Star Wars: The Mandalorian & Grogu

Din Djarin, famed as "The Mandalorian," and his diminutive ward Grogu are working for the New Republic, bringing down Imperial warlords and war criminals in the lawless Outer Rim. His latest commission sees him reluctantly working with the Hutts to rescue the lost son of Jabba the Hutt so he can get information on an Imperial fugitive. Several reversals of fortune see Djarin with a bounty on his head from the most powerful crime lords in the galaxy.

The Mandalorian & Grogu is the first Star Wars movie in seven years, since the critical misfire of The Rise of Skywalker, despite multiple attempts to bring different projects to the screen in the interim. The film started as the fourth season of The Mandalorian, the hit TV show that established Disney+ as a serious player in the streaming wars, but was condensed down by director-writer Jon Favreau and writer-producer Dave Filoni at the behest of Lucasfilm and Disney, who were rather desperate to get a new Star Wars project on the screen, no matter the cost.

I suspect that as the fourth season of The Mandalorian, we'd have seen more extensive tie-ins with the established lore, a return for key characters and a furtherance of the show's main story arcs. As a stand-alone movie that cannot assume anyone watching it has seen even a single minute of The Mandalorian, the film has to jettison anything that even risks being vaguely confusing to create a perfectly stand-alone adventure. The result is a film that takes no risks and, more than once, made me ponder if some of the dialogue, visuals and pacing had been created by AI.

The Mandalorian & Grogu is the safest of safe choices, a perfectly adequate succession of action set-pieces, daring captures and escapes, and choice deployment of nostalgia bombs to make viewers giggle because a character has dropped a key catchphrase or deployed a fan-favourite vehicle. The amount of bombast on display is sometimes impressive, and those complaining the movie feels like an episode of the TV series may need to revisit the TV show to realise just how relatively constrained its action set pieces could be. Here, unshackled by such budgetary considerations (though this is still the cheapest Star Wars movie since Return of the Jedi, adjusted for inflation), we get an at-times exhausting succession of gun battles, fights with creatures, fights with droids and, er, WWE-style pro-wrestling scenes with Hutts.

The sheer volume of action and CGI set pieces is there to disguise the thinness of the plot. The Mando goes to one place to rescue one guy and then goes somewhere else to capture someone else, but annoys some other guys who try to capture him etc etc. To mimic the TV show, dialogue is stripped-back but the writers confuse minimalism with triteness, with the film featuring some of the weakest dialogue of any Star Wars movie to date. Rotta the Hutt gives almost the exact same speech about being his "own man" (despite being a giant space slug, albeit an absolute ripped one, guy is shredded) twice, for no apparent reason. Virtually every utterance in the movie is either an intended zinger (landing with the accuracy of a drunk stormtrooper) or rote exposition. This may be the least-quotable Star Wars movie to date...which given the competition includes the prequel and sequel trilogies, and Solo, is really saying something. The lack of good dialogue is also a problem for the actors: Pedro Pascal is at least used to being taciturn and Sigourney Weaver is too much experience to let it throw her, but Jeremy Allen White has nothing to work with as Rotta and turns in such a flat performance it feels like placeholder dialogue. The colour grading is also poor, making this easily the flattest and least-dynamic-looking Star Wars movie of them all.

Still, there's something to be said for the straightforwardness of the film at a time when a lot of films seem to get tripped up on convoluted storytelling or lore density. There are some nods at other media - a bunch of the X-wing pilots from The Mandalorian show up, alongside Zeb from Star Wars: Rebels and Rotta himself from the Clone Wars TV show - but nothing too outrageous, and the film does not outsay its welcome, even if a couple of action set-pieces and an overlong recuperation sequence could have been jettisoned to make for a tighter movie. One thing the film does do well is further the characterisation of Grogu, who here is shown to be more capable of understanding the Mandalorian's instructions and is a lot more capable of undertaking his own solo adventures. He has more to do here than simply stand around looking cute, which is a relief.

Watched as a standalone Mandalorian adventure, this is perfectly serviceable. As the next great hope for Star Wars in the cinema, it whelms at best. But maybe after the commercial and creative misfires of Solo and The Rise of Skywalker, that's just what Disney wanted.

The Mandalorian & Grogu (***) might be the most serviceable slice of Star Wars yet made, a perfectly adequate way of wasting two hours that is rarely outstanding, occasionally mediocre, but mostly inoffensive. Young children may enjoy the film more for Grogu's antics. I would definitely wait on Disney+ for this one.

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Kathleen Kennedy steps down as the boss of Lucasfilm

After fourteen years, Kathleen Kennedy has stepped down as the head of Lucasfilm, passing the reigns to Dave Filoni and Lynwen Brennan.

Kennedy has had a storied career in Hollywood, which began in the late 1970s working in TV before becoming John Milius's assistant. Through Milius she met Steven Spielberg, who employed her as a secretary but was impressed by her grasp of storytelling. She gradually got bigger roles, going from assistant on Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) to producer on E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial (1982). She co-founded Amblin Entertainment with Spielberg and her future husband Frank Marshall in 1982.

