The upcoming Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker is set to bring the decades-spanning Skywalker Saga to a close, but that’s not to say the entire film end of the franchise stops here.
Speaking to The Star Wars Show at the recent Star Wars Celebration, Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy clarified that while this year’s release will serve as a finale of sorts, she’s still excited to see what the future holds for the property.
“It’s a mixed feeling of emotions. We don’t look at it entirely as an end, but it is a culmination of the Skywalker story,” Kennedy said. “I’m also incredibly excited about where we’re going and what the future holds and what the new saga might be.”
Though the premiere of The Mandalorian on Disney Plus later this year will signal the start of a new series of small screen adventures, Disney CEO Bob Iger recently mentioned that the film franchise will go on hiatus after The Rise of Skywalker. Nonetheless, The Last Jedi helmsman Rian Johnson and Game of Thrones creators David Benioff and D.B. Weiss are each working on their own series of movies, and Kennedy has even mentioned that a project following the Knights of the Old Republic is in development.
What’s more, the producer told MTV News a few days ago that there are certain characters in the Sequel Trilogy that Lucasfilm “may very well want to see down the line in the future.” So while The Rise of Skywalker is likely to be the final outing for several Original Trilogy stars, the younger heroes may still have more stories to tell.
But again, we’re reportedly in for a bit of a wait before the next set of Star Wars movies comes along, so we probably shouldn’t expect Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker to leave us with any major cliffhangers. In any case, we’ll see how Abrams wraps up this current era when the film hits theaters on December 20th.