybe also Raimi's traditional one, namely a messy ending which indicates he wasn't quite sure where to leave things (complete with requisite multi-end-credits sequences to tee up future films, of course).

Otherwise Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (****½) is a never-boring, always-entertaining head-trip through comedy, horror and gonzoid SF weirdness, and a shot in the arm to an MCU that, on film anyway, feels like it's been drifting for a few instalments. The movie is available to watch worldwide now on Disney+.

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First teaser trailer for AVATAR: THE WAY OF WATER released

Disney have released the first teaser trailer for Avatar: The Way of Water, the long-gestating sequel to James Cameron's 2009 movie.

The sequel sees the return of Sully (Sam Worthington) and Neytiri (Zoe Saldana), who have relocated to a coastal area of Pandora and are raising a new family in peace. The film will focus extensively on underwater photography and filming.

The original Avatar was a massive smash hit on its original release, earning $2.8 billion and becoming the highest-grossing movie of all time, displacing Cameron's own Titanic (1997). Its crown was temporarily lifted by Avengers: Endgame in 2019, which outgrossed it by just $8 million, but Avatar reclaimed it in March 2021 thanks to a Chinese re-release of the original movie.

Avatar: The Way of Water will be released on 16 December this year, following a release of the "remastered" version of Avatar on 23 September. Three more Avatar movies are expected to follow in December 2024, 2026 and 2028 respectively.

SPIDER-MAN director Jon Watts leaves FANTASTIC FOUR project at Marvel

Director Jon Watts has decided to move on from the Marvel Cinematic Universe for now. The director helmed three well-received Spider-Man movies (Homecoming in 2017, Far From Home in 2019 and No Way Home in 2021) which cumulatively grossed $3.9 billion at the box office. In 2020 it was announced he would be helming a new Fantastic Four movie, which will now be handled by someone else.

The rights to Fantastic Four were acquired by Fox, who released Fantastic Four in 2005 and Rise of the Silver Surfer in 2007. A reboot, just called Fantastic Four, was released in 2015 to a poor critical reception and very poor box office.

In 2019, Marvel regained the rights to Fantastic Four as part of the sale of 21st Century Fox to Disney. Development of the new film began at that time. Watts was tipped for the role because of his success in releasing three well-received and well-performing Spider-Man films in just four years, and the fact that Fantastic Four shares some of its DNA with Spider-Man (both franchises are set in New York City and meld everyday drama with superhero shenanigans), with the characters frequently crossing over in the comics.

Marvel will now be looking for a replacement. They could bring in fresh blood or reassign one of their existing stable of directors. In particular, Peyton Reed has previously expressed an interest in a Fantastic Four project. Reed previously helmed Ant-Man (2015) and Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018) and is currently shooting Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania for release in 2023. Marvel may want to get moving on the project sooner than that, however.

AVATAR 2 gets new title and drops first footage behind closed doors

The long, long-gestating Avatar sequel has dropped its first footage (not for public consumption yet, though). Under conditions of high secrecy, attendees at CinemaCon in Las Vegas got to see several minutes of material. It is believed some of this material will be publicly released as the film's first trailer in a couple of weeks.

The sequel - the first of four films to follow on from the 2009 original - is now entitled Avatar: The Way of Water. The film returns to the moon of Pandora and the Na'vi, but will focus on a new coastal region where original film protagonists Sully (Sam Worthington) and Neytiri (Zoe Saldana) have relocated and spent years living in peace, raising a new family. The film will feature extensive underwater photography and filming.

Director James Cameron has spent most of the last decade working on the sequel project, with early development starting after Avatar's hugely successful release in 2009, when it became the highest-grossing movie of all time (displacing the previous record-holder, Cameron's 1997 film Titanic). Avatar temporarily lost the crown to Avengers: Endgame in 2019 but regained it in 2021 thanks to a limited re-release.

Press and public opinion over the sequels has become divided, with Avatar routinely derided for its lack of a long-term impact on popular culture and a storyline that felt over-familiar, and many predicting the sequels would struggle to make any impact at the box office. However, others have advised betting against James Cameron, who has arguably never made a wrong move in his career and frequently achieved massive, smash-hit successes despite difficult shoots and technological limitations. The last two sequels Cameron made were Aliens (1986) and Terminator 2: Judgement Day (1991), which are formidable precedents.

