Next month, The Mandalorian arrives on Disney+ and, in one fell swoop, becomes the first live-action Star Wars series in history.
For a franchise that has been going strong since as far back as 1977, one can’t help but wonder why it took so long for the Powers That Be to fast-track a live-action TV series, but here we are. Two months out from The Rise of Skywalker‘s premiere, and Jon Favreau and his team have delivered an episodic take on the titular bounty hunter.
And according to animation guru and Lucasfilm veteran Dave Filoni, The Mandalorian is very much fulfilling George Lucas’ vision of modern-day Star Wars, after Filoni revealed that the former Lucasfilm chief always envisioned a future in which Star Wars expanded onto streaming platforms such as Disney+.
We can make something like Star Wars because technology has advanced, and that’s one of the dreams that George [Lucas] had even when I worked with him on Clone Wars. He would talk about the future being streaming, the future being episodic, serialized Star Wars, because it’s what influenced him.
Disney+ is expected to boot online next month with more content than you can shake a lightsaber at – hell, it’s even got all eight live-action installments in the Skywalker Saga, which will surely fuel all sorts of marathons as we approach The Rise of Skywalker‘s debut in December.
As for The Mandalorian, it’s but one of the TV projects percolating at Lucasfilm towers, given there are also plans in place for an Obi-Wan Kenobi spinoff. Perhaps most exciting of all is that the latter TV show will herald the long-awaited return of Ewan (“hello there!”) McGregor as the fan favorite character.
It’s a little further out than The Mandalorian, which is locked in for a Disney+ premiere on November 12th. And based on early reactions, Favreau and his team are on to a winner.