With the strikes over, work is back up and running in a galaxy far, far away. First up, Star Wars: Ahsoka creator Dave Filoni has been promoted to a much bigger creative role. Second, he and his team are finally able to speak about all the huge revelations at the end of the latest Star Wars Disney+ show.
One of the biggest reveals in Ahsoka was that the Star Wars galaxy was just that. One galaxy. To find Grand Admiral Thrawn and Ezra Bridger, Ahsoka Tano and Sabine Wren had to travel to a whole other galaxy and Filoni reveals that his new galaxy will play a role in his future Star Wars stories, including that movie he’ll be working on.
“I’m setting up what it seems to be a larger conflict with the Imperial remnant,” Filoni told Vanity Fair. “That conflict can’t just mirror what we’ve seen before. It has to take on a different shape. It can’t just be the Empire versus what looks like the Rebellion, or even the Republic. It has to be visually different.”
Filoni got the idea for the new galaxy in a rather unlikely place, Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones. “If you look, there’s an image of the galaxy, and then there are actually these smaller galaxies near it. So I’m like, ‘Oh, that’s interesting,’” he said. Plus, a whole new galaxy helped cover that fact that neither Ezra or Thrawn were discovered in the decades between their disappearance in Star Wars Rebels and rediscovery after Return of the Jedi.
“If they were in the Star Wars galaxy—the old Star Wars galaxy that we know—I think somebody would’ve found them,” Filoni said. “There’s too many star ships, there’s too many people traveling. You get a signal out, and I think you could have found them if they wanted to be found. I had to really throw them far afield.”
Once in that galaxy, several of his new characters set off on unique journeys too. One in particular, Baylan Skoll, teased some connections with the Mortis Gods. “You have to be careful with that,” Filoni said about bringing in some of the franchise’s deepest canon mythology. “I know it’s a very specific group of people that would even know what those statues are, but I thought it was an exciting image, and it does give you the shape of what Baylan is after.”
Whether or not we’ll find out exactly what that is is unclear. Actor Ray Stevenson, who played Baylan, passed away earlier this year and Filoni admits while that might change his plans, he’s just happy people loved the actor as the character. “Obviously, there’s a story there,” Filoni said. “We’re in a wait and see pattern at this point. But I’m glad the conversation is about Ray and how great he was … I used to have little mini debates with him and say, ‘Ray, you’re the villain here.’ And he’d be like, ‘I don’t think so.’ I was like, ‘I know you don’t think so, but you are. I love that you’re playing it like you’re not.’ Which is exactly the way Baylan thinks.”
Filoni teased a bit about how Baylan thinks in the same Vanity Fair article. “He’s tried to take these teachings that he learned as a young person and create his own way of being,” Filoni said. “And he’s looked at the cycle of things and said, ‘Enough with this. If I have this power, I should wield it. I should be the one making decisions, which a lot of people with power decide that’s the way to go. He’s also very certain that what he’s doing now is the right thing.”
Hopefully Filoni feels the same way because, in his new role, all these thoughts suddenly become much, much more important. Read more, including quotes from Ahsoka stars Rosario Dawson, Hayden Christensen, and Natasha Liu Bordizzo, at Vanity Fair.
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