She worked closely with Spielberg on most of his movies, and some with husband Marshall. In early 2012 she was recruited by George Lucas to become co-chair of Lucasfilm Ltd. when it was still an independent company. On 30 October that year, Lucas sold the company to Disney and retired, with Kennedy becoming President.

Charged with succeeding George Lucas and revitalising the success of Star Wars, her approach of identifying talented film-makers and giving them creative freedom initially achieved success: The Force Awakens (2015) and The Last Jedi (2017) were smash hits at the box office (the former still being the biggest movie ever at the American box office), and the former received critical acclaim (despite concerns over its conservative approach to the Star Wars greatest hits). The Last Jedi took much bigger creative swings but only achieved mixed critical success, becoming the most divisive of all Star Wars films. Rogue One (2016) was a success on both fronts, and the first live-action Star Wars TV series, The Mandalorian (2019 - present) was also a hit on her watch and helped launch the Disney+ streaming service to great success.

Unfortunately, The Rise of Skywalker (2019) received a critical drubbing and the film only achieved half the box office of The Force Awakens. Even worse, Solo (2018) had already become the first Star Wars movie to lose money at the box office. TV shows The Book of Boba Fett (2021), Obi-Wan Kenobi (2022) and The Acolyte (2024) also all underwhelmed. Outside of Star Wars, other Lucasfilm properties stumbled: the TV series Willow (2022) was written off as a tax exercise and removed from Disney+ altogether just a few weeks after release, and Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (2023) underwhelmed at the box office, despite a reasonable critical reception.

To what degree Kennedy should be blamed for these failures remains a fierce point of contention among fans, with it being pointed out that changes in leadership at Disney with wildly different demands for the amount of content caused problems for not just Lucasfilm but also Marvel. More recent Star Wars projects have also been more successful: Andor (2022-25) has been critically lauded as the best Star Wars work of all time in some quarters, whilst Skeleton Crew (2024) was also warmly received critically, though its viewership on Disney+ was not strong (but at least it hasn't been removed from it).

Kennedy confirmed the transition period actually began two years ago, with the plan being to split her role in two: Dave Filoni will take over creative control of the franchise and Lynwen Brennan, formerly of ILM, will handle business affairs. Filoni started work on Star Wars on the Clone Wars TV show (2008-14, 2020) and Star Wars: Rebels (2014-18) before moving over to live-action as a writer, producer (and sometimes actor) on The Mandalorian.

Kennedy also has a foot in the door on forthcoming projects: she is a producer on The Mandalorian & Grogu, a movie spin-off from The Mandalorian due out this May, and Star Wars: Starfighter, due in 2027.

During her departure interview with Deadline, Kennedy also gave a brief update on other percolating projects. James Mangold's is on hold, apparently taking a wild swing with the Star Wars universe. His script is rumoured to be the Jedi origin story, set tens of thousands of years before the rest of the franchise. Taika Waititi has submitted a comedic script but the greenlight has not been given. Donald Glover has also submitted a script, and Steve Soderbergh and Adam Driver are pushing a script written by Scott Burns expanding on Kylo Ren, although this project is believed to be on hold. Simon Kinberg's project is still in active development, with a recent total rewrite of the treatment. More intriguingly, Kennedy confirmed that conversations have happened with David Fincher and Vince Gilligan over them doing takes on the franchise.

Andor: Season 2

The Rebel Alliance is starting to take shape. Senator Mon Mothma and her allies are gathering political backing in the Galactic Senate, whilst Luthen Rael is getting his hands dirty with scheming and planning. The Empire itself is working in secret on a project of tremendous scale, requiring immense resources, including the strip-mining of the planet Ghorman, which becomes an early flashpoint in this struggle. Rebel operative Cassian Andor finds himself drawn back into Luthen's schemes, as he charts his course towards his ultimate fate.

The first season of Star Wars: Andor was a surprise, an adult and intelligent take on the Star Wars mythos that emphasised intelligent characters, interesting storytelling and a vibe that was more 1970s thriller than colourful space opera. "Star Wars as a premium HBO show from their golden age," was a common description. It was also designed to set up a planned five-year arc. Due to variable streaming figures, a significant budget and an immense production timeline, showrunner Tony Gilroy and star Diego Luna agreed to wrap the show up with the second season instead.

Compressing four seasons of television into one is a tough job, but here Gilroy and his writers make a virtue of it. The twelve-episode season (and it's an unalloyed joy to have a decent-length season of television again) is divided into four arcs of three episodes each, effectively meaning four movies back-to-back getting us from the end of the first season to the events of Rogue One. The result is focused and disciplined, with us seeing four important snapshots showing the evolution of the Galactic Empire into a fully repressive fascist state, and the Rebel Alliance into a viable military threat.

There's so much going on in Andor between these four arcs that it can be hard to pare it down. We have Cassian and Bix's domestic life, constantly interrupted by missions for Luthen. There's Luthen and Kleya's intelligence operations (Elizabeth Dulau emerges as the season's MVP, especially in the closing episodes), and Mon Mothma's politicking in the Senate. There's internal politics as the Imperial Security Bureau. There's the slowly-gathering rebels on Ghorman, who don't have a clue about what they're doing. There's Director Krennic (Ben Mendelsohn chewing the scenery with aplomb) throwing around his authority to get his secret project made. But the show moves between these different storylines with skill. There's also little filler or flab. To quote another show, all the pieces matter.

