Disney may finally have found something rarer than a peaceful Jedi Council meeting: a cheaper Star Wars production. According to a new Forbes report, pre-production on Ahsoka Season 2 cost around 30% less than The Acolyte, making it one of Disney’s leaner Star Wars projects. That is not the same as saying Ahsoka is suddenly being made for pocket change. This is still Star Wars, where “budget-conscious” probably means someone only built three ancient temples instead of five. But after years of expensive streaming swings, the number is still worth noticing. Ahsoka Is Getting a More Disciplined Season 2 The comparison point matters. The Acolyte became one of the most debated Disney-era Star Wars projects, not just because of the story, but because of its reported cost. Forbes previously reported that The Acolyte spent $49.2 million during pre-production alone, before the full production spend entered the conversation. Now Ahsoka Season…
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Dave Filoni Says He’s Becoming Lucasfilm’s Little Obi-Wan
Dave Filoni has found a very Dave Filoni way to describe running Star Wars. Not “brand architect.”Not “content overseer.”Not “the guy trying to stop the galaxy from collapsing under the weight of canon spreadsheets.” No, Filoni sees himself a little differently. Speaking to USA Today, via AOL, the Lucasfilm creative chief described his role as helping bring out the best in the people around him and being “a little Obi-Wan” when creators need guidance through the galaxy. Honestly, that may be the most Star Wars management quote ever given. The Mentor Role Fits Filoni Almost Too Well Filoni has always been a slightly unusual figure in modern Star Wars. He began as George Lucas’ animation apprentice on The Clone Wars, became one of the key voices behind Rebels, helped shape the Disney+ era through The Mandalorian and Ahsoka, and is now one of the central creative leaders steering Lucasfilm into…
Mando and Grogu Just Made Starfighter’s Job Harder
The Mandalorian and Grogu has done its job. Star Wars is back in theaters, the opening weekend was strong, and Grogu has once again proven that he may be less a character and more a tiny green economic stabilizer with ears. But that success also makes the next Star Wars movie more interesting. Because if The Mandalorian and Grogu was the safe theatrical restart, Star Wars: Starfighter is shaping up to be the real test. The Safe Bet Worked The numbers are good. The Mandalorian and Grogu opened with roughly $165 million worldwide, according to Reuters, giving Lucasfilm exactly what it needed after years away from cinemas: proof that Star Wars can still pull people into theaters. But it did so with a lot of help. Din Djarin and Grogu are familiar. They have years of Disney+ momentum behind them. They are family-friendly, toy-friendly, meme-friendly, and emotionally simple in the…
Star Wars’ Streaming Detour May Not Have Hurt the Franchise After All
For years, the big worry around Star Wars was simple: had Disney trained audiences to see the galaxy as a streaming franchise? After The Mandalorian, The Book of Boba Fett, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Andor, Ahsoka, and several animated series, Star Wars had spent a long time living on Disney+. Good for subscription value. Good for weekly discourse. Good for Grogu GIFs. But maybe risky for theaters. Now The Mandalorian and Grogu has opened with around $165 million worldwide, and the early answer may be less dramatic than expected. Star Wars did not return to cinemas like The Force Awakens. But it also did not come crawling back with a broken hyperdrive and a note from accounting. As box office analyst David A. Gross told Variety: “For Star Wars not to be hurt in any obvious way by its long detour onto streaming is good news for the franchise.” That is the…
Mando and Grogu Opens Big, But Star Wars Still Has Something to Prove
Star Wars is back in theaters, and the opening weekend number is doing exactly what Star Wars numbers usually do: starting an argument. The Mandalorian and Grogu opened to an estimated $165 million worldwide over Memorial Day weekend, with about $102 million coming from the U.S. and Canada, according to Reuters and AP. That is a big number. A very big number, in fact. It is also the lowest domestic opening for a Disney-era Star Wars movie. So yes, welcome back to theatrical Star Wars, where even success has to arrive carrying a small glowing discourse grenade. A Strong Opening, But Not a Supernova For almost any other franchise, a $165 million global launch would be a clear victory lap. For Star Wars, it comes with an asterisk shaped like the Millennium Falcon. The good news is obvious: The Mandalorian and Grogu brought Star Wars back to cinemas after a…
Can Mando and Grogu Make Star Wars Feel Big Again?
