At this year's Star Wars Celebration, we learned that Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny director James Mangold will helm a Star Wars movie set during a period dubbed "Dawn of the Jedi."
Taking place thousands of years prior to the events of The Phantom Menace, we'll meet the first person who wielded the Force and learn the origins of the Jedi Order. That's a big story to tell in this Galaxy, and one which promises to explore the roots of this franchise in a way not even George Lucas did.
During an interview with Happy Sad Confused (via SFFGazette.com), Mangold elaborated on his approach to exploring this pivotal moment in the franchise's history.
"When I talked to some of the Star Wars clerics that keep track of all of these timelines, I was like 'So when would this happen?' And they were like '25,000 years before Episode I,' and I was like 'Oh, I was looking for some distance, but that’s distance.'"
"The reality for me is that that feeling of space, no pun intended, was something that I felt was really important not to get away from fan service or the intricacies of what George had set up and dreamed of, but to just have the space to tell a story and not be instantly encumbered with the bases you have to hit."
Asked if we'll actually hear words like "Jedi" and "midichlorian" in his movie, the filmmaker said, "I don’t wanna make any guarantees one way or another, but it will be before Jedi. Meaning, you might be experiencing something that might become Jedi. Despite the fact that people make movies other ways, I don’t tend to think people brand themselves before they’ve actually found themselves."
Elsewhere in the conversation, Mangold weighed in on what he had planned for his scrapped Boba Fett project. Confirming it didn't as a result of Solo: A Star Wars Story's poor box office performance, it doesn't sound like a movie Disney would ever consider making!
"At the point I was doing it, I was probably scaring the shit out of everyone. But I was making much more of a borderline, rated R, single-planet spaghetti Western. They probably would never be able to embrace Baby Yoda if I had made that. So it didn’t really belong in the world I was kind of envisioning."
"I was just listening to Ennio Morricone all day, all night, and typing away. I’m not sure it ever would have happened, I’m not sure it was in anyone’s plans what I was thinking."
It's a shame it never happened, and this movie is one many fans would have likely embraced (some might argue it sounds infinitely better than The Book of Boba Fett). However, The Mandalorian - at least when it started - isn't that different from what Mangold dreamed up, so that's something!
Are you excited about Mangold's upcoming "Dawn of the Jedi" Star Wars movie?