That's not to say it's completely golden perfection. Cassian spends a chunk of the first two episodes bogged down with some would-be rebels who seem to have learned everything from Keystone Cops, in a storyline that drags a little. The time jumps between each set of episodes can leave a bunch of storylines feeling unresolved. Mon Mothma's domestic life with her husband and daughter early on is left dangling in the breeze (with a coda showing her husband re-married feeling like an apologetic sop to viewers invested in that story). A major speech Mon Mothma makes is hyped but we never hear it, because it was already made on animated series Rebels and they didn't want to repeat themselves.

But such quibbles are overshadowed by everything it does right. Luthen's increasingly ruthless scheming (Stellan Skarsgard should walk away with every award going), Dedra and Syril's bizarrely watchable relationship and Major Partagaz's troubles managing the semi-incompetent ISB (Anton Lesser an under-sung hero of the show, as he was in Game of Thrones, The Crown and Wolf Hall). Partagaz lecturing underlings to "calibrate their enthusiasm," is one of the most amusing scenes in Star Wars history, and Director Krennic's weird interrogation tactics are very entertaining. The show also fulfils its potential as an epic tragedy, with heroes dying unmourned in the dark, and the clock ticking with palpable doom towards Rogue One where we know many of these characters will meet their fate. When several of them do survive (at least the end of this series), there's a feeling of relief. The show also delivers good action, not as much as you'd expect from Star Wars, but it instead builds tension and dread like nothing else in the franchise before finally pushing the button.

Andor tells a story of authoritarianism becoming ever more arbitrary, incoherent and violent, and the yearning of people for freedom and expression rising to meet it. It is a heavy story, but one that is also run through with signs of hope. A better tomorrow is possible, if people are willing to work and fight for it.

Star Wars: Andor's second season (*****) is not quite as tight as the first season, but it's bigger, more epic and more emotionally powerful, steered by outstanding actors working with excellent scripts. It's one of the best slices of Star Wars produced since 1977 and restores some faith in a franchise that has faltered too much recently. The season is available to watch now on Disney+.

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STAR WARS: ZERO COMPANY announced

Lucasfilm, Respawn and BitReactor have confirmed development of Star Wars: Zero Company, a turn-based tactics game set during the Clone Wars. The game is currently targeting a 2026 release window.

The game is basically "XCOM, but in Star Wars." The game sees players taking control of a Republic special forces group fighting the Separatists. Your initial squad of named characters (who will drive story decisions and appear in cutscenes) can be augmented by fresh recruits, who can level up as they do missions. The game will feature an ironman mode and also permadeath, which on the highest difficulty can be applied even to your named characters. On the named characters is a Jedi, one is a droid and there are at least two Clone Troopers. You lead character, Hawks, can be customised in appearance and ability.

The game is being developed by new studio BitReactor (who have veterans of the XCOM, Civilization, Gears of War and Elder Scrolls series on board) but are receiving support from Respawn, who made the recent Jedi Fallen Order and Jedi Survivor games. The game will be published by Electronic Arts.

Star Wars: Skeleton Crew

The people of the planet At Attin are carrying out a Great Work for the Galactic Republic, which requires their planet to be sealed off from the rest of the galaxy by an unbreachable barrier. The children of At Attin are encouraged to study hard to get great jobs to carry out the Work, with only ancient stories of Jedi percolating through to reach those with imagination. When four children stumble across a buried starship which inadvertently carries them far from At Attin, they have to use all their resourcefulness to get home, through a galaxy decidedly less civilised than they were led to believe.

Skeleton Crew is yet another Star Wars TV show from the Lucasfilm/Disney+ production line. Since The Mandalorian debuted five years ago, the production line has pushed out a whole raft of Star Wars projects, which have all looked fantastic but, to varying degrees, struggled to hit the high notes of the franchise. The first season of Andor and the first two seasons of The Mandalorian were very good, but its third season, Obi-Wan Kenobi and Ahsoka were all patchy, The Acolyte flawed and The Book of Boba Fett bafflingly structured.

Combined with the well-documented struggles in getting a new movie in the franchise off the ground, this has led to the conclusion that Star Wars, at least as a live-action concern, was in trouble under Disney's stewardship.

Fortunately, and most unexpectedly, Skeleton Crew didn't get that memo. Jon Watts, who masterminded Marvel's take on Spider-Man, rocked up with a mission: to make the Star Wars / 1980s kids' movie crossover event that we never knew we wanted, but it turns out was a great idea all along. Taking inspiration from the likes of The Goonies and Flight of the Navigator, the film jettisons almost all the baggage of the extended Star Wars canon that has been weighing down the rest of the franchise for a near-stand-alone adventure in which some kids find a spaceship and get into hijinks.

