After The Mandalorian, these are the Star Wars spin-offs Disney should make next
Jedi noir, Lego chaos and Darth Plagueis horror stories? Lucasfilm has options
The Mandalorian and Grogu land on Disney+ on May 22 (Today), representing a (mostly) well-earned big screen reward for the breakout Star Wars TV show.
How did this humble spin-off show become the first Star Wars movie to hit cinemas in seven long years? Largely thanks to the show’s fabulous first two seasons (the less said about the third, the better), which focused on the seedier side of the Star Wars mythos, and framed the results as a lean sci-fi Western.
Its titular bounty hunter, played almost entirely with his helmet on by Pedro Pascal, is every inch the kind of laconic gunslinger you might find in a Sergio Leone movie – albeit with indestructible armour and a rocket pack.
That’s only half the story, of course. The other major character here is Grogu – essentially Yoda as a kid, conceptually speaking – who quickly stole hearts and helped catapult The Mandalorian into the big time.
All of which got us to thinking about the wider Star Wars universe, and which minor properties and characters might deserve their own standalone film. Which characters, stories and games would you like to see given the full cinematic treatment?
Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
There have been a whole bunch of Star Wars video games over the decades that have fleshed out the universe as well as any TV show or novelisation. Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic has to be chief among them, and it would make a rip-roaring film.
It’s set 4,000 years before the original film trilogy, which is already excitingly untouched territory for a live-action treatment. It also features the kind of twisty, turn plot that honours the heritage of the franchise, as you take on the role of a Jedi exile with a shadowy past.
The High Republic
We’ve already seen The High Republic covered in live-action form, but the Disney+ series The Acolyte (above) didn’t exactly tear up any trees and left much of this fascinating era unexplored.
The High Republic is the name given to a series of stories set hundreds of years before Anakin Skywalker came to the fore, thus neatly sidestepping the overused space-Jesus trope that had been explored with increasing tedium throughout the nine mainline films. It depicts a more strident Jedi order at the very height of their power, and with (seemingly) no Sith to check their expansionist tendencies. Talking of which...
The tragedy of Darth Plagueis the Wise
Darth Plagueis is a shady character who first received a mention in Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith, when Palpatine spun young Anakin a yarn (or did he?) about a powerful Sith Lord who gained the power over life and death.
His story has since been fleshed out in the wider Star Wars Expanded Universe, but in canonical terms, he only really has a brief cameo at the end of The Acolyte to show for himself. There’s a compelling story to be told about Emperor Palpatine’s mysterious master, and how he operated in the shadows to undermine the Jedi at their height.
Shadows of the Empire
The events of Shadows of the Empire are set between The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, which poses a bit of a problem, since it covers familiar characters (basically all of the original trilogy cast, minus Han Solo) in their fresh-faced prime.
Lucasfilm’s ropey history of ghoulish CGI recreations surely precludes a live-action treatment, but a high-quality animated feature seems feasible. Among the story’s most interesting elements is its attempt to answer one of the original fan questions – how the Hoth did Luke transition from battered naïf to kick-ass Jedi in just a year?
Rogue Squadron
There were three Star Wars: Rogue Squadron games released on Nintendo consoles between 1998 and 2003. They each effectively took the tense thrill of the original film trilogy’s epic space battles and placed you at the controls of a futuristic X-Wing fighter.
We’re already getting a Star Wars film about a fighter pilot in Star Wars: Starfighter (starring Ryan Gosling), but that’s said to be set well after the events of The Rise of Skywalker. We’d like to be thrown back into the pivotal events of the original trilogy, but from the perspective of a crack Rebel Alliance flight crew.
Lego Star Wars
We got a spin-off movie about the Lego take on Batman, so why not one about Lego Star Wars? It’s one of the most enduringly popular lines that the Danish toy company produces, after all. We’ve also got numerous Lego Star Wars video games to attest to the fact that there’s a huge appetite for this nerdy confluence.
If nothing else, it would be a great way to send up the often po-faced sci-fi franchise without putting too many fan noses out of joint.
Star Wars: Droids
Star Wars fans of a certain age will have fond recollections of Star Wars: Droids – an animated series from 1985 that focused on the exploits of everyone’s favourite robotic comic relief, R2-D2 and C-3PO, in the run-up to the events of the first movie.
It only ran for a single season of 13 episodes, but that’s more than enough to prove that they could carry a whole live-action movie on their metallic shoulders. I’d like to think of it as a futuristic Laurel and Hardy, with perhaps a soupçon of ‘80s buddy cop mayhem.
Mace Windu
Die-hard Star Wars prequel fans (there are some, honest) will swear that Samuel L. Jackson’s powerful Jedi Master survived his Force-electrocution, dismemberment, and fall at the end of Revenge of the Sith.
It’s an idea that Jackson himself adheres to, which leads us to the idea for a standalone Mace Windu movie. We can imagine Jackson returning to play the character as a traumatised, embittered old hermit – think Obi-Wan with an attitude – rediscovering his mojo for one last crack at the Sith.
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