This Week, In a Galaxy Far, Far Away: The ‘Star Wars’ Project Hail Mary, ‘Zero Company’ Comes Back To Life, and More
Happy Sunday, and welcome to a new edition of “This Week, In a Galaxy Far, Far Away“. We are a little over a week away from the two-episode premiere of _Maul: Shadow Lord_ , and a little less than two months away from the premiere of the first _Star Wars_ movie in six-and-a-half years. What a time! We had new clips and TV spots from each one this week.
We had a new _SWNN Live!_ show on Thursday, where Tyler and Tom said all there is to say about _Maul: Shadow Lord_ , and also a few things recapping MEGACON Orlando and what really happened at John Boyega’s panel. Check it out! We also have a new Character Spotlight from Josh. The series is in full _Shadow Lord_ lead-up, with a piece on Mother Talzin out on Friday. Any guesses as to who’s coming next week?
On the issue of the new Disney leadership, it was yet another intense week for Josh D’Amaro, who had to cancel a big investment done by his predecessor on Artificial Intelligence. The truth is that the deal between Disney and OpenAI hadn’t been signed yet, so it was going more slowly than initially anticipated. The Disney Plus rollout for Sora that they had initially announced would have probably been delayed to later in 2026 anyways. But D’Amaro was also the main architect of a major deal between Disney and Epic Games, the company behind Fortnite, which also announced layoffs this week after their flagship product underperformed in recent months. Probably unrelated, but it’s also been the same few months when they’ve been rolling out some _Star Wars_ tie-ins. They still plan a fully integrated entertainment universe within the game.
One final thing before we really get started: Remember that you can sign up to our Discord server by clicking here! Join us and have fun chatting with us!
## Three Things That May Have Flown Casual
* _As I was saying…_ Last time we spoke, we had a few stories brewing in our drafts but none of them were quite there yet. There were some alleged reports of John Boyega saying at MEGACON Orlando that he’d spoken with Dave Filoni — yet our own Tyler Bradshaw, who was in the room for the panel, disputed them. There was also an alleged runtime for _The Mandalorian and Grogu_ going around, but I wanted to get confirmation on it… And indeed, it was just a placeholder. Fortunately, we did get a March Madness TV spot for the movie! We also got some character names revealed over the week, as well as Hot Toys announcements.
* _It’s alive!_ EA and Bit Reactor proved this week that _Zero Company_ , the turn-based tactics game they had announced at _Star Wars_ Celebration Japan, is alive and well. The game is supposed to come out later this year, and it was just on the cover of _PC Gamer_ , with plenty of new story and gameplay details revealed.
* _Publishing updates_ : Not much happening this week, other than our review for _The High Republic Adventures: Pathfinders #1_ (by Nate), and the announcement of the William Shakespeare-ization of the first season of _Ahsoka_ via a new book by Ian Doescher coming out in September.
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## The Star Wars Project Hail Mary
It’s been a week since _Project Hail Mary_ came out in North American theaters, and it’s now expanding to other international territories. Given its obvious _Star Wars_ connections, I feel it’s at least worth discussing here.
Here is a semi-original movie (it’s based on a book by _The Martian_ author Andy Weir) mostly set in outer space starring Ryan Gosling. In other words, it’s a non-franchise, giant blockbuster sold on the concept of Ryan Gosling interacting with adorable alien creatures. I mean, Shawn Levy and Lucasfilm must be _enamored_ with the box office numbers (an $80M opening, the highest in years for an original story, and an easy projection of $500M worldwide, if not more), since next year they will have to sell a similar movie — but this time with the added weight of the _Star Wars_ brand in front of it. (The actor was just talking about his amazing experience interacting with an alien in the movie!)
As usual, this paints a limited picture of where audiences are at today, but certainly one we can learn from. The Barbenheimer effect a few years ago showed us that audiences are desperately craving a culture-defining movie-going event that feels original. Movies like _The Housemaid_ or _Marty Supreme_ still show the power of movie stars at the box office. Can Lucasfilm build on what’s happening right now and sell _Star Wars: Starfighter_ as an entirely original adventure in a galaxy far, far away? In a way, it will be our own _Force Awakens_ moment but in 2027: a movie sold on a pure return of the brand to the place it belongs, with new characters and new adventures — only this time, without nostalgia porn.
Shawn Levy on Set of Starfighter; Photographed by Dan Martensen
A small caveat here: will _Avengers: Doomsday_ negate this thought in a few months? That movie is already being sold on a mix of the very old and the very new that Marvel has to offer, and if it performs as strongly as Disney is expecting, I wonder if they will pivot the _Starfighter_ campaign.
For now, I think that resting a _Star Wars_ movie on the shoulders of Ryan Gosling seems like a good bet. But we should also be wary of recency bias, since _The Fall Guy_ a couple of years ago was sold on the concept of the post-_Barbie_ Ryan Gosling leading a solo adventure, and Universal found out the hard way how much that might not work. To the surprise of no one, maybe there isn’t a magical recipe to sell a new movie. But _Star Wars: Starfighter_ definitely has a lot of elements going for it.
One more thought: they should also capitalize on the chemistry between Gosling and Flynn Gray, if that is really there. Audiences are now familiar with Gosling’s sense of humor when he’s by himself (_Project Hail Mary_) and when he’s paired up with a strong co-lead (_Barbie_). They are familiar with lightsabers. And they surely know Shawn Levy’s sensibilities (the director hasn’t really missed at the box office lately; even _Free Guy_ delivered $330M during COVID). Let’s hope they can finally bring the magic of _Star Wars_ back to the movies!
Also related to _Project Hail Mary_ : This was the first live-action movie that Phil Lord and Chris Miller have directed since they were fired off _Solo_. A 95% critic rating on Rotten Tomatoes (and even more impressive, a 95% Top Critics rating) kind of speaks for itself. Even though I liked Ron Howard’s _Solo_ overall, I will always wonder what Lord & Miller’s version of that movie would have looked like. I never fully bought into the “improv on steroids” narrative that Lucasfilm tried to sell at the time — that may have been true, but I find hard to believe that those two were not going to deliver a funny and extremely endearing portrayal of Han Solo. I can see a world in which their Han Solo wouldn’t have really matched the Han Solo we knew and love, but I would still love to visit the alternative universe in which that movie was finished.
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Have a great week!
##### Miguel Fernandez
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Miguel Fernández is a Spanish student that has movies as his second passion in life. His favorite movie of all time is _The Lord of the Rings,_ but he is also a huge Star Wars fan. However, fantasy movies are not his only cup of tea, as movies from Scorsese, Fincher, Kubrick or Hitchcock have been an obsession for him since he started to understand the language of filmmaking. He is that guy who will watch a black and white movie, just because it is in black and white.
* Miguel Fernandez
https://www.starwarsnewsnet.com/author/miguel-fernandez
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This Week, In a Galaxy Far, Far Away: The ‘Star Wars’ Project Hail Mary, ‘Zero Company’ Comes Back To Life, and More Happy Sunday, and welcome to a new edition of “This Week, In a Galaxy ...
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