Disney Star Wars Announcements

So, unless you've been living under a rock, Disney announced a whole bunch of Star Wars and Marvel news the other day. I'll discuss the Marvel news later. Here are my thoughts on the Star Wars news.

First up: the Mandalorian, a truly great show by the way, is getting two spin-offs. Rangers of the New Republic and Ahsoka. Now, Ahsoka is the one I'm most excited about. If you don't know who that is, then you clearly haven't been keeping up with Star Wars. Ahsoka Tano is the apprentice to Anakin Skywalker but left the Jedi order due to losing faith in them. She appeared in the animated film The Clone Wars in 2008 and has appeared in animated series Star Wars: The Clone Wars and Star Wars: Rebels, voiced by Ashley Eckstein, and recently appeared in The Mandalorian played by Rosario Dawson. She is one of my favorite characters in Star Wars and her getting her own series is truly awesome. I believe I may have squealed a little bit at the news. The Rangers series sounds fun as well and I'm interested if it will follow the X-Wing pilot played by Paul Sun-Hyung Lee cause I love his acting in Kim's Convenience and his character is pretty interesting so far here. Also, apparently all of these series will converge for an event. Now, I'm pretty sure that will revolve around the tease of 'Grand Admiral Thrawn,' Star Wars Rebels villain and one of the greatest Imperial tacticians. In Star Wars Legends (Star Wars stories that came out before Disney bought it) Thrawn tried to restart the Empire in a trilogy of books featuring Luke, Leia, and Han on another adventure. It seems like Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni may be trying to repeat that here. Sounds fun. Can't wait.

Next, Andor. A new series based on Cassian Andor, the rebel soldier from Rogue One, and his adventures evading the Empire. One of the things I love about Rogue One was that it was new and gritty look at Star Wars and the sacrifices that had to be made to win against the power of the Empire. The original trilogy didn't focus on it as much so that's kind of what I'm hoping will happen here. Rebels undertaking nail-biting missions with everything on the line and not everyone making it out. That's already shown in some of the comics, now it's time for it to be seen on live action.

Obi-Wan Kenobi, a limited series (meaning it only gets one season) that will take place ten years after Revenge of the Sith and follow Ewan McGregor's Kenobi. It will also feature the return of Hayden Christensen as Darth Vader in the 'rematch of the century.' Not sure how that will work out in canon, but excited to see what happens. I've always been cautions about this series as there is not much Kenobi can do on Tatooine and yet his stories need to be entertaining. So we'll see. Still, excited for this rematch.

The Bad Batch. If you don't follow The Clone Wars, then these characters are new. Basically, the Bad Batch are defective clones with desirable mutations. Each one has a unique skill valued in the war. Now, the war's over. The Empire has risen. This show will follow them as they try to adapt to this new world. Honestly, these characters were awesome in The Clone Wars so I'm excited to see this new show. Plus, the beginnings of the Empire. Not many Star Wars stories about that.

Star Wars Visions. Apparently Star Wars anime. Didn't get much information out of it and I'm not that much into anime so not too excited for this until I see some more of it.

Lando. Another limited series coming out. I like Lando. But I don't love the character. So, I'm cautious about this one. See what it looks like. But this announcement isn't really something that gets me excited.

The Acolyte. A new series that will take place in the final days of the High Republic. The High Republic is the era of Star Wars 200 years before Phantom Menace and has a whole slew of books and comics on it coming out this January. Sounds fun. But again, not too excited.

Taika Waititi's new Star Wars movie has no news except it's still being worked on. I have the same level of excitement when I first heard the news, so good. He reinvented Thor and made him one of the best Marvel characters, so here's hoping he'll do it to Star Wars. Cause those films need a reinvention after the last one.

Wonder Woman's director, Patty Jenkins is directing Rogue Squadron, a fighter pilot movie in Star Wars. Gotta say, this sounds a lot of fun. The space battles are always one of the best parts of Star Wars and yet there are so few of them and they don't last long or they're part of the original trilogy and you've already seen them a hundred times (and the visual effects are much better now). This feels like it'll go all in on the space battles and ship on ship action. That's awesome. So I am very excited for this movie.

From all this news, to me it sounds like while Star Wars is going full throttle on new stories, they're also playing it a little safe. After they lost many fans with the new trilogy, they need to win their trust back and honestly it seems like so far they're doing it. The Mandalorian is striking the right balance of nostalgia and new, making Star Wars entertaining again. Let's hope they keep that up.