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Star Wars will permanently bring Star Wars: The Clone Wars and Star Wars Rebels together in 2027. Next year is a big year for Lucasfilm’s flagship franchise, as it celebrates the 50th anniversary of the first Star Wars movie, later retitled A New Hope. With two theatrical releases coming up, including an incredibly rare run of George Lucas’ original and buried cut of 1977’s Star Wars and Shawn Levy’s and Ryan Gosling’s new-era standalone, Star Wars: Starfighter, there’s a lot to look forward to.
It’s not just a big year for Star Wars‘ theatrical side, however. Disney+ will also air its final confirmed live-action TV production, as Dave Filoni’s Ahsoka returns for its second season nearly four years after season 1 premiered on the streamer. It seems that Lucasfilm and Disney are intent on slowing production forStar Wars’ TV branch, with Ahsoka potentially marking the start of a new schedule of one live-action season per year (or even less).
For now, however, after The Mandalorian and Grogu‘s one-off Hutt-centric adventure, Ahsoka season 2 will be responsible for pushing the so-called Mandoverse’s narrative forward, as Grand Admiral Thrawn’s return from Star Wars’ groundbreaking secondary galaxy sparks a wave of Imperial threats. While Ahsoka season 2 could alter the New Republic era forever and set up the rise of the First Order as seen in the Star Wars sequel trilogy, it will also continue to function as a sequel to both Star Wars: The Clone Wars and Star Wars Rebels — perhaps now more than ever.
Star Wars Rebels offered a bridge for Ahsoka’s character between her harrowing Order 66 escape in Star Wars: The Clone Wars season 7 and her post-World Between Worlds return in Ahsoka season 1. In turn, Ahsoka’s first season brought Rebels’ most important characters into live-action for the first time, catching up with characters like Hera Syndulla, Sabine Wren, and Ezra Bridger (Garazeb “Zeb” Orrelios returned in The Mandalorian season 3 and The Mandalorian and Grogu, though it seems inevitable that he’ll turn up in Ahsoka season 2 as well).
A Long Time Ago in a Galaxy Far, Far Away · Eight Questions How Well Do You Know Star Wars? “The Force will be with you. Always.”
🗡️Jedi OrderLight-side guardians
⚡The SithRule of two
⚙️The RebellionA new hope
🪓Bounty HuntersThis is the way
👑The EmpireOrder 66
01
The original Star Wars film — later retitled Episode IV: A New Hope — opened in just 32 American theatres and proceeded to become the highest-grossing film of its era, redefining what summer blockbusters could be. In which year did it premiere?
✓ Correct! 1977 — specifically May 25. 20th Century Fox had so little faith in the project they only opened it in 32 theatres at first; queues quickly stretched around the block, and the film expanded to over 1,000 screens within months. It earned $307 million in its initial domestic run, won six Academy Awards (with another four nominations) and inverted Hollywood’s economics for the next 50 years.
✗ Wrong. The answer is 1977. 1975 is when the script was being shopped around. 1979 is when Star Trek: The Motion Picture released as a Star Wars-shaped countermove. 1980 is The Empire Strikes Back. The original Star Wars is May 25, 1977.
02
A New Hope’s writer-director was a then-32-year-old American Graffiti veteran who’d struggled to get the project greenlit and famously took back-end profit and merchandising rights in lieu of a higher salary — the deal that would build a billion-dollar company. He returned to direct the prequels but stepped away from the original-trilogy sequels. Name him.
✓ Correct! George Lucas. The merchandising rights he kept (because Fox didn’t value them) became the financial bedrock of Lucasfilm and the basis of the modern toys-and-licensing megabusiness. After A New Hope, Lucas produced but didn’t direct Empire Strikes Back (Irvin Kershner) or Return of the Jedi (Richard Marquand), then directed all three prequels (1999–2005). He sold Lucasfilm to Disney in 2012 and stepped away from creative control of the sequels.
✗ Wrong. The answer is George Lucas. Steven Spielberg was Lucas’s close friend (and the godfather of his post-A-New-Hope career) but never directed a Star Wars film. Coppola was Lucas’s mentor at USC and at American Zoetrope. Irvin Kershner directed Empire Strikes Back. The original is Lucas’s.
03
In 1980’s The Empire Strikes Back, Darth Vader delivers cinema’s most-misquoted line at the climax of his Cloud City duel with Luke Skywalker. Vader severs Luke’s hand and reveals their relationship. The exact line is — for the record — “No, I am your father.” What relationship does it confirm?
