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It’s been a long, long time since we heard anything about The Last Jedi director Rian Johnson‘s Star Wars spinoff trilogy. At this point, most fans assumed it was dead in the water. During the past year of Disney/Star Wars announcements following The Rise of Skywalker, Johnson’s name rarely came up.
When Disney revealed its slate of upcoming Star Wars spinoffs in December and Johnson wasn’t even mentioned, it seemed like tacit confirmation that he was out. But apparently that isn’t the case. According to a new interview with author Sariah Wilson, Johnson’s trilogy is still on.
Wilson posted the news on Twitter, confirmed by Johnson following her on the platform soon after:
“Yes, Rian’s SW trilogy is still on,” she tweeted. “No dates or timelines because he has other projects going on, but it is happening.”
While The Last Jedi was divisive in some corners of Star Wars fandom, the film was generally well-received by critics and mainstream audiences, and many see it as a high point of the franchise. Thus, when Disney announced in 2017 that Johnson would follow The Last Jedi with a new standalone trilogy of his own, it generated plenty of excitement.
Johnson’s trilogy of films would reportedly star new characters and take place in different locations from the main Star Wars franchise—a refreshing departure considering the number of prequels and character-focused spinoffs in the works, like the Disney+ shows for Boba Fett and Obi-Wan Kenobi.
After that 2017 announcement, however, Disney went radio silent. Various other Star Wars movies were revealed (and in some cases subsequently canceled), and since many fans interpreted The Rise of Skywalker as a somewhat insulting response to The Last Jedi, people assumed Johnson had quietly exited the franchise.
This new update suggests that Johnson is just one of several filmmakers with Star Wars projects on the backburner—and in all fairness, none of the others are really discussing theirs, either. Patty Jenkins is the only director with an actual title and release date for her movie (Rogue Squadron in 2023), while Taika Waititi and Marvel’s Kevin Feige also have unspecified films in the works. Fans will just have to cross their fingers and hope that Johnson’s trilogy makes it to the filming stage.