Star Wars is back in theaters, but the real question is slightly more uncomfortable: Does it still feel huge? The Mandalorian and Grogu has finally brought the galaxy far, far away back to cinemas after a long theatrical break. It is the first new Star Wars movie since The Rise of Skywalker in 2019, and Disney is clearly hoping Din Djarin and Grogu can do more than sell popcorn. They need to remind people that Star Wars still belongs on the biggest screen possible. That is a heavier job than it sounds. The Galaxy Returns With Smaller Expectations According to Reuters, The Mandalorian and Grogu has been projected to open somewhere between $75 million and $100 million in the U.S. and Canada. For almost any other franchise, that would be a strong launch. For Star Wars, it is more complicated. Disney-era Star Wars used to open like a cultural emergency….
Fortnite’s Mando Crossover Is Only the First Step
Fortnite is not just borrowing Star Wars costumes anymore. It is starting to look like one of the places where Star Wars tests what the franchise can become next. With The Mandalorian and Grogu now tied directly into Fortnite through a dedicated Watch Party Island, quests, rewards, and a full Nevarro-inspired experience, Lucasfilm and Epic Games are doing more than tossing Din Djarin into the Item Shop and calling it a day. According to StarWars.com, the Watch Party Island gave players a special message from Jon Favreau and a 10-minute sneak peek of The Mandalorian and Grogu ahead of the film’s theatrical release. That alone is unusual enough. But Favreau’s comments to GamesRadar make the whole thing more interesting. He called the collaboration “a very first step” toward what he sees becoming a much larger project. That sounds less like a one-off promo and more like Lucasfilm quietly opening a…
Mando and Grogu’s 88% Audience Score Splits the Room
Star Wars is back in theaters, and yes, the galaxy is arguing again. The Mandalorian and Grogu currently has an 88% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, based on more than 1,000 verified ratings. That is a strong early sign that regular moviegoers are responding much more warmly to Din Djarin and Grogu’s big-screen adventure than many critics did. Because naturally, Star Wars could not simply return to cinemas quietly. It had to bring a scoreboard. Audiences Are Much Kinder Than Critics At the time of writing, Rotten Tomatoes lists the film at 64% on the Tomatometer and 88% on the Popcornmeter. That gap is the story. Critics have been more cautious, with several reviews describing the film as fun but familiar, charming but light, or closer to a supersized Disney+ adventure than a major cinematic reinvention. Audiences, apparently, are less bothered by that. For many viewers, “Mando and Grogu go…
Pedro Pascal Still Wants More Mando and Grogu
Pedro Pascal is not talking like someone ready to put the helmet away for good. With The Mandalorian and Grogu bringing Din Djarin and his tiny green chaos apprentice to the big screen, Pascal has made it clear that he still sees more road ahead for Star Wars’ most famous clan of two. Speaking in a new CBR interview clip, Pascal said he sees “a next chapter” for the pair, whether that happens on the big screen or the small screen. That is not an official announcement, obviously. Lucasfilm has not suddenly dropped a secret trilogy, a Disney+ season, and a Grogu holiday special into our laps. But it is still the kind of quote that tells you something important: the actor at the center of this whole beskar-covered machine does not sound finished. The Clan of Two Still Has Mileage The appeal of Mando and Grogu has always been…
Star Wars: Galactic Racer Leak Points to an October 2026 Release
Star Wars: Galactic Racer have just let one of its biggest remaining secrets slip a little early. Several new images were briefly added to the game’s Steam store page, including fresh screenshots and marketing artwork that appeared to contain both release date and pre-order information. Those assets were later pulled, but not before we spotted the details. Because the live Steam page currently still lists the game with a broader 2026 window, the surfaced date still sits in leak territory rather than full official confirmation. The leaked date is October 6, 2026 The leak points to October 6, 2026 as the launch date for Star Wars: Galactic Racer, with the surfaced material also mentioning pre-order bonuses. While that date is not currently shown on the public Steam listing, the game’s digital storefront presence has clearly been expanding, and the broader rollout makes the timing believable. So no, Lucasfilm has not…
