Lucasfilm had previously announced that producer, director and actor Jon Favreau has signed on to executive produce and write a live-action Star Wars series for Disney’s new direct-to-consumer platform. The director was on the red carpet last night for the premiere of Solo: A Star Wars Story and provided some details regarding the new series.
Speaking to Nerdist’s Jesse B. Gill, Favreau revealed that the series will be set 7 years after Return of the Jedi. That’s a relatively unexplored time period in the Star Wars galaxy that has only really been explored in video game form in EA’s Battlefront 2.
He also said that about 50% of the show is written at the moment. It will feature an all-new cast and follow all-new characters, and it’ll be making use of the same cutting edge motion capture technology the director has used in The Jungle Book.
From the fragmentation of the Empire, to the rise of the New Republic, there’s a lot happening in that backdrop for the citizens of the Galaxy. Plus, the majority of old Expanded Universe content before the release of The Phantom Menace was set in that era, so there’s a chance we’ll see those storylines and characters explored.
Favreau is known to be a huge Star Wars fan and has appeared in roles on Star Wars: The Clone Wars and Solo: A Star Wars Story. He has delivered several hits for Disney with Marvel’s Iron Man 1& 2 and Jungle Book. He’s working on a live action version of The Lion King set for release in 2019. Jungle Book won an Oscar for VFX.
Disney plans to develop four to five original series and another four to five original movies for the debut of their Disney entertainment OTT service when it launches in late 2019. There is no official title or release date for the Star Wars project at this time.