✓ Correct! Vader is Anakin Skywalker, Luke’s father. The reveal was so jealously guarded that Mark Hamill was only told the real line on set the day they shot it (the script said “Obi-Wan killed your father”), and even James Earl Jones recorded the dub without knowing the full plot context. The line — commonly misquoted as “Luke, I am your father” — rewrote what trilogies could pull off and is broadly considered cinema’s most famous twist.
✗ Wrong. The answer is that Vader is Luke’s father, Anakin Skywalker. The whole foundation of the Skywalker saga collapses to this single twist: Anakin (the Jedi prodigy of the prequels) becomes Vader after his fall. Luke and Leia are revealed in Return of the Jedi to be his twin children, separated at birth.
04
Yoda — the green, ear-twitching Jedi Master — was puppeted and voiced from his Empire Strikes Back debut through the prequels and the sequels by a single Muppet-show-veteran performer who also voices Miss Piggy and Fozzie Bear. Name him.
✓ Correct! Frank Oz — longtime Jim Henson collaborator and voice/puppet work on Miss Piggy, Fozzie Bear, Animal, Sam Eagle and Grover. Oz puppeted Yoda directly through The Phantom Menace before CGI took over for Attack of the Clones onward, but he’s continued to voice the character through the sequels and animated series. Yoda’s syntax was developed jointly by Lucas and Oz to feel old, foreign and hard-won.
✗ Wrong. The answer is Frank Oz. Jim Henson was Oz’s mentor and collaborator (he created the Muppets) but didn’t voice Yoda. Steve Whitmire took over Kermit after Henson’s 1990 death. Brian Henson is Jim’s son and runs the Henson company today. Yoda is Frank Oz’s.
05
In a deal that reshaped Hollywood, Disney acquired Lucasfilm Ltd. for $4.05 billion in cash and stock — bringing Star Wars, Indiana Jones, ILM and Skywalker Sound under the Disney umbrella. The deal also kicked off the sequel trilogy production. In what year did Disney close the acquisition?
✓ Correct! 2012 — specifically October 30. The deal was announced with simultaneous reveal that a Star Wars Episode VII was being developed for a 2015 release. Lucas had been quietly preparing his exit from Lucasfilm for years; Kathleen Kennedy had been brought in as co-chair months earlier specifically to take over. The Force Awakens came out three years later, in December 2015, kicking off the modern era.
✗ Wrong. The answer is 2012. 2009 is when Disney acquired Marvel ($4 billion). 2010 is the year before Lucas began signalling exit plans. 2014 is when production proper began on The Force Awakens. Lucasfilm joined Disney on October 30, 2012.
06
The Mandalorian launched as Disney+’s flagship original on November 12, 2019 — the day the streaming service itself launched. Created by Jon Favreau and run by Dave Filoni, the show centres on a helmeted bounty hunter who reluctantly becomes a foster father to “The Child” (Grogu). What is the Mandalorian’s real name?
✓ Correct! Din Djarin — played by Pedro Pascal under the helmet (with body double Brendan Wayne handling much of the physical work). The Mandalorian is widely credited with reviving Star Wars on TV, popularising the StageCraft LED-volume virtual production technology now used across Hollywood, and turning baby Yoda — Grogu — into the meme-economy phenomenon of late 2019. Three seasons have aired with a feature film, The Mandalorian & Grogu, set for May 2026.
✗ Wrong. The answer is Din Djarin. Boba Fett is the famous bounty hunter from the original trilogy, with his own Disney+ spinoff (The Book of Boba Fett, 2021). Cobb Vanth is the Tatooine marshal played by Timothy Olyphant. Bo-Katan Kryze is the Mandalorian princess played by Katee Sackhoff. The Mandalorian himself is Din Djarin.
07
Order 66 — the secret directive that turns the Republic’s clone troopers against their Jedi commanders and effectively ends the Jedi Order — is dramatised in the climactic third act of which prequel film?
✓ Correct! Episode III: Revenge of the Sith (2005). Palpatine’s “Execute Order 66” comm to the clone armies leads to the methodical, planet-by-planet liquidation of the Jedi Order — one of the saga’s most operatic sequences, scored to John Williams’ “Anakin’s Betrayal” cue. The same film features Anakin’s fall to the Dark Side, the Mustafar duel with Obi-Wan, and his rebirth as Darth Vader in the suit. Widely re-evaluated as the best of the prequels.