London Film and Comic Con 2026 Has Been Cancelled
A major UK fan event just dropped off the calendar. London Film and Comic Con 2026 has been cancelled, according to reporting from Fantha Tracks, which says there will be no 2026 edition of the long-running convention. The same outlet notes that guests who had already been announced for the 2026 show are now being shifted toward other Showmasters events instead. That is a pretty significant blow for convention fans, especially with LFCC usually sitting as one of the bigger annual genre gatherings in the UK. The cancellation is notable because other Showmasters events are still moving What makes this more interesting is that this does not look like a full stop for Showmasters activity in 2026. Fantha Tracks had already been covering London Comic Con Spring 2026 at Olympia earlier this year, including multiple guest announcements, and those posts explicitly referenced the return of that event after the cancellation…
Andor Season 2 Has Now Won a Peabody Award
Andor Season 2 is no longer just a nominee. It is now officially a Peabody Award winner, giving Lucasfilm’s most prestige-coded Star Wars series another serious trophy on the shelf. The 86th Peabody winners were announced by the Peabody Awards, and Andor (Season 2) appears among this year’s winners in Entertainment. That makes this a pretty big follow-up to the earlier nomination story. This is not Andor’s first Peabody win What makes the update even stronger is that this is not the first time Andor has pulled this off. The Peabody Awards previously honored the series at the 83rd Annual Peabody Awards for its first season, which means the show has now won Peabody recognition twice. Jedi News also noted that Season 1 had already won a Peabody, making this latest result feel less like a fluke and more like a pattern. And honestly, that feels extremely on-brand for Andor….
On This Day in 2019, Battlefront II Added Kashyyyk to Capital Supremacy
Seven years ago today, Star Wars Battlefront II got one of its most important Clone Wars-era updates. On April 24, 2019, DICE rolled out the Giants Above Kachirho Update, bringing Kashyyyk – Kachirho Beach into Capital Supremacy. The official patch notes listed the new map as the headline addition, while later summaries of the game’s update history also note that April 24 was the date Kashyyyk joined the mode. That may sound like a smaller content drop now, but at the time, it mattered a lot. Capital Supremacy was still the big new thing When Capital Supremacy launched in March 2019, it instantly felt like the mode Battlefront II had been missing. Bigger battles, AI soldiers, command posts, and ship assaults gave the game a more ambitious, large-scale Clone Wars identity. EA’s own follow-up coverage in spring 2019 made it clear that more locations were already planned, with Kashyyyk arriving…
On This Day in 2014, Star Wars Games Officially Became Legends
Twelve years ago, the Star Wars galaxy changed in a way that still shapes gaming conversations now. On April 25, 2014, Lucasfilm published its now-famous announcement, “The Legendary Star Wars Expanded Universe Turns a New Page,” confirming that the old Expanded Universe would be rebranded as Star Wars Legends. That move hit books and comics hardest in the public conversation, but it also changed the status of a huge chunk of Star Wars gaming history overnight. That meant a long list of beloved titles — from Knights of the Old Republic and Jedi Knight to The Force Unleashed, Republic Commando, and Dark Forces — were no longer part of the main official canon timeline. They were still Star Wars. Still playable. Still important. But now they lived under the Legends banner instead. The day old Star Wars games entered a different timeline For a lot of players, this was the…
Shawn Levy Says Star Wars: Starfighter Is Now in the Edit Room
Star Wars: Starfighter has moved into a very important phase of production: the part where the footage stops being potential and starts becoming an actual movie. Speaking to Variety at the Breakthrough Prize Ceremony, director Shawn Levy said he is currently editing the film, describing himself as being in the “beautiful sanctity of the edit room” while shaping the movie ahead of its 2027 release. As Levy put it, “We don’t come out until next year,” adding that he is in the “dark quiet of the edit room finding the best possible shape for the film.” The quote comes from Variety’s recent interview with Levy. That is not exactly a flashy reveal, but it is the kind of update that makes the project feel more real. Earlier official coverage from StarWars.com’s original announcement of Star Wars: Starfighter confirmed that the film stars Ryan Gosling, is directed by Shawn Levy, and…