Avatar: The Way of Water has a reported budget of $250 million, meaning it will likely have to do $750 million to break even (assuming a large marketing and merchandising campaign, which seems probable). Cinemas may have to upgrade their 3D equipment to show the film in its best light, which is an unwelcome expense following on from difficult times during the pandemic. Theatre chains are wary after the 3D boom following the release of Avatar a decade ago, which was a mixed success for them, and the likely fact that the only films that will push 3D in the same way are The Way of Water's three sequels. Still, the argument has also been made that offering a genuinely new, fresh experience that pushes things forward like Avatar did in 2009 could help cinemas rebound amidst increased competition from streaming.

Avatar itself has been "remastered" and will hit cinemas on 23 September this year, with Avatar: The Way of Water to follow on 16 December. Avatar 3, 4 and 5 are scheuled to follow on 20 December 2024, 18 December 2026 and 22 December 2028.

STAR WARS: OBI-WAN KENOBI to hit screens on 25 May

Disney have confirmed that Obi-Wan Kenobi, their six-part mini-series about the titular Jedi, will hit the Disney+ platform on 25 May.

Obi-Wan Kenobi sees Ewan McGregor reprise his role as Obi-Wan, whom he last played on-screen in Revenge of the Sith in 2003. The series is set a decade after Revenge of the Sith and nine years before the events of A New Hope, and sees Obi-Wan's semi-retirement on Tatooine interrupted by a new adventure.

In addition to McGregor, Hayden Christensen will reprise his role as Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader, most likely in flashbacks and dream sequences, whilst Bonnie Piesse and Joel Edgerton will reprise their roles as Beru and Owen Lars from Revenge of the Sith. It is likely that a new actor will also play a 10-year-old Luke Skywalker.

Additional roles will be played by Kumail Nanjiani (Eternals) and Indira Varma (Rome, Game of Thrones), among others.

25 May is also known as "Star Wars Day," this year marking the 45th anniversary of the release of the original Star Wars (subsequently retitled A New Hope).

The Book of Boba Fett: Season 1

Famed mercenary Boba Fett has laid claim to the former palace and territory of the crime lord Jabba the Hutt. The civic and criminal gangs which rule Tatooine warily watch to see how events will pan out, with Fett having to fend off challenges from Jabba's cousins, the Twins, and the merciless Pyke Syndicate. As Fett struggles to rule through respect, rather than fear, he revisits his past, how he escaped the Sarlaac beast and how his recovery was helped by unxpected allies.

The Book of Boba Fett is the long, long-awaited Star Wars spin-off focusing on the titular bounty hunter. A fan-favourite character ever since since he debuted in the otherwise woeful Star Wars Holiday Special, Fett received only limited screentime in the original trilogy, adding to his mystique, but was given more backstory in the prequel trilogy and the Clone Wars animated series. The second season of The Mandalorian saw his return as a grizzled veteran out to settle scores.

This series establishes a format it follows through its first four episodes: we follow both a present-day storyline as Fett wrestles with taking and keeping control of Mos Espa and also extensive flashbacks explaining how he survived the events of Return of the Jedi. Sometimes the flashbacks are dominant and the present-day storyline only gets a few scenes and sometimes the reverse. There is one key problem with this narrative structure: neither story has enough juice or momentum to warrant its screen time individually, let alone together.

The flashback stories flirt with dull colonialist tropes as Boba Fett teaches some Tusken Raiders how to be better warriors, whilst their acceptance of him into their tribe teaches him compassion and honour. This is set up to explain why Fett is now kinder, more willing to make friends and allies than the lone-wolf bounty hunter he was first introduced as. In the present day, we see Fett and ally Fennec Shand (Ming-Na Wen) attempting to bring justice to the streets of Mos Espa through respect rather than fear. However, it all feels a bit half-hearted. Jabba inspired fear and respect through his ruthless crushing of the opposition and his power being backed by the Hutts. Boba has no such power base and it's unclear how he and effectively one hired gun and a bunch of droids can hope to replicate Jabba's power. This sets up a storyline as he recruits allies, including an irate Wookie bounty-hunter, a new pet rancor and a bunch of cyborg "mods" who race around the streets of Most Espa on hover-Vespas. It all feels a bit random, especially as the show sets up formidable enemies in the form of a brother and sister team of Hutts, but then immediately exiles them from the story in favour of the altogether vaguer Pyke Syndicate.

