It’s been a bit of a bonkers week for “Star Wars” fans, and we’re not even at Friday yet. Monday kicked off with the long awaited trailer for “Solo: A Star Wars Story,” which was followed by yesterday’s announcement that “Game Of Thrones” creators David Benioff and D.B. Weiss will write and produce a new series of “Star Wars” films. Turns out, there’s going to be even more adventures in the galaxy far, far away.
Disney CEO Bob Iger revealed to investors on Tuesday that multiple “Star Wars” TV shows are in the works for the company’s brewing streaming service which they will launch in late 2019.
“We are developing not just one, but a few ‘Star Wars’ series specifically for the Disney direct-to-consumer app. We’ve mentioned that and we are close to being able to reveal at least one of the entities that is developing that for us. Because the deal isn’t completely closed, we can’t be specific about that,” he said during an earnings. “I think you’ll find the level of talent … on the television front will be rather significant as well.”
There’s no word yet if this will be more animated fare like “Star Wars Rebels,” or live action, or both. Certainly, there have been plenty of rumors and speculation about the latter in the last few years. As recently as November, it was reported that at least one live action series was in the works for Disney’s streaming service, but now it sounds like there could possibly be more.
As for the streaming service itself, don’t necessarily think of it as a Netflix killer. Iger revealed that unlike their rivals, they don’t need to spend as much on original content, namely because the IPs they control — Lucasfilm, Marvel, and Pixar — are so powerful on their own. Thus, they likely won’t have the breadth of programming that Netflix does, but they will have some of the most sought after programming.
“[Disney] will not necessarily go in the volume direction that Netflix has gone,” Iger explained. “That’s not to suggest that we’re going to be low. But when you go to market with ‘Star Wars,’ Marvel, Disney … Using well-known IP — we’re making series based on ‘Monsters,’ ‘High School Musical,’ ‘Star Wars’ — will give us the ability to probably spend less than if we’d come to market without these brands.”
And don’t forget, if that whole Disney/Fox deal goes through, it will given Iger and co. even more brands to play with. The future is looking very bright for Disney and “Star Wars” fans alike. [THR/Deadline]