The Mandalorian & Grogu May the 4th IMAX Previews Have Already Sold Out
That did not take long. The special-look IMAX fan events for The Mandalorian & Grogu on May the 4th are now officially sold out, according to Star Wars’ own social posts announcing the sellout. The events were set up as free advance screenings at select IMAX theaters around the world, giving fans an early look at more than 25 minutes of footage from the movie ahead of its full theatrical release. And honestly, that is a pretty strong signal. Fans moved fast on this one Lucasfilm and IMAX only just started pushing the event publicly, with trade coverage confirming that the May 4 screenings would include more than 25 minutes of exclusive footage, special fan giveaways, and a new poster at select locations. Boxoffice Pro reported the event on April 23, framing it as a global May the 4th fan push tied directly to the movie’s theatrical rollout. Now the…
Gina Carano Says She Has Spoken With Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni After Settlement
The Gina Carano story is not over yet, even if the legal fight is. After settling her lawsuit with Disney and Lucasfilm in August 2025, Carano says she has already spoken with both Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni. The detail comes from Carano’s appearance on The Ariel Helwani Show, later picked up by multiple outlets, where she described a post-settlement Zoom call with the two Mandalorian creatives as warm and surprisingly natural. According to Carano, the conversation did not sound tense at all. As quoted by CinemaBlend’s write-up of the interview, she said, “I’ve already had a conversation with Dave Filoni and Jon Favreau,” describing both as “really lovely,” and said the call happened after the lawsuit was settled. She also recalled Favreau joking, “So, where did we leave off?” That is the headline. The more complicated part is what it actually means. The lawsuit is over, but a return…
The Acolyte Has Quietly Reappeared on Disney+’s Top 10
For a show that was supposed to be yesterday’s argument, The Acolyte has suddenly popped back into the conversation again. According to FlixPatrol’s Disney+ charts, The Acolyte re-entered the platform’s Top 10 TV Shows list in the No. 9 spot in the United States this week. That puts it back on the board well after its original release cycle, and well after most people assumed its streaming-chart life was over. That alone makes it a mildly surprising little Star Wars story. It is not topping the charts — but it is back To be clear, this is not The Acolyte suddenly becoming the biggest thing on Disney+. FlixPatrol’s current U.S. chart still has Star Wars: Maul – Shadow Lord near the top, along with titles like Daredevil: Born Again and several other Disney+ regulars. But The Acolyte showing up at No. 9 is still notable, because it means enough viewers…
Looking Back at Every Star Wars Celebration Ahead of 2027 Ticket Sales
With Star Wars Celebration 2027 tickets going on sale on May 6, this feels like the perfect time to look backward before the fandom charges forward again. We already know the next Celebration is going to be a big one. The event heads to Los Angeles in 2027, and with ticket sales around the corner, the usual mix of excitement, planning, badge stress, hotel panic, and “should we actually do this?” energy is starting to kick in. If you missed the latest update on badge pricing and the on-sale date, we already broke that down in our guide to Star Wars Celebration 2027 tickets, prices, and the May 6 on-sale date. But before everyone starts refreshing ticket pages and wrecking their budgets, it is worth taking a step back and remembering just how long and strange the road to Celebration 2027 has actually been. This article is also built around…
Star Wars Zero Company Just Got a Proper Official Home — and Wider Wishlisting