You might think that sounds fair enough but maybe not enough to sustain eight episodes, but Watts and his team expand the storyline to incorporate subplots revolving around the kids' families trying to work out how to find them from back home, as well as expanding on Jod, the mentor character they encounter along the way who agrees to be their guide through the dangerous galaxy beyond At Attin. Jude Law plays Jod with absolutely maximum relish, turning in a great performance that mixes humour and roguery in classic Star Wars fashion. The kids are all fine (due to their age, the occasional scene where they mistake enthusiasm for skill can be overlooked), and many of the other adult actors are great, though Kerry Condon (Rome, Better Call Saul) feels under-utilised.

The episode count allows our characters to visit several planets (all new) and learn more about the galaxy and its recent past, meaning that total Star Wars novices should be at home here. The impressive action set-pieces come thick and fast, and the lighter tone is mostly successful after too many Star Wars projects that feel weighed down by the need to be serious. But, like the best 1980s kids' movies, the show also knows it won't work without some darker moments and real jeopardy, and a late-series shakeup to its format is highly effective at darkening the show without making it unsuitable for its audience.

Star Wars: Skeleton Crew (****) is not high art but it achieves its objective of being breezy fun for kids and adults alike. Easily the best Star Wars TV project after Andor and the early part of The Mandalorian, it's almost a relief to find an adventure in the Galaxy Far Far Away that can simply be enjoyed and not merely tolerated. The show is airing now on Disney+ worldwide.

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Lucasfilm and Disney announce three new STAR WARS films

As part of the Star Wars Celebration events in London, Lucasfilm and Disney have announced three new Star Wars live-action films are in development.

First up, and most removed from the others, is a "Biblical" story set many thousands of years prior to all existing Star Wars media. This film will be about the very first person to become a Jedi and will be directed James Mangold, best-known for his acclaimed movie Logan (2017). He also directed Cop Land (1997), Girl, Interrupted (1999) and the upcoming Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (2023).

Dave Filoni's film will "close out" the interconnected series of stories being told in the Disney+ shows The Mandalorian, The Book of Boba Fett and Ahsoka. The film is believed to unite all of the major characters from those series in an Avengers: Endgame-style battle against an ultimate foe, probably Grand Admiral Thrawn (who will debut first in the upcoming Disney+ series Ahsoka). Filoni is best-known for his work on the Star Wars animated shows The Clone Wars, Rebels and The Bad Batch, as well as his work on The Mandalorian and the upcoming Ahsoka. Filoni has previously only directed three episodes of The Mandalorian, one of The Book of Boba Fett and an unknown number of Ahsoka episodes, so this is a vote of confidence in his skills (intriguingly, the much-more experienced director and Mandalorian co-creator Jon Favreau is not doing this gig).

The final film will be directed by Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy (the 3 Bahadur trilogy, Sitara: Let Girls Dream and episodes of Ms. Marvel) and will be the first new Star Wars film set after the events of Rise of Skywalker. Daisy Ridley will return as Rey and will chronicle her rebuilding of the Jedi Order, possibly with appearances by other sequel trilogy characters and other Force-using characters from the other projects. Damon Lindelof developed the first draft of the script but has since left the project.

Not mentioned is Rian Johnson's trilogy idea (although he has indicated that project is on ice until he completes his Knives Out series) nor the Rogue Squadron movie from Patty Jenkins, with some reports indicating the latter has been cancelled outright. Taika Waititi's Star Wars movie is apparently still in development, but has not been mentioned amidst these new announcements.

With the disappointing box-office for Solo (2018) and The Rise of Skywalker (2019) and numerous projects getting stuck in development hell, there was some speculation that Lucasfilm might avoid returning to the cinema with the franchise for a long time. Today's announcement indicates they have renewed faith and confidence in the franchise.

By also "closing out" the current era of TV shows and establishing new material set after The Rise of Skywalker, they may also be looking at setting up a new era for Star Wars stories where they are not locked into the events of the earlier films and shows, which can only be a good thing, otherwise we will get an origin mini-series about Admiral Ackbar at the current rate.

Andor: Season 1

Fourteen years after the end of the Clone Wars, the Galactic Empire seems to be invulnarable. From Coruscant, a colossal bureaucracy rules over millions of worlds through thousands of warships and a vast number of troops. Resistance appears futile. But there are those who believe otherwise, and from the lowliest depths of the poorest planets to the halls of the Galactic Senate itself, a rebellion is taking shape. Fighting this rebellion will not be easy, or pretty, or easy, and to start it requires a single victory, small in scope but enough to start the avalanche.

When Lucasfilm was putting together its initial package of live-action Star Wars TV shows, the one about Cassian Andor, a relatively low-key character from Rogue One, always seemed like the most random and least interesting. An Obi-Wan show? Sure, that makes sense. A show about Mandalorians? Cool. A Boba Fett series? Why not? But this guy? Diego Luna gave a great performance and there were some interesting edges around this more amoral, ruthless rebel operative, but he didn't exactly seem to be screaming out for more backstory.

Andor's first season proves that guess completely wrong, and unexpectedly emerges as the best of the live-action Star Wars shows to date, knocking the underwhelming Obi-Wan and disappointing Book of Boba Fett into a cocked hat, and even shading the fun Mandalorian. Coming across as the answer to the question, "What if Star Wars was on HBO?", Andor is a serious, adult SF drama about totalitarianism, the price of freedom, the perils of resistance and ultimately how the smallest acts can have huge ramifications.

