Before the days of Disney, the new trilogy, and Jon Favreau’s currently-in-production Mandalorian show, the idea of a live action series set in the galaxy far, far away was more than many fans could dare to dream of. But there was once hope of a mythical show that was to be helmed by George Lucas and would feature episodes written by some of the biggest genre names out there. It was called Star Wars: Underworld, and with the new announcement that Disney+ will be rolling out a Cassian Andor solo series, we got to thinking about how that never-made project could serve as the skeleton for the Diego Luna-starring program.
It makes sense that the new show would have to mine some material from a Star Wars project that never saw the light of day; Cassian Andor hasn’t had much time to establish canon in the Star Wars universe. Since his first appearance in 2016’s Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, he’s had a one-shot comic, which gave fans a little context and history about how he met his partner in crime, K-2SO, a reprogrammed Imperial Droid. And since (Rogue One spoilers!) Cassian died at the end of Rogue One as the planet of Scarif was destroyed by the Death Star, it’s unlikely the story will continue on from there. So we’re thinking that the outline for the never finished George Lucas project, which was purported to be set between the end of Revenge of the Sith and the beginning of A New Hope, might just be a great place to start.
Lucas announced Star Wars: Underworld at Celebration 2005. The show was rumored to be an expansive epic that  would focus on the criminal underworld of the planet Coruscant—which we briefly saw in Episode II: Attack of the Clones—and would work almost as a televised expanded universe story. The series wouldn’t focus on main canon characters, though Lucas did say that they could appear and that Underworld would be connected to multiple threads of Star Wars lore. Lucas had also mentioned that, just like Rogue One, the show would contain no Jedi.
It was an age before the era of prestige TV as we know it, and during an interview with movieweb in 2011, Lucas explained why the show had gone on hiatus. Less than a year later, the deal with Disney was announced. “It sits on the shelf. We have 50 hours. We are trying to figure out a different way of making movies. We are looking for a different technology that we can use, that will make it economically feasible to shoot the show. Right now, it looks like the Star Wars features. But we have to figure out how to make it at about a tenth of the cost of the features, because it’s television. We are working toward that, and we continue to work towards that.”
Though Lucas may have been wrong about having to find ways to create cheaper Star Wars shows (Disney is projected to spend $100,000,000 on Jon Favreau’s The Mandalorian), the idea of a show exploring the world behind the shiny, bustling facade of Coruscant is a brilliant one and would fit in perfectly with a possible prequel for Cassian Andor and the burgeoning days of the Rebellion. The planet is the proverbial center of the Star Wars galaxy; from classic and new canon like Lost Stars, we know that it was also the center of both the burgeoning Imperial forces and the Rebellion. Placing Cassian right in the center of that could be perfect. Such an iconic and bustling setting also opens the door to some potential killer cameos like Enfys Nest or Ciena Ree, and even original trilogy cast like Mon Mothma and Princess Leia.
We got a glimpse at the wider criminal galaxy in Solo: A Star Wars Story with the Crimson Dawn, and repurposing Underworld could be a great way of delving even deeper, especially as it’s unlikely that we’ll get a Solo sequel. But we could definitely imagine Qi’ra showing up in an episode or maybe even getting a glimpse of Maul. There’s a vast underbelly to be explored and Cassian’s past could be the perfect way to do it.
Do you buy into this theory? Just want to see more Diego Luna? Think it’s actually a secret Caravan of Courage reboot? Let us know below!!
Images: Disney