Star Wars Zero Company just took a small but very useful step toward feeling like a real upcoming release instead of just a cool reveal trailer memory. EA now has a dedicated official page live for the game, and it does more than just slap the logo on a dark background. The new site lets fans wishlist Star Wars Zero Company across Steam, Epic Games Store, PlayStation, and Xbox, while also offering an email signup for updates. That matters more than it sounds. This is the kind of update that makes a game feel real A lot of upcoming games exist in that awkward in-between stage where everybody knows the name, remembers the reveal, and then spends months waiting for signs of actual retail life. A proper official page with platform wishlisting is one of the clearest signs that the marketing machine is slowly shifting from reveal mode to release-track…
Lucasfilm and IMAX Are Letting Fans Watch the First 30 Minutes of The Mandalorian & Grogu on May the 4th
Lucasfilm and IMAX are doing something very smart with The Mandalorian & Grogu: they are letting fans sample the movie early, on the most Star Wars date imaginable. A special May the 4th IMAX event is giving fans the chance to watch the first 30 minutes of The Mandalorian & Grogu at select theaters before the film’s full release. Fandango’s event listing says the screening will preview more than 25 minutes of never-before-seen footage, and the RSVP sign-up is being handled through a theater registration form for local participating locations. That is not a small teaser. This is Lucasfilm effectively treating the opening half-hour like a theatrical sales pitch, which makes a lot of sense for a movie that has been pushed hard as an IMAX event. The official IMAX movie page lists The Mandalorian and Grogu as a Filmed For IMAX release and confirms the full theatrical release date…
Burger King Is Getting a Mandalorian & Grogu Menu on May the 4th
Fast-food Star Wars promotions are usually a little chaotic by design, but Burger King’s new The Mandalorian & Grogu tie-in actually sounds like it knows exactly what kind of chaos it wants. Burger King has officially announced a limited-time menu launching May 4 at participating U.S. locations to celebrate the upcoming movie, which hits theaters on May 22, 2026. And yes, the menu names are doing a lot. According to Burger King’s official announcement, the lineup includes the BBQ Bounty Whopper, Grogu’s Blue Cookie Shake, Grogu’s Garlic Chicken Fries, and Imperial Cheddar Ranch Tots. The chain is also rolling out four collectible cups, available with select purchases including the Bounty Bundle, the BBQ Bounty Whopper Combo, and the 12-piece Grogu’s Garlic Chicken Fry Combo. The actual menu is very Star Wars-branded in the best possible way The most obvious headliner is the BBQ Bounty Whopper, which Burger King says comes…
Star Wars: Legion Is Getting a Mandalorian Leaders Expansion
If your Star Wars: Legion armies needed more jetpacks, more clan politics, and more heavily armored Mandalorians making big battlefield decisions, Atomic Mass Games has you covered. The new Mandalorian Leaders expansion is now up for pre-order, bringing Bo-Katan Kryze, The Armorer, Paz Vizsla, and Axe Woves into Star Wars: Legion as a new command-focused pack. The official Asmodee store listing says the box includes four miniatures that can be deployed as two Commanders and two Operatives, along with new cards to expand Mandalorian strategy options. That already makes this one more interesting than a generic unit drop. Four Mandalorians, four very different vibes The obvious hook here is the lineup. This is not just “more Mandos.” It is a very specific slice of Mandalorian leadership styles from The Mandalorian era. Bo-Katan brings the legacy claimant energy.The Armorer brings the myth-and-tradition angle.Paz Vizsla brings the “solve it with a lot…
One Year Ago Today, Star Wars Zero Company Finally Broke Cover
A year ago today, Star Wars finally pulled the tarp off one of its most intriguing game reveals in years. On April 19, 2025, Star Wars Zero Company was officially revealed at Star Wars Celebration Japan, with Lucasfilm and EA dropping the first announce trailer and confirming the game as a single-player turn-based tactics title from Bit Reactor, made in collaboration with Respawn Entertainment and Lucasfilm Games. The official announcement also confirmed releases for PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S in 2026. That made the reveal feel important right away. Not just because Star Wars got another new game, but because it got a very specific kind of game. Zero Company was pitched as a gritty Clone Wars-era tactics experience, putting players in command of a ragtag squad during one of the galaxy’s ugliest stretches of war. StarWars.com’s reveal coverage described it as a perspective on the Clone Wars…