The show nominally focuses on Cassian Andor, with Diego Luna returning to play a younger, cockier version of the character from Rogue One. Flashbacks reveal his backstory as a young child on a planet left ravaged by an unexplained disaster, whilst his present-day story sees him recruited by Luthen Rael (a fantastic Stellan Skarsgård) from his adopted homeworld of Ferrix to take part in a rebel raid on the planet Aldhani. The raid triggers a massive series of reprisals by the Empire, with the Imperial Security Bureau sending its best agents to track down those responsible. Andor absconds from the cause the first chance he gets, only to wind up, ironically, getting arrested and sentenced to an Imperial prison facility under a false identity. There he has to learn to become a leader and a facilitator for his fellow inmates, and sets about recruiting the reluctant floor manager Kino Loy (an outstanding Andy Serkis) to his cause.

However, one of the show's smartest moves is using Andor as the connective tissue between the ground-level story of how the Empire is crushing the common people, exemplified by Andor himself, and a much higher-level story in the Imperial Senate, where Mon Mothma (Genevieve O'Reilly reprising her role from Rogue One and Revenge of the Sith, the only high-profile actor apart from Luna and Forest Whitaker as Saw Gerrera to return from the films) is trying to simultaneously present herself as a harmless, bleeding-heart irritant against the Emperor's tyranny whilst secretly funding the establishment of the Rebel Alliance. When the financial web she's spun to carry this out is abruptly broken, she urgently needs to find a way of covering her back before the Empire discovers and destroys the Alliance before it can even get going.

In some senses Andor is an atypical Star Wars show: there's only a single, brief space battle and only a few ground-based action scenes. Much of the show seems to revolve around taut conversations between desperate individuals. The Empire is frequently presented as a mildly boring bureaucracy packed with functionaries just trying to get through the day so they can go home, rather than psychopathic maniacs. One major storyline revolves around financial dealings and shadow accounts and distasteful criminal deals like an episode of The Wire. It's also a decidedly more adult show: sex is alluded to more than in most Star Wars material, we get our first blink-and-you'll-miss-it bit of swearing in the franchise and character motivations are much more the focus, rather than cool spaceships or droids (though we do get at least one great new spaceship and a somewhat sympathetic robot with B2EMO).

It's a bold step but also a necessary one. Star Wars is now a transmedia franchise that is clearly never going to entirely stop this side of the end of human civilisation, but it can't do that if it doesn't broaden its tonal horizons and become a much broader church than what it has been up until now. Lucasfilm has been reluctant to do that - after hiring Phil Lord and Christopher Miller to make a more comedic Star Wars movie with Solo, they panicked when the directors did exactly that and fired them - but seems to have now gotten the message. How far this will go remains unclear: will we eventually get Star Wars the romantic comedy (no, Attack of the Clones does not count) and Star Wars the horror franchise? Maybe. But starting that broadening with Star Wars: The Prestige Streaming Showcase isn't such a bad idea.

Andor works because it shows us in a very real way how day-to-day life in the Empire works. It doesn't actually appear to be that bad, as long as you keep your head down and work hard and don't speak out, and you might even get a promotion and fancy you can work inside the system to your family's benefit, or try to make things better. But the insidiousness of the Empire is clear, as it beats and crushes the spirit out of people slowly, day by day. Star Wars has always nodded a little at Nineteen Eighty-Four with its depiction of the Empire, but that influence is much stronger here, with a bit of Brazil-esque surrealism thrown in as well (particularly with Syril Karn's story). The effort it takes for people to "wake up" and realise they have to fight is startling, but once that ball starts rolling it becomes difficult to stop.

Andor does have some flaws. The pacing is deliberate and measured, and for the most part that works well. However, there's at least one episode's worth of material that could have been shaved off to make an even tighter, sharper show. There's also some creaky continuity gaps between Andor and the rest of the franchise: The Bad Batch established that resistance movements against the Empire began almost immediately after its founding (with Andor character Saw Gerrera playing a leading role!), and Rebels, set almost simultaneously with this show, seems to suggest the Rebel Alliance should be much further along the road to being the spaceborne insurgency we all know. Having the Rebellion in a much more nascent form here doesn't seem to be quite right. Others will bemoan a Star Wars show without more action, or one they can't perhaps as easily sit down to watch with their kids.

That said, it's hard to argue with quality. Andor's first season (****½) is an impressive, adult science fiction drama that interrogates many of the ideas and premises of the Star Wars franchise that we haven't seen in live-action before (some of the novels and video games have trodden this kind of ground, though), and restores hope to a franchise that was in danger of becoming moribund.

The season is available to watch now worldwide on Disney+. A second season is in production for airing in 2024.

Thank you for reading The Wertzone. To help me provide better content, please consider contributing to my Patreon page and other funding methods.

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+ delays STAR WARS TV show ANDOR

Disney+ has delayed the launch of its next Star Wars TV series, Andor, by three weeks. The show will now launch on 21 September.

