Lucasfilm’s Star Wars franchise is one of many moving parts.
At the time of writing, the Powers That Be over at Skywalker Ranch are no doubt hard at work trying to figure out why Solo: A Star War Story, the second of Lucasfilm’s Anthology pics, bombed so hard at the box office this weekend. Back in the Sequel Trilogy, meanwhile, The Force Awakens director J.J. Abrams has returned to helm Episode IX, with filming expected to kick off in the United Kingdom this July.
Looking further afield, though, and while the studio is reportedly keen on getting a Lando spinoff in the works at some point, the mooted Obi-Wan Kenobi pic is beginning to make serious headway ahead of its own production start in the spring. As expected, it’ll take place between the events of Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope, with Ewan McGregor rumored to reprise his role as the legendary Jedi Master in some shape or form. Details beyond that are scarce, but could an important Prequel Trilogy character be set for an appearance in the movie as well?
At the Comicpalooza convention this past weekend, a fan named David Weiser took to Twitter to share his experience meeting with Ray Park. For those unaware, the actor’s best known for playing Darth Maul in The Phantom Menace, not to mention later reprising the role in the aforementioned Solo. While Park didn’t have anything particularly groundbreaking to say, here’s what Weiser shared:
And the last person I met for the weekend was Ray Park. Very nice guy! Had a chat with him about the character of Darth Maul and various Lucasfilm endeavors. I’m just gonna say he strongly implied that a Kenobi movie will happen so all the reports are PROBABLY legit.
There’s two things of note here that we’d like to point out. For one, the fact that Park is strongly implying that the Obi-Wan film is a go is a good sign, as you’d imagine that he could have some inside information on the project. Otherwise, why would he imply that it’ll happen? Furthermore, and in the same line of thinking, if he does indeed know something about the pic that we don’t, could he be involved in it?
As we said above, we just saw Maul return in Solo and from his appearance there, it seems that Lucasfilm definitely has more plans for him. Could it be, then, that his next role will be in the Obi-Wan Kenobi movie? It certainly seems possible, wouldn’t you say?
Even if he doesn’t show up here, then let’s just hope that Ewan McGregor gets a final stab at the character. For all the prequels’ problems, he was consistently great in them, even when wrestling with some truly terrible dialogue. As such, I’d love to see his take on the character in a solid movie. C’mon Disney and Lucasfilm, give the fans what they want!