Spoiler warning for The Mandalorian Season 2
When Disney+ launched so did the ambitious Star Wars TV Show The Mandalorian. After two seasons, the story of Din Djarin and Grogu (Better known as Baby Yoda) has become a bona fide hit. A hit that was much needed after the middling offerings of The Force Awakens, The Last Jedi, and The Rise of Skywalker.
Season 2 of The Mandalorian reintroduced beloved characters such as the former Jedi Ahsoka Tano (played by Rosario Dawson), Bo-Katan Kryze (Katee Sackhoff) a leader of a Mandalorian group called the Nite Owls, Boba Fett (Temuera Morrison) and Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamil) himself. while bringing back Cara Dune (Gina Carano) Greef Karga (Carl Weathers) and Mayfeld (Bill Burr) from season one. These memorable and fun cast members really worked to make the series feel like a living and breathing world, intertwining with the original story while telling it’s own.
At the Disney investor meeting earlier this month the company did not hold back on confirming and announcing new Disney+ series as well as theatrical releases.
The Book of Boba Fett, while it wasn’t announced during the investor meetings it was teased at the end of The Mandalorian season 2, season 3 of The Mandalorian was confirmed, Andor a series starring Rogue One actor Diego Luna reprising his role as Casian Andor, Rangers of the New Republic lead by Gina Carano, Ahsoka with Rosario Dawson, Obi-Wan Kenobi with Ewan McGregor and Hayden Christensen reprising their roles as Obi-Wan and Darth Vader, an animated sequel to the Clone Wars series entitled The Bad Batch, a series of animated short films called Star Wars Visions, a limited series called Lando with Donald Glover likely reprising his role as Lando Calrissian, The Acolyte which is described as a thriller, Patty Jenkins director of Wonder Woman and Wonder Woman 1984 will direct Rogue Squadron, and an untitled film directed by Taika Waititi fresh off of Thor Ragnarok, and Jojo Rabbit.
These announcements tell us two things, the first being our Disney+ subscriptions will be well worth the money, and the second that Disney is modeling their Star Wars strategy after their Marvel studios success. An interconnected universe of movies and television shows rather than a single mainline movie once every few years. This change was needed, regardless of how you feel about the sequel trilogy, and everyone reading this knows that discussion can easily become toxic, the new Disney movies hurt Star Wars’ reputation. After a promising but unoriginal start with The Force Awakens, The Last Jedi fractured the fanbase, and very few people actually enjoyed The Rise of Skywalker.
Stepping away from the mainline story is the right move. Even so this has been lightly attempted before with Rogue One, and the less successful Solo: A Star Wars Story. However I think a sustained focus on expanding the universe while connecting the series for a bigger narrative could pay off extremely well. Disney is really the only company that has pulled anything like this off with The Avengers on the big screen and The Defenders on the small screen. While one has taken over pop culture the other was not as well received. Though the Netflix shows do have their fans, myself among them. Star Wars is often referred to as a sandbox where many stories can be told, and some have pointed out that people are seemingly afraid to play. These films should be the first step in a new age of Star Wars, one that could bring the franchise to a level of cultural relevance Disney envisioned when they purchased the rights for more than $4 billion dollars in 2012. It all started with a masked hero and an adorable sidekick and I for one am excited to see how it all plays out.
No comments:
Post a Comment