Andor is a prequel to the movie Rogue One and follows a young Cassian Andor as he takes up arms against the Empire for the first time. However, the film also has a more epic scope and follows Mon Mothma and other dignitaries on Coruscant as they take their first faltering steps in opposing the tyrannical government that the Galactic Empire has become. Other storylines span the Star Wars galaxy instead of the very tight focus on single characters from The Mandalorian, The Book of Boba Fett and Obi-Wan Kenobi.

The reason for moving Andor is unclear, but there is speculation that it was to move it out of a crowded launch window which would have seen it going head-to-head with She-Hulk: Attorney at Law (17 August), House of the Dragon (21 August) and The Rings of Power (2 September).

Andor sees Diego Luna reprise his role as Cassian Andor from Rogue One. Forest Whitaker also returns as Saw Gerrera, a role he played in Rogue One and also in Star Wars: Rebels. Genevieve O'Reilly returns as Mon Mothma, a role she played in Rogue One and Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith. Stellan Skarsgård also stars as Luthen. Adria Arjona, Kyle Soller, Fiona Shaw, Anton Lesser, Ben Miles, Robert Emms and David Hayman have unconfirmed roles.

Star Wars: Obi-Wan Kenobi

Ten years after the fall of the Old Republic, former Jedi Master Obi-Wan Kenobi lives in self-imposed exile on the desert planet Tatooine, keeping a watchful eye over the son of Anakin Skywalker. However, when Anakin's daughter is kidnapped from her home planet of Alderaan by mercenaries, Obi-Wan is reluctantly called back into action. The Emperor's Inquisitors are tracking down and destroying the last survivors of the Jedi Order, and some are obsessed with finding the last members of the Jedi Council...no matter the cost.

If there was an actor who was particularly ill-served by the Star Wars prequel trilogy, it was Ewan McGregor. One of Britain's hottest actors at the time, he was also a major Star Wars fan (partially due to his uncle Denis Lawson playing Wedge Antilles in the original trilogy) and leapt at the chance to appear in the films as the young Obi-Wan Kenobi. Unfortunately, his performance was hamstrung by some truly awful dialogue. It's a tribute to McGregor's acting skills that he was sometimes able to rise above the material with some great performances and moments (I'd argue he is the very thin line keeping Attack of the Clones on just about the right side of mostly bearable).

In view of this unfulfilled potential, McGregor and Lucasfilm have been working on ways of bringing him back to the galaxy far, far away for some years. A movie was in development at one point, but the underperformance of Solo seemed to shut down that idea. So now we have a six-part mini-series instead.

Obi-Wan Kenobi is certainly a stronger show than the inconsistent Book of Boba Fett but doesn't rise to the heights of The Mandalorian. McGregor is, once again, the best thing in it and he gives a stately, emotional performance filled with pain and regret for the horrors he has experienced. The script serves him much better than the prequel movies and it's genuinely fun to see the middle-aged Obi-Wan going on another adventure. Most of the supporting cast is great, and it's enjoyable to see Hayden Christensen reprise the role of Anakin/Darth Vader (even if the flashback scenes to the Clone Wars with a forty-year-old Christensen playing a teenager without much effort to de-age him are a bit odd). There's moments of satisfying fanservice along the way which will have long-term Star Wars grinning, from the minor (seeing Vader's personal Star Destroyer again) to the major (which would be major spoilers).

The show is inconsistent, though. Like a lot of other Disney+ shows (both Star Wars and Marvel), it feels like the low episode count is preventing it from being too ambitious, meaning a small and often claustrophobic scale which is not very Star Wars. On paper there's a lot to unpack here, with the politicking among the Inquisitors, Vader's hunt for Obi-Wan, the threat from new villain Third Sister Reva, an Imperial defector trying to make amends for the Empire's crimes, an underground railroad for Force-sensitives, Bail Organa walking a political tightrope, flashbacks to the day of Order 66 and the lives of the Skywalker family on Tatooine. However, the tight runtime prevents any of these ideas from really being explored in-depth. Instead we ping-pong between them as needed, meaning there's a lot of people doing a lot of things, but we are not necessarily given a good reason to invest in any of them.

It's a shame because we see some interesting new Star Wars planets for what feels like the first time in ages and there's a lot of ideas here that could be explored in an interesting manner if there was more time, but these ideas never have a chance to breathe.

There's also the curse of the larger canon surrounding the series: Obi-Wan Kenobi ties in to the video game Jedi: Fallen Order and the Clone Wars and Rebels TV shows, and walks a very awkward line between expanding on those entries to the mythos and keeping things accessible to the newcomer.

On the plus side, the lightsabre battles are very impressive, the musical score is great and the cast elevate the material. But there is the feeling that Obi-Wan Kenobi (***½) is relying too much on familiar ideas (another cute kid to protect!) and doesn't have enough time to flesh out its best ideas. The series is available now worldwide on Disney+.

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Fan-favourite STAR WARS book character debuts in live-action

Lucasfilm have sneakily debuted the live-action appearance of a beloved Star Wars literary character. The second episode of Obi-Wan Kenobi sees the first appearance of Corran Horn as a young refugee boy, and he reprised that role in the fifth episode. In the old "Star Wars Expanded Universe" (now called "Legends) line of books, Horn was a hotshot X-wing pilot and Rogue Squadron member who became a powerful Jedi.

