The Star Wars franchise is in a very exciting place right now; we have Star Wars: The Last Jedi coming this December, a Han Solo origin story on the way in 2018, and the finale of the current trilogy with 2019’s Star Wars Episode IX. However, what comes after that is currently a mystery.
Will a new trilogy be launched, and if so, is it going to revolve around the same characters? Or will it move ahead in this world’s history? Oh, and let’s not forget what form those spinoffs might take. An Ewan McGregor led Obi-Wan Kenobi movie is one possibility, but that’s just one of many rumoured upcoming releases.
While we don’t have any exact answers to those questions just yet, during a talk today at USC’s Marshall School of Business, Disney CEO Bob Iger had this to say about the studio’s long-term plans for the Star Wars franchise:
“We’re just starting to talk about what happens to Star Wars after [Episode] 9. It’s way too early, and certainly nothing that I can reveal, but we’ve got a creative team actually thinking about what could be another decade and a half of Star Wars stories. It’s kind of mind-blowing to spend an afternoon with a creative team talking about that. Where could you go, where should we go?”
It’s good to know that Disney and Lucasfilm are thinking ahead rather than making things up as they go along, and it’s a relief that they’re taking the Marvel Studios approach to planning out where the Star Wars franchise will go next. What happens fifteen years from now, though? It’s easy to imagine the studio ultimately running out of legacy characters to exploit, but that may not be a bad thing assuming these releases continue introducing a wide array of new heroes and villains. Either way, the future of the Star Wars franchise definitely looks bright and we’re excited to see what else Iger and co. have in store for us.