When Disney first took the reins of Lucasfilm, they announced that they would be relaunching the series with STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS, the first of a brand new trilogy of films which would continue the story of the Skywalker clan over thirty years after the conclusion of RETURN OF THE JEDI. This sequel trilogy would be interspersed with standalone installments, the first of which will be ROGUE ONE: A STAR WARS STORY, but what are Lucasfilm's plans post STAR WARS: EPISODE IX?
Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy was asked that very question recently by Entertainment Weekly and surprisingly, it seems that Lucasfilm doesn't know quite what they're going to do either.
That’s a conversation going on right now, too, I have to honestly tell you, could we [do nothing but stand-alones]? Sure. But I don’t know. We are looking at all of that. There are [possible movies] that we have been talking a lot about, but we are planning to sit down in January, since we will have had The Force Awakens released, now Rogue One, and we’ve finished shooting Episode VIII. We have enough information where we can step back a little bit and say, What are we doing? What do we feel is exciting? And what are some of the things we want to explore?”
I know, not the biggest piece of breaking news out there, but it's definitely an interesting topic for discussion. Disney/Lucasfilm is obviously going to keep the STAR WARS train running for as long as they can, and I think most of us assumed that another STAR WARS trilogy would pick up the pieces following the climax of EPISODE IX. It looks like they haven't figured out which direction they want to go just yet, but I'd be very shocked if Colin Trevorrow's EPISODE IX was the last we saw of the main saga. Kennedy is correct, Lucasfilm would be perfectly fine if they produced nothing but standalone installments, but the main saga movies will always be the big draw. I'd like to hear how you folks would prefer to see Lucasfilm handle the STAR WARS franchise post-EPISODE IX. Should they continue purely with the standalone films or stick to their schedule and launch EPISODE X in 2021, or perhaps even wait a few years before the main saga returns?
ROGUE ONE: A STAR WARS STORY is set for a December 16, 2016 release, followed by STAR WARS: EPISODE VIII on December 15, 2017, the UNTITLED HAN SOLO ANTHOLOGY FILM on May 25, 2018, STAR WARS: EPISODE IX on May 24, 2019 and a third UNTITLED ANTHOLOGY FILM arriving by 2020.
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