The Book of Boba Fett loses its story thread several times in the first four episodes, leaving the viewer to scratch their head about what the through-line of this series is. If Fett is no longer a ruthless, amoral bounty-hunter, why does he want to be a ruthless, amoral crime lord? If he learned respect and honour from the Tuskens living a simple life in the desert, why is he proceeding to take over the big cities with morasses of competing interests? It doesn't help that the show introduces potentially interesting characters and subplots and then does nothing with them.

Jennifer Beals plays the owner of a high-class cantina in Mos Espa and it's hinted that she has an interesting agenda. However, neither her character nor the stories of her cantina are fleshed out in any way. The exceptional Sophie Thatcher from Yellowjackets plays Drash, the leader of the cyborgs biker gang, and gets virtually nothing to do other than take part in a couple of very half-heated action sequences. Why does the Mod gang join forces with Boba? How does he retain their loyalty? Why does everyone treat Boba as a respected and honoured warrior when five seconds ago he was a feared, amoral bounty hunter and ruthless criminal? Why cast Danny Trejo in a fun role and do absolutely nothing more with him?

The Book of Boba Fett does remain watchable thanks to some sharp action set-pieces (particularly a fun train heist), but these questions keep mounting, leaving the viewer scratching their head on why anything is happening. Then the show takes a hard left-turn into real non-sequitur randomness.

With its fifth and sixth episodes, The Book of Boba Fett abruptly turns into Season 2.5 of The Mandalorian. We rejoin the adventures of Din Djarin as he learns to master the Darksabre and tries to pay a visit to Grogu (aka Baby Yoda). The problems with the rest of the series abruptly disappear as the show gains focus and clarity...at the expense of its lead character. Boba Fett disappears for most of these two episodes and instead we get a concentrated thermonuclear blast of fan-service. R2-D2! Luke Skywalker! Ahsoka Tano! Cad Bane! Timothy Olyphant's lawman guy! That X-wing guy! It's all fun and well-handled, but also feels incredibly off-target.

Eventually the producers seem to remember this is the Boba Fett show and re-team the Mandalorian and Boba Fett for the finale, which does almost lives up to its billing. We get a reasonably impressive and long battle sequence, featuring rancors climbing buildings, gigantic versions of the destroyer droids from The Phantom Menace and more. It's visually impressive, if mildly incoherent: a droid fails to gun down Fett's assorted allies when they are standing five feet away and its powerful turbolasers, which took out an armoured personnel carrier in five seconds, is now unable to make much of an impression on a relatively thin stone wall.

Of course, applying cast-iron logic to Star Wars is not a winning strategy, so overlooking such pedantry there is some fun to be had from these battle scenes, particularly the two Mandalorian-armoured warriors working out a rhythm as they learn how to fight as a team (albeit a team that has apparently never heard of the term "cover"). Fett's assembled allies get a bit more time in the sun and story ends in a reasonably interesting place. But it all feels a bit underwhelming.

Some of the problems can be ascribed to the fact that The Mandalorian has just featured two seasons of a taciturn, badass warrior wearing Mandalorian armour and sorting out business, so having a third, and considerably more weakly-plotted, season of exactly the same thing feels redundant. Other issues can be perhaps ascribed to the problems of having a lead actor in his sixties being supposedly an accomplished warrior. Don't get me wrong, Temuera Morrison could certainly break most twenty-year olds in half, but Boba definitely does not live up to his lethal billing as a fighter here. The show also doesn't really address the age problem: Boba should only be around 41 years old at this point, so it's unclear why he looks and acts like a guy twenty years older, aside from the fanservice of using the "right" actor. They'd have been better using Daniel Logan who played the younger Fett in Attack of the Clones who is now in his mid-thirties and would be a better fit for the character's age, or setting the show twenty years later and focusing on a story about an older Boba facing retirement and obsolescence, although of course that would have reduced the chances for tying into the Mandalorian's storyline.

As the first season of The Book of Boba Fett (***), the show just about remains watchable through some effective action sequences, a few nice comic asides and Ming-Na Wen stealing every scene she's in. As an interlude of The Mandalorian (****), the show is altogether more successful, catching us up on what Din and Grogu are up to and setting up Season 3 of The Mandalorian in style. As a show overall, it feels lopsided, and, disappointingly, is at its weakest whenever Boba Fett and his confused motivations are on screen. The season is available now on Disney+ worldwide.

Eternals

Seven thousand years ago, a group of super-powered begins known as "Eternals" arrived on Earth to safeguard the planet from mutated creatures called Deviants. Five centuries ago they defeated the last Deviant and split up, living undercover as humans until such time that they are recalled for their next mission by their masters, the Celestials. However, the return of the Deviants and the death of one of their number spurts the Eternals to reunite and face down a new threat.

