INQUISITR.COM / Entertainment

Disney Plans Six ‘Star Wars’ Movies Before 2020

By Dustin Wicksell
Published on: 06:47 PST, Apr 8, 2016

With the recent release of the Rogue One trailer, Disney’s resurrection of the Star Wars saga is in full swing, and fans will be happy to know that the House of Mouse plans to move forward by releasing six films in the franchise between now and the end of the decade.

Many fans reacted with apprehension when it was announced that Disney had purchased Lucasfilm, and along with it, the rights to the Star Wars franchise, back in 2012. At the time, it was unclear how the company would handle the beloved saga, yet the release last December of The Force Awakens proved that Star Wars was in good hands, as the film took just 12 days to gross over a billion dollars at the box office.

The Force Awakens garnered mostly positive reviews, successfully jump starting the series’ resurrection, as Business Insider notes. Unlike the past, however, fans had little time to wait before the next installment in the franchise was in production. On April 7, the first trailer for that film, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, was unveiled on Good Morning America, as the Inquisitr previously reported.

Rogue One begins a new chapter in the Star Wars saga, igniting a planned run of films that were originally announced as an anthology series, before being re-branded as Star Wars Stories. These films will tell corollary stories set in the same universe as the core sequel trilogy. That series, meanwhile, will focus on the continuing saga of the Skywalker family, just as all previous Star Wars films have.

Revealing the chain of events that led the Rebels to obtain the plans for the Death Star, Rogue One will hit theaters this December, just a year after the release of The Force Awakens. Disney’s Star Wars machine will keep moving forward with both series, however, as Episode VIII, which has been written and directed by Rian Johnson, will be the next film to make it to theaters. Currently wrapping its principal filming, Episode VIII was originally intended for a May 26, 2017, release date. It has since been pushed back to December 15, however. The story will reportedly pick up right where The Force Awakens left off, as Entertainment Weekly notes, and will feature far more of Mark Hamill as Luke Skywalker, according to star Daisy Ridley.

At that point, Star Wars fans will only have to wait a few months before the next anthology film arrives. The second movie in that series will be the long-anticipated Han Solo spinoff, and while the lead role has yet to be cast, veteran screenwriter Lawrence Kasdan is working on its script alongside his son. The Han Solo film will be released on May 25, 2018, just a few months after Episode VIII.

The core Skywalker trilogy will then conclude with the 2019 release of Star Wars: Episode IX, which will be directed by Colin Trevorrow. The film has already entered production, yet it won’t be the decade’s final entry in the franchise. In 2020, Star Wars fans can expect to see the third anthology film, which will be focused on bounty hunter Boba Fett.

Where Disney will take the series after the end of the decade remains to be seen. With the positive response to The Force Awakens and the trailer for Rogue One paving the way, however, it appears Star Wars fans have much to be excited about in the near future.

[Photo by Chris Jackson/Getty Images]

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