There had been talk of it happening for several months, but the Writers Guild of America is officially on strike with no end currently in sight. If this strike lasts as long as the last one in 2007 - 2008 (100 days), then we can expect some major delays to a number of upcoming TV shows and movies, but what about Star Wars?
On that front, we have good and bad news (via SFFGazette.com).
When it comes to this Galaxy Far, Far Away's small screen offerings, TV shows like Ahsoka and Skeleton Crew are well into post-production. Andor showrunner, Tony Gilroy, has also confirmed that he finished season 2's final script shortly before the strike began. On-set rewrites won't be allowed, but as he has a clear vision for the project, that's unlikely to matter.
The Acolyte, which is still shooting, could be in trouble as that production is based in the UK and writers there are standing in solidarity with their American counterparts. We don't know whether the show has completed scripts or not, but if so, it may be largely unaffected.
In terms of animation, Tales of the Jedi and The Bad Batch could face similar issues, though The Mandalorian season 4 may be safe to move forward seeing as Jon Favreau has said it's already written! Then again, if any changes need to be made following the show's third batch of episodes and Ahsoka, this strike will put the brakes on that quite sharply.
Where Star Wars is most likely to suffer is in theaters. Steven Knight was recently hired to replace Damon Lindelof as the writer of the movie revolving around Daisy Ridley's Rey Skywalker but will have been forced to down tools. That script was supposedly six weeks from being finished three weeks ago, so with weeks left of work to do, pre-production is going to face problems preparing when they don't have a finished story.
Dave Filoni and Jon Favreau also can't have done much work on their upcoming Star Wars movie, though we doubt James Mangold planned to begin writing his project about the first-ever Jedi quite yet, anyway. Still, these delays could ultimately have an impact on release dates depending on how long the strike lasts.
It's an uncertain time, that's for sure, but this franchise could really do without any further delays seeing how long it's already been absent from theaters!
You'll want to stay tuned to SFFGazette.com for the latest updates.