Editorial: Why The Team Behind the Upcoming ‘Star Wars’ New Jedi Order Film Has Me Concerned

As announced in April 2023, Lucasfilm is actively working on at least three live-action Star Wars movies which could potentially start releasing by the end of 2025. We know that the first to come out will feature the return of Daisy Ridley as Rey Skywalker, and will be set 15 years after the events of The Rise of Skywalker, an era now dubbed the New Jedi Order.

 

There is nothing that excites me more about the future of the Star Wars franchise than going back to the movies. We may argue about their quality, but there is no denying that there is a special feeling whenever any new film in the franchise is released, something that hardly any other IP can replicate. And despite what TV can do nowadays, Star Wars has always belonged to the big screen. It is a visual spectacle as much as it is a storytelling feast, and the world was changed in 1977 because of the creation of ILM as much as it was because of Star Wars’ simplistic approach to good guys fighting bad guys and winning the day. Despite the revolution that The Mandalorian‘s StageCraft technology represents for the industry, the space opera side of the franchise has been missing over the past few years in favor of serialized television or spy thrillers. And as excellent as those can be, I just miss the movies.

 

All of this is to say that I am very excited about what the future can bring. And yet, I also have some concerns, particularly with the aforementioned, untitled New Jedi Order-set film. The fact that Daisy Ridley is coming back to play Rey, a character I adore, that Lucasfilm finally decided to move forward with the story and opted not to tell a story about Obi-Wan Kenobi’s long-lost brother, and the potential that this particular story has, have me very excited about what we could see in theaters. (It’s expected that it will do so on December 19, 2025, but with the ongoing strike, who knows what will happen.) But it’s the creative team behind the film that is itching me at this moment.

 

Star Wars: TROS - Daisy Ridley as Rey

 

First, we have Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy at the helm. The Pakistani-born filmmaker made a name for herself in the 2010s by directing two short documentaries that were awarded the Oscar in their corresponding category, in 2013 and 2017, respectively. In addition, she also directed several documentaries about her own country and its culture, from Song of Lahore, about the place that Pakistani musicians hold in the country as it exists today, to the 3 Bahadur trilogy of animated films, about a group of 11-year-old superheroes. But what most people reading entertainment news might know her for is 2022’s Ms. Marvel.

 

Now, it’s obvious that Ms. Marvel holds a special place for many people and even connected with non-Marvel fans who related to the show’s handling of family themes over the odd superhero tie-ins. I completely agree with that sentiment, and I very much enjoyed the first and last episodes, which Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah directed, and highlighted those aspects of the story. But the show lost me a bit in the middle, and I found episodes 4-5 (especially the former) a bit lacking and all over the place. Those are the two episodes that Obaid-Chinoy directed.

 

Combine that with the fact that she hasn’t directed a narrative, live-action feature film yet and my excitement goes down a notch. This is not to say that she will do a bad job, or that I am not looking forward to her film, but the truth is that the only stuff from her I’ve seen so far didn’t impress me very much. I have also not listened to her pitch for the film, and maybe I’d be as wowed as Kathleen Kennedy and the rest of the Lucasfilm team might have been. (I’ve only been able to find one short video interview where she talks about Star Wars.) And I really hope that I will be eating my words by the time the movie comes out. But for now, I’m just a bit hesitant.

 

Star Wars Celebration 2023
LONDON, ENGLAND – APRIL 07: (L-R) Daisy Ridley, Kathleen Kennedy and Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy attend the studio panel at Star Wars Celebration 2023 attends the studio panel at Star Wars Celebration 2023 in London at ExCel on April 07, 2023 in London, England. (Photo by Jeff Spicer/Jeff Spicer/Getty Images for Disney)

 

With regards to the film’s writer, the story is completely different. Not to drag this out too much, we know that Steven Knight took over the script for the new film after Damon Lindelof departed the project earlier this year and Lucasfilm decided to move in a different direction. From what it looks like, Knight is doing a near-page-one rewrite.

 

Knight’s resumé includes the critically-acclaimed BBC series Peaky Blinders, which he created and wrote in its entirety. Outside of TV, he has also some TV experience that includes the 2013 claustrophobic thriller Locke, Robert Zemeckis’ Allied, the mystery-thriller Serenity, the 2020 pandemic-centric Locked Down, or the 2021 Kristen Stewart-led, Princess Diana biopic Spencer. Now, aside from Locke, I have mixed feelings about all of those films (Spencer, in particular, I could not stand). But even putting all of that aside, here’s my point.

 

Knight’s writing credits seem absolutely perfect for Tony Gilroy to hire him to write a three-episode arc of Andor, but not exactly appropriate to write a fantasy-heavy, lightsaber-wielding, world-building adventure led by Rey Skywalker. His experience in the fantasy genre or anything that could resemble a galaxy far, far away is pretty slim. This is why Damon Lindelof always seemed like a perfect call to write this film — he’s experienced with creating mythology in Lost and The Leftovers, and he knows how to operate within the genre (being able to handle Watchmen appropriately is good enough for me).

 

Star Wars Celebration 2023 Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy Dave Filoni James Mangold
Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy announced three new Star Wars feature films from filmmakers Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, Dave Filoni, and James Mangold.

 

Now, I’m not saying that Lucasfilm should have stayed with Lindelof; for all we know, his script was weak and his pitch didn’t ultimately work. (Rumors about an elder Rey made me feel grateful that Lucasfilm decided to move in another direction.) He’s the type of writer that seemed like a good call to write the film, not that he’s the only one. And again, for all we know, Knight’s pitch was jaw-dropping and he actually is the perfect candidate to keyboard this out.

 

Ultimately, there are many ways to look at this. We can be optimistic and say that Knight will make up for Obaid-Chinoy’s lack of experience in big-budget Hollywood, while Obaid-Chinoy will help Knight introduce a new voice through her ventures into Pakistani filmmaking and her ability to portray real-life heroes in her documentaries. I am just a little bit concerned that this will fall apart, simply because I really want it to work.

 

The current status of the script is unknown, and a lot could (and based on Lucasfilm’s history, will) change over the next few months. Knight was supposed to turn in a new draft by the end of May, but with the writers’ strike nowhere near finished, nothing is set in stone anymore. Stay tuned for more news on this as the situation continues to develop.

 

+ posts

Miguel Fernández is a Spanish student that has movies as his second passion in life. His favorite movie of all time is The Lord of the Rings, but he is also a huge Star Wars fan. However, fantasy movies are not his only cup of tea, as movies from Scorsese, Fincher, Kubrick or Hitchcock have been an obsession for him since he started to understand the language of filmmaking. He is that guy who will watch a black and white movie, just because it is in black and white.

Miguel Fernandez

Miguel Fernández is a Spanish student that has movies as his second passion in life. His favorite movie of all time is The Lord of the Rings, but he is also a huge Star Wars fan. However, fantasy movies are not his only cup of tea, as movies from Scorsese, Fincher, Kubrick or Hitchcock have been an obsession for him since he started to understand the language of filmmaking. He is that guy who will watch a black and white movie, just because it is in black and white.

LATEST POSTS ON MOVIE NEWS NET