Corran Horn was created by Michael A. Stackpole for his X-Wing series of space opera novels. The novels were notable as the first Star Wars book series to focus on original characters, with Star Wars stalwarts like Luke and Leia reduced to cameo appearances. Corran was a hotshot pilot who joined the elite Rogue Squadron two years after the events of Return of the Jedi and rose to become one of its best pilots. He was instrumental in the New Republic's capture of Coruscant and its restoration as the Republic capital world. During these battles Horn was recognised as being Force-sensitive. Eventually he joined Luke Skywalker's New Jedi Academy on Yavin IV, rising to become a Jedi Knight and playing a key role in the war against the Yuuzhan Vong. Horn is notable as one of the few Legends-original characters who got an entire novel (I, Jedi) dedicated to him.

He was a very popular character, despite surface similarities to Luke (a hotshot pilot who becomes a Jedi Knight). He was generally more torn between his different outlooks and options than Luke ever was. In 2012 Disney bought Lucasfilm and the Star Wars IP and later ruled all the spin-off novels and comics non-canon, leading to the assumption that Horn would never be seen again.

In Obi-Wan Kenobi we meet Corran as a young boy on the planet Daiyu, a refugee from the Empire. A man named Haja Estree (Kumail Nanjiana) helps a sort-of underground railroad movement, helping would-be Force-sensitive people especially escape from the Inquisitors. We see Horn and his mother being helped in escaping the planet.. The role of Horn - listed in the credits just as "Corran" - is played by Indie Desroches. His mother, Nyche, is played by Marisé Alvarez. Nyche Horn was also the name of Corran's mother in the books. Horn and his mother briefly reappear on Jabiim in the fifth and latest episode of the series.

Stackpole noted the character's appearance on Twitter and confirmed he had been told about the appearance but he hadn't been consulted on it.

Fans have speculated whether Horn's appearance in Obi-Wan Kenobi is just an Easter Egg or might be setup work for Horn to appear in the upcoming Rogue Squadron movie.

More details revealed about ROGUE ONE prequel show ANDOR

Writer and showrunner Tony Gilroy has dished the dirt on his upcoming Star Wars TV show Andor. A prequel to the movie Rogue One, the TV series focuses on Rebel Alliance agent Cassian Andor (Diego Luna), a ruthless operative who won't let anything stop him from helping bring down the Empire.

The show has the distinction of being the longest live-action Star Wars season to date, with twelve episodes in its first season. That compares to the six of Obi-Wan Kenobi, the seven of The Book of Boba Fett and the eight of each of The Mandalorian's seasons so far. The show is also already prepping a second season, which will apparently complete the story.

According to Gilroy - who previously wrote the first four Bourne movies and helmed the extensive rewrites and reshoots on Rogue One during its production period - the first season (which starts five years before Rogue One) is about how Andor becomes a revolutionary and joins the Rebel Alliance, whilst the second season tells the story of the events leading up to the start of Rogue One. As a result of that structure, don't expect K-2SO (Alan Tudyk) to show up until Season 2.

The show will have more of an ensemble feel, with a large cast of characters as well as Andor, and a major focus on the character of Mon Mothma (Genevieve O'Reilly), the head of the Rebel Alliance. Mothma previously showed up in Return of the Jedi (when she was played by Caroline Blakiston) as utterer of the infamous line, "Many Bothans died to bring us this information." O'Reilly took over the role of the younger Mothma in a scene cut from Revenge of the Sith, but finally got to play the role onscreen in Rogue One. Apparently Mothma and Andor will not cross paths until Season 2, but their parallel journeys in Season 1 are a major part of the story.

I'm not entirely sure this is a story that needs to be told, but Diego Luna is a great actor and Gilroy is an excellent writer and director when it comes to spy stories, so it should, at the least, be intriguing. Rogue One also stands tall as the best Star Wars movie of the recent era (if not the best since Empire), so seeing an extension to it's story could be worthwhile.

Star Wars: Andor is expected to debut on Disney+ before the end of the summer.

Lucasfilm outlines ongoing plans for STAR WARS

In a major article for Vanity Fair, the creatives at Lucasfilm have outlined their plans moving forwards for the Star Wars franchise. The franchise has had mixed fortune recently, scoring a major international hit with TV series The Mandalorian but also two box-office disappointments with Solo (2018) and The Rise of Skywalker (2019), and TV series The Book of Boba Fett which had a mixed reception.

During the article, Lucasfilm confirm the release schedule for their upcoming TV shows, with Obi-Wan Kenobi launching on 27 May and Rogue One prequel show Andor hitting screens a few weeks later, before the end of summer. The Mandalorian Season 3 will arrive late this year or early next, with Ahsoka being a confirmed 2023 release. The Acolyte, a show set during the "High Republic" era about 100 years before The Phantom Menace, is likely to appear in 2023 or 2024.