The Eternals began life as a Marvel Comics team, created in 1976 by Jack Kirby after his defection to DC Comics in 1970 to work on the New Gods comics line. Unceremoniously cancelled by DC, Kirby brought the idea back to Marvel and reworked it (to avoid getting sued), where it was more successful. Though not quite a Marvel mainstay, the Eternals have resurfaced intermittently through the years, crossing over with other Marvel properties and characters.

The news that Marvel Studios was developing a movie based on the team was a surprise, given it was a relatively obscure group of characters and integrating the high-powered, celestial team with the more grounded characters elsewhere in the MCU was going to be challenging. However, the MCU's unexpected success in making characters like the Guardians of the Galaxy work gave the studio greater confidence in proceeding with the project, even tapping the much-feted Chloe Zhao to direct and co-write (Zhao won an Oscar for her previous movie, Nomadland, whilst working on Eternals).

The result is an ambitious movie. Most MCU films introduce one or at most two or three major new characters to the MCU at any one time. Eternals introduces a mind-boggling ten at once. Although the film does have some previous work to rest on - the Celestials were introduced in 2014's Guardians of the Galaxy - it doe have a lot of its own worldbuilding to bring into the mix. It also has to establish each Celestial's major power and ability, as well as their motivation and characterisation. This it achieves through flashbacks to different periods in Earth's history, showing where the Eternals were present and how events changed them and their characters.

Eternals also makes a very bold decision: to drop most of the MCU's snarky, pop-reference-laden humour. Not completely, of course, there are still some jokes and a few quips and a bit of family banter, but the humour is toned down here from the MCU norm, which will be a relief to those tired of the humour undercutting the seriousness of the action. However, it is also a problem in that leaves Eternals as the most serious - and occasionally dour - Marvel movie since Thor: The Dark World.

Fortunately the film mostly overcomes that. The runtime is dangerously close to creaky at well over two and a half hours, but there's so many stories, characters and ideas on display here that the pacing generally doesn't flag. If anything, it could be argued that Eternals needed to be longer, say a six or eight-hour mini-series on Disney+ which could introduce the characters and add a lot more weight to their backgrounds. As it stands, the film feels like a truncated Greatest Hits of a band you've only just encountered which leaves a lot of great work on the cutting room floor.

The cast is stacked and for the most part excellent, particularly Richard Madden as Ikaris, Lia McHugh as Sprite, Brian Tyree Henry as Phastos, Salma Hayek as Ajak and Angelina Jolie as Thena. Lauren Ridloff (Makkari) is great but gets disappointingly little to do, whilst Kit Harington shows up solely to set up his role in a completely different project (likely the upcoming Blade reboot). Gemma Chan is fine as Sersi but feels like she needed some better writing, as she ends up being arguably the least-defined Eternal (power and character-wise) despite being our viewpoint character for most of the movie. In fact, the connections to the rest of the MCU - the Eternals defend why they didn't intervene in any of the previous incidents where Earth was threatened, and Kingo laments not being able to reconnect with old buddy Thor - feel very incongruous, to the point where this may have worked better as a completely stand-alone film.

Eternals does do something interesting and relatively original though, namely in that all the characters that matter are in the actual main team. The enemies are monsters rather than some nefarious, offscreen villain and the tension and drama comes from divisions within the team as they debate strategy. A late-film plot twist is effective in splitting the group apart and setting us up for a Civil War-style internal dispute, which is a bold move given we've only just met these characters. In fact, it feels like Eternals' plot might have been better saved for the sequel, with this first film instead focusing on meeting the characters in a more relaxed way as they fight a more generic threat. However, you can't fault the ambition here. Eternals seems to know that audiences are in danger of getting bored with the traditional Marvel formula and tries to spruce it up with a greater focus on internal dissent and a more well-balanced conflict between people whose powers, abilities and weaknesses (even the bad guys get those) are established beforehand.

The result is an interesting movie which isn't altogether successful. Eternals (****) has a great cast, a strong central plot, some genuinely impressive vfx sequences (increasingly hard these days) and surprisingly good pacing, despite its length. However, it also biting off more than it can chew narratively, not all the characters are as well-developed as others, the links with the MCU feel contrived and the film's lack of humour leaves it feeling a bit heavy on occasion (and the fewer moments of humour now feel incongruous). The things it does well, it does very well though, and it's definitely an MCU movie that at least feels like it's trying to do something fresh.

