Before the release of Star Wars (Episode VII), The Force Awakens in 2015 Lucasfilm had announced that they would be releasing a Star Wars movie every year for, at the very least, the next decade. However, after only five years this December's Star Wars (Episode IX), The Rise of Skywalker looks set to be the last Star Wars movie to be released for the foreseeable future. Recently Lucasfilm announced that they would be releasing the next Star Wars movie and the first in a trilogy, brought to us by David Benioff and D. B. Weiss in 2021, however, more recent reports claim the Game of Thrones writers have exited their deal with Lucasfilm and that their much-publicized trilogy has been canceled.
The loss of the Benioff and Weiss trilogy makes the future of Star Wars movies very uncertain with Star Wars, The Rise of Skywalker being marketed as the last installment of the Star Wars' Skywalker saga, the poor box office returns for Solo: A Star Wars Story having essentially eliminated all chance of any future 'anthology' Star Wars movies, and with it looking increasingly likely that Rian Johnson's trilogy has also been canceled.
Lucasfilm has notably shifted their focus away from the big screen recently with The Mandalorian, which has already been greenlit for a second season, soon to premiere on Disney Plus with the streaming services release November 12th and news that a six-episode series exploring Obi-Wan Kenobi's exile on Tatooine between Episode III and Episode IV is to enter production next year, with Ewan McGregor confirmed to be returning. Both of these shows started out as big-screen projects, with The Mandalorian (in part) having been formed from the ashes of Josh Trank's ill-fated Boba Fett movie, and the forthcoming Kenobi series originally planned to be a movie that once had James Mangold attached as director.
With Lucasfilm seemingly favoring their Disney Plus streaming service, which still has no confirmed UK release date, over the big screen the question remains - with the recent loss of Benioff and Weiss' trilogy and the likely loss of Rian Johnson's trilogy, what will be the next Star Wars movie, and when will it be released?
Will the Skywalker Saga be resurrected with another trilogy across Episodes X, XI, and XII? Will Lucasfilm pursue other writers/directors to continue development on Benioff and Weiss' trilogy, which was heavily speculated by fans and critics to explore the Old Republic era of Star Wars lore? Will the 'anthology' Star Wars Stories be resurrected to fill the void following the release of the Star Wars, Rise of Skywalker? Or have Lucasfilm and Disney abandoned developing Star Wars for the big screen altogether?