Lucasfilm are also developing a new project, which so far only has the code name "Grammar Rodeo" (a Simpsons reference). The show sounds like Star Wars: Stranger Things, with a group of four children who get swept up in events following the fall of the Empire. The show is reported to have a "Amblin coming-of-age adventure" vibe from the 1980s. Director Jon Watts, who helmed the recent Spider-Man Homecoming trilogy, is in charge alongside writer Chris Ford.

In terms of feature films, it appears that the new focus is on Taika Waititi's Star Wars movie, which is in pre-production and will be Waititi's next project once Thor: Love & Thunder launches and he gets his commitments to that out of the way. That could potentially be a 2024 release. Patty Jenkins' Rogue Squadron movie was delayed a while back due to commitments to Wonder Woman 3 and Cleopatra, but Jenkins cleared Cleopatra by transferring it to another director. Rogue Squadron will be Jenkins' next film once the third Wonder Woman movie is done, possibly for 2025.

Marvel Cinematic Universe head honcho Kevin Feige agreed to brainstorm and produce a Star Wars movie a while back, but he's so busy with the MCU that that project has been back-burnered. Likewise on hold is Rian Johnson's Star Wars trilogy. Johnson has committed to his Knives Out franchise and a Netflix deal, which puts a Star Wars return a long way off. Left unspoken is the mixed critical reception to Johnson's film The Last Jedi, which may have discouraged his return to the franchise altogether.

The Knights of the Old Republic movie, rumoured heavily a couple of years ago, and the rumoured Lando Calrissian TV show, are also left completely unmentioned.

The article addresses potential issues with the Star Wars franchise moving forwards: most of the projects reiterate on eras and things we have seen before. Only The Acolyte seems to be set in a new time period distinct from the prior settings, and even that is apparently going to eventually be setting up The Phantom Menace (I suspect a Darth Plagueis appearance). The article also suggests that the failure of Solo has been blamed on recasting Han Solo rather than its release date or franchise fatigue. This has driven the decision to use CGI to resurrect classic characters rather than recasting, which I think is the wrong conclusion to draw from that. The "deepfake" technology is getting better all the time, but it's still not at the point where classic characters can be restored to the screen convincingly. Even if it could, it feels like that's feeding into the desire to keep Star Wars permanently stuck revisiting the same time periods, characters and concepts.

The mixed reception to Star Wars projects which have tried to go in new directions seems to have resulted in a lot of conservatism in these new projects, which is a shame. The problem with the sequel trilogy wasn't that it was trying to go in new directions, but that it starting off not doing that (with the highly retro and fan-servicing The Force Awakens), then did that only semi-successfully (in The Last Jedi, half of the best Star Wars movie bolted onto half of the most pointless) and then reversed course again and made a complete pig's ear out of the situation (in The Rise of Skywalker). A Star Wars project which did go in genuinely new directions with a coherent plan in place from the start and was genuinely well-written I think would have every chance of success.

Forthcoming Star Wars Projects

• Obi-Wan Kenobi: Disney+ streaming series, 27 May 2022
• Andor: Disney+ streaming series, late summer 2022
• The Mandalorian Season 3: Disney+ streaming series, late 2022/early 2023
• Ahsoka: Disney+ streaming series, 2023
• The Acolyte: Disney+ streaming series, 2023/2024
• "Grammar Rodeo": Disney+ streaming series, tbc
• Taika Waititi-directed Star Wars movie, tbc
• Rogue Squadron: feature film, tbc
• Kevin Feige Star Wars movie: on hold
• Rian Johnson Star Wars trilogy: on hold

New trailer released for STAR WARS: OBI-WAN KENOBI

Lucasfilm have released a new trailer for their upcoming mini-series Star Wars: Obi-Wan Kenobi.

Set roughly halfway between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope, the six-part series sees Obi-Wan Kenobi reluctantly pulled away from his mission on Tatooine, safeguarding the young Luke Skywalker (to the ire of his aunt and uncle), to deal with a group of Imperial Inquisitors who are tracking down the last of the Jedi.

The series sees Ewan Mcgregor reprising his role as Obi-Wan Kenobi, with Hayden Christensen also returning as Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader, Joel Edgerton as Owen Lars and Bonnie Piesse as Beru. Also starring in the series are Moses Ingram, Indira Varma, Rupert Friend, Sung Kang, Kumail Nanjiani, O'Shea Jackson, Simone Kessell, Benny Safdie, Maya Eriskine and Rory Ross, among others.

The series debuts on Disney+ on 27 May with a double bill of its first two episodes.

Christopher Lloyd joins THE MANDALORIAN

Lucasfilm have cast legendary comedic actor Christopher Lloyd in the third season of The Mandalorian.

Lloyd is best-known for his co-starring role as Dr. Emmett Brown in the Back to the Future movie trilogy alongside Michael J. Fox (plus a cameo in A Million Ways to Die in the West), as well as his role on the sitcom Taxi (1978-83) and the films One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975) and Clue (1985). He also starred as the villain in Star Trek III: The Search for Spock (1984) and has recently co-starred in the move Nobody (2021).

The third season of The Mandalorian is currently shooting and is expected to air later this year. Lucasfilm will launch Obi-Wan Kenobi on 25 May and Rogue One spin-off Andor in the meantime.

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.