There have been conflicting reports about the status of Lucasfilm's planned "New Jedi Order" Star Wars movie, which will see Daisy Ridley reprise the role of Rey "Skywalker" following her lead role in the recent sequel trilogy.
Rumors have been doing the rounds online that the project may have been delayed indefinitely, but several different sites have reached out to Lucasfilm for clarification, and there doesn't seem to be any validity to these reports.
Insider Jeff Sneider has now weighed in via the latest edition of his newsletter, and he's shared some intriguing new details about Rey's return and Ridley's not-too-shabby payday.
Sneider believes that the untitled Rey movie will be the second big-screen release after The Mandalorian and Grogu, and will likely arrive in theatres around Christmas 2026. He reckons James Mangold’s "Dawn of the Jedi" film will follow in 2027, and Dave Filoni’s "New Republic" (or, "Heir to the Empire" as it's now being referred to) movie could be as far away as 2028.
As for Ridley's fee, Sneider has heard that the actress will pocket a cool $12.5 million. This may not sound that high, especially when compared to the monumental amounts the top MCU stars make, for example, but keep in mind that Ridley's career hit a bit of a slump after The Rise of Skywalker, and $12M is said to be a lot more than her usual quote.
It also sounds like Ridley will appear in more than just one upcoming project, as Sneider has heard Rey could factor into Shawn Levy's mysterious Star Wars movie, which he may begin working on as soon as he's done with Deadpool 3.
However, on The Hot Mic, Sneider noted that this film could be set in a different timeline with an older take on Rey. As you may recall, previous rumors claimed that the original plan was to cast Helen Mirren (or someone of that status) in the role before Ridley agreed to sign on.
Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy will direct the "New Jedi Order" film, which will be set a whole fifteen years after the events of The Rise of Skywalker. Plot details are still mostly under wraps, but we do know that Rey will be a "powerful Jedi master" running her own training academy when we catch up with her.
Last year, Lucasfilm's Kathleen Kennedy revealed that work on this movie is further along than we realized.
"We’ve been working on that film for a few years and all of that feeds into our overall storytelling. So we’ve just got to a point now where we’ve got a wonderful writer in Steven Knight, and we’re probably going to see a script in the next month and a half that we’ve been working on for quite a while. So we’re getting close."
Of course, this was prior to the Hollywood strikes, which no doubt had at least some impact on the movie's development.
It sounds like a lot of things are still very much up in the air when it comes to Lucasfilm's return to the galaxy far, far away on the big screen, but we should have some official updates fairly soon.