Eternals is now available globally on Disney+.

Sabine Wren cast for STAR WARS: AHSOKA

Lucasfilm and Disney have confirmed the casting of the live-action version of the character Sabine Wren for their upcoming TV series, Ahsoka. The character previously appeared in animation in Star Wars: Rebels.

The role will be played by Australian actress Natasha Liu Bordizzo, who previously appeared in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword of Destiny, Hotel Mumbai and The Society. The character was previously voiced on Rebels by Tiya Sircar (The Good Place).

The character of Sabine Wren is a Mandalorian warrior who joins forces with the crew of the Ghost has they struggle to liberate the occupied planet of Lothal. During this conflict she joins the Rebel Alliance, continuing to work with the Ghost crew. As the conflict escalates, she also finds herself involved in the struggle for Mandalore's independence from the Empire. At the end of Rebels, she joins former Jedi apprentice Ahsoka Tano in tracking down their missing friend and ally, Ezra Bridger, who had disappeared into deep space along with Grand Admiral Thrawn.

The second season of The Mandalorian introduced the live-action versions of both Ahsoka (played by Rosario Dawson) and Mandalorian loyalist Bo-Katan Kryze (Katee Sackhoff, who also voiced the character in The Clone Wars and Rebels), or may or may not also recur in the new series. Ahsoka will apparently focus on Ahsoka's search for the missing Grand Admiral Thrawn, possibly as a way of tracking down Ezra. It makes sense that Sabine would join the mission. Ahsoka has also been confirmed to see the return of Hayden Christensen as Anakin Skywalker, presumably in flashbacks.

Ahsoka is currently in pre-production and expected to start shooting in March for an early 2023 debut on Disney+.

STAR WARS: ROGUE SQUADRON delayed

Lucasfilm have announced a delay to their next theatrical Star Wars release, Rogue Squadron. The movie was scheduled for release on Christmas Day 2023 but the movie has now been put on indefinite hold due to scheduling issues with director Patty Jenkins.

Jenkins was hired to make the film in late 2020, with the plan being for the film to enter production in 2022. However, Jenkins' schedule has shifted with Warner Brothers greenlighting a third Wonder Woman film, with Jenkins returning to co-write and direct, despite the previous film in the series, Wonder Woman 1984, having a risible performance both critically and commercially. Jenkins has also committed to making Cleopatra, a remake of the 1963 epic, and may shoot that before Wonder Woman 3 and both before Rogue Squadron.

Rogue Squadron has not been officially cancelled and officially remains in development with Jenkins as director. However, it may not see the light now until 2025 or later.

Disney and Lucasfilm have adopted a wary attitude towards the future of the Star Wars franchise on film, following the commercially disappointing performances of Solo: A Star Wars Story (which became the first film in the franchise to lose money at the box office) and The Rise of Skywalker (which made less than half the money of The Force Awakens). Instead, they have pivoted the franchise hard towards television, where The Mandalorian has been a smash hit success for Disney+ and generated two spinoff series: The Book of Boba Fett (to air in December) and Ahsoka (in pre-production). Two other series are in post-production, namely Rogue One spinoff Andor and the long-gestating Obi-Wan Kenobi project starring Ewan McGregor. Both are expected to air in 2022. The streamer is also developing The Acolyte, set in a much earlier time period. A further series, Rangers of the New Republic, was in development for some time but was recently put on indefinite hold. That's not including the animated projects The Bad Batch, Visions and A Droid Story.

On film, aside from Rogue Squadron, Lucasfilm is also developing a Taika Waititi-directed film, although a schedule for that movie has not yet solidified: Waititi has an insanely full directorial slate, including Next Goal Wins (in post-production), Thor: Love and Thunder (in post-production), The Incal (just announced) and a live-action version of Akira, as well as numerous ongoing TV shows. Lucasfilm is also developing a trilogy of Star Wars films to be planned, written and possibly directed by Rian Johnson, but this project has been put on hold due to the huge success of Johnson's Knives Out franchise (and, cynics may say, the polarising reception to Johnson's 2017 movie, The Last Jedi). Marvel head honcho Kevin Feige is also developing a Star Wars project as producer, and Lucasfilm has reportedly held talks on a Knights of the Old Republic movie, possibly contingent on the success of the new video game version of that story now in production.

The future will hold a lot of Star Wars, but the question is how much of it will be in the cinema, where the franchise originated.