It’s right there in the trailer. “The Saga Comes to an End.” Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker is the final film in the Skywalker Saga that originated back in 1977. But apparently, the end doesn’t mean everything that’s happened or everyone who has been introduced gets locked away, as Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy explained at Star Wars Celebration last week.
When asked by MTV if fans will ever see the core Star Wars characters again now that the saga is ending, Kennedy had this to say: “There’s no question that there’s certain characters that we’ve created, certainly in the last three movies, that we may very well want to see down the line in the future.”
She qualified, though, that doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll be in future movies.
“We also have huge opportunities with Disney+ now, to be able to look at that space, and find perhaps even smaller stories, grittier stories,” Kennedy said. “And yet Mandalorian which debuts in November has huge scope and scale. So we’re just excited about what the potential is for the kind of things we can do.”
Which really means, yes, we could see them on Disney+, but there are also books, comics, video games, animated shows, virtual reality, so many spaces where a character from the sequel trilogy could show up. Plus, if the story warranted it, one has to think it’s very possible for upcoming movies to lean into some of them, if the creators were so inclined.
However, those decisions haven’t been made yet. Kennedy reiterated that right now the company is using this time as “an opportunity to see where we’re going now that we’re leaving the Skywalker saga behind.” And yet, the other quotes make it seem that even if Rey, Poe, Finn, or Rose don’t star in another series of movies, which they certainly could, we haven’t necessarily seen the last of them. It’s a big galaxy, far, far away, and an end isn’t only an end. It’s also a new beginning.
Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker opens December 20.
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