✗ Wrong. The answer is Revenge of the Sith. Phantom Menace ends with Qui-Gon’s death and the unveiling of Darth Maul. Attack of the Clones ends with the Clone Wars beginning. Rogue One is set just before A New Hope, after Order 66 has long since happened. The Order 66 sequence is the climax of Episode III.
08
Andor (2022–25) is widely regarded as the most adult, politically literate Star Wars project ever made — a slow-burn prequel to Rogue One charting Cassian Andor’s radicalisation against the Empire. The series was created and showrun by a writer/director best known for the original Bourne trilogy and Michael Clayton. Name him.
✓ Correct! Tony Gilroy. He’d previously been brought in for extensive Rogue One reshoots in 2016, and Lucasfilm gave him near-total creative independence on Andor. Season 1 (12 episodes, 2022) is widely regarded as Star Wars’ finest dramatic writing ever; Season 2 (also 12 episodes, in four three-episode jumps across 2025) closes the gap to Rogue One’s opening scene. Gilroy’s prior credits: Bourne Identity / Supremacy / Ultimatum / Legacy, plus directing Michael Clayton (2007).
✗ Wrong. The answer is Tony Gilroy. Rian Johnson directed The Last Jedi (2017). Jon Favreau created The Mandalorian and is Lucasfilm’s Disney+-era animation/live-action lieutenant. Dave Filoni runs the Filoniverse (Clone Wars, Rebels, Ahsoka, the upcoming Heir to the Empire film). Andor is Tony Gilroy’s.
The Force Has Spoken · Final Tally Your Galactic Standing
🗡️
/ 8
Jedi Master — or moisture farmer on Tatooine?
Now, with Ezra Bridger back in Star Wars’ primary galaxy and reunited with New Republic General Hera, Ahsoka season 2 is positioning itself as the third (and potentially final) installment in this unofficial Star Wars trilogy. While The Clone Wars was about the wider conflict between the Republic, the Jedi, and the Separatists, Ahsoka Tano was undeniably one of the show’s most important characters, a connective thread between Anakin Skywalker’s eventual downfall, the Jedi’s flaws, and the rise of the Rebel Alliance as seen in Star Wars Rebels.
Together, these three shows make up a larger arc, one arguably just as important to the galaxy’s history as the rest of the Skywalker saga.
Star Wars’ Animated Canon Is More Important Than Ever Before
Ahsoka Tano wearing white robes and holding a staff in the Star Wars Rebels series finale.
Before Disney+ gave Lucasfilm the room to experiment with the live-action TV format, Star Wars’ animated canon was secondary to the audience’s understanding of the overarching Star Wars story. Sure, The Clone Wars fills in the gaps between Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones and Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith, but viewers can understand the prequel trilogy without issue if they haven’t watched it. Similarly, Star Wars Rebels offers a compelling look at the early days of the Rebellion, but A New Hope remains just as good with or without it.
Now, however, with The Mandalorian finding inspiration in lore from The Clone Wars’ Mandalorian history and Ahsoka relying on characters and storylines from Star Wars Rebels, the franchise’s animated stories have become more important than ever. Both live-action shows can still be enjoyed without having watched either animated series. Even so, it’s hard to deny that they provide an incredible amount of important context that affects how audiences experience The Mandalorian and Ahsoka. It’s a different level from Rebels’ connection to A New Hope or The Clone Wars’ influence on Revenge of the Sith.
Animation has long been an important aspect of Star Wars’ brand identity, and it’s been wonderful to see this part of Star Wars’ storytelling grow so much under Disney’s rule. Between Rebels, The Clone Wars season 7, Star Wars: The Bad Batch, the Star Wars Tales anthologies, and the most recent and excellent Star Wars: Maul – Shadow Lord, some of the galaxy’s best stories have been told in animated form.
Still, it’s debatable whether the live-action TV shows’ reliance on the animated continuity has worked in the franchise’s favor. While animation deserves to be valued, Star Wars‘ increasing interconnectedness risks alienating new viewers. If Star Wars wants to keep growing, it needs to remain accessible. Ahsoka season 2 is an undeniably exciting prospect, but it’s good that Star Wars’ upcoming movie will offer something brand-new in the galaxy far, far away next year, too.
Ahsoka season 2 will premiere on Disney+ in 2027.
Release Date
August 22, 2023
Network
Disney+
Directors
Steph Green, Jennifer Getzinger, Peter Ramsey, Rick Famuyiwa
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