The Force is strong with Rian Johnson, it seems. In advance of the release of Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Disney announced that it has tapped Johnson to create a brand new trilogy of films in the Star Wars universe. This trilogy will be set in an unexplored corner of the Star Wars universe, focusing on a new cast of characters, and tell a wholly original story. Johnson, who is set to write and direct the first film in the new trilogy, will produce the films alongside his longtime producing partner Ram Bergman. The news, which we saw via Deadline, was announced by Disney CEO Bob Iger during a company call to discuss its yearly and quarterly earnings with financial analysts, and later confirmed in an official post on StarWars.com.
“We all loved working with Rian on The Last Jedi,” said Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy in a statement. “He’s a creative force, and watching him craft The Last Jedi from start to finish was one of the great joys of my career. Rian will do amazing things with the blank canvas of this new trilogy.”
The fact that Disney wants to work with Johnson again isn’t surprising given his talent as a filmmaker and his apparent ability to play within the sandbox that has seen directors like Phil Lord and Chris Miller (Solo: A Star Wars Story), Josh Trank (the untitled Boba Fett spinoff), Colin Trevorrow (Star Wars: Episode IX), and Gareth Edwards (replaced on Rogue One reshoots by Tony Gilroy) removed, replaced, and repurposed to fit the seemingly strict Lucasfilm master plan.
The surprising part is that this story will seemingly, finally deviate from the existing Star Wars storyline as we know it. The Skywalker saga, when completed, will span nine core films and god knows how many spinoffs, but the prospect of a new trilogy in a different part of galaxy raises a whole host of narrative and logistical questions and may excite fans who thought that the series was too cyclical. What part of the Star Wars galaxy will this take place in? Will it be set in the distant past or the far-flung future? Only time will tell. After all, as Lucasfilm notes in their statement: “No release dates have been set for the new films, and no porgs were available for comment.”
What would you want to see from a brand new Star Wars trilogy? Let us know in the comments below
Image: Disney/Lucasfilm
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Dan Casey is the senior editor of Nerdist and the author of books about Star Wars and the Avengers. Follow him on Twitter (@DanCasey).
