The D23 Expo in 2022 had a few gifts for Star Wars fans, bringing trailers for Tales of the Jedi (see above!) and The Mandalorian‘s third season to the public after holding them hostage back at Celebration Anaheim ’22, a new trailer for the imminent premiere of Andor, The Bad Batch season 2 pushed from the fall to January 2023, our first glimpse at the Jude Law-led Skeleton Crew, and even the initial concepts for the heroes of The High Republic-set Young Jedi Adventures animated show! Head below for the other new trailers and other details, like the recent casting news (not officially confirmed at D23) for the Ahsoka show!
Tales of the Jedi:
Releasing October 26, Tales of the Jedi, initially announced at Celebration Anaheim ’22 is a 6 episode miniseries that has 3 episodes focused on Ahsoka Tano and 3 on Count Dooku during various times in their lives. Isn’t it awesome to finally see this footage in HD, not through some blurry camera?! For those of us not in the room, and I’m sure even those who had been there when this was revealed back in May, it’s great to have it available online in all its intense and interesting glory. Yaddle looks sly, far better than her brief moment in The Phantom Menace (she’s made an appearance in The High Republic and hopefully it’s not her last); young Qui-Gon Jinn with his Master Dooku is just scratching the surface of Qui-Gon content I want in my life (and it’s cool Liam Neeson will return again to voice the character while his son will voice the younger iteration of him); more Dooku prior to his Sith-ly ways should be fun, as it was in Dooku: Jedi Lost, the new Mace Windu model is looking very cool; exploring Ahsoka’s past and how Anakin basically trained her to survive Order 66 will be awesome additions to her time in animation; and having Ahsoka at Padmé’s funeral is already bringing the tears.
There’s been some concern about the show following in the footsteps of The Bad Batch‘s premiere, which overrode a previous comic, a glaring choice considering all levels of media are supposed to be canon now. There’s plenty of arguments to be made if Tales of the Jedi does, including how both can still be viable if you ignore one or the other (like the rest of the Kanan comic still stands or the rest of The Bad Batch would still work if you solely used the comic’s version of events), like how historical retellings can change depending on whose telling it, or how of course the on-screen content would always end up taking precedence, but the biggest thing is the leaker of what actually happens in this show or how it overrides key moments in Dooku: Jedi Lost or the Ahsoka novel has walked back several of their claims. We’ll find out for sure when the show releases on October 26, but considering Dave Filoni worked with George Lucas on The Clone Wars when anything but the films was fair game to mess with, I’m sure that mentality hasn’t quite left Filoni’s mind, so don’t be surprised if things are changed somewhat here.
The Mandalorian Season Three:
While different from the one shown at Celebration Anaheim ’22 (which I only saw thanks to leaks and cell phone video, which hey, doesn’t look as bad as it used to), this The Mandalorian S3 trailer does the job damn well, teasing the grander scope of the show and Bo-Katan’s less than friendly demeanor to Din Djarin now that he has the darksaber. There’s amazing glimpses of the ruined Mandalore, big environments like Greef Karga’s new digs, lots of Grogu enjoying Din’s new Naboo Starfighter, an Anzellan like Babu Frik (or maybe it is?!), a sweet shot of Mandalorians diving into battle, and more which really hyped up the show’s February 2023 return (date could change, considering it wasn’t mentioned here despite a date given at Celebration). Giancarlo Esposito (Moff Gideon, who is a great Villain to play in Star Wars Villainous, by the way!) was on stage to say we should be on the watch for the Moff since he’s finally vulnerable! I’ll be curious to see how it incorporates the developments from the show’s takeover of The Book of Boba Fett‘s storyline, or how much they’ll touch on what happened there, for those who didn’t watch the other show prior to this season’s start.
Andor:
With 10 days and counting until the three episode premiere of Andor‘s first season on September 21, the latest trailer was debuted online for the show. It’s not the only Andor content you can enjoy, as the 10-mins of Andor hype attached to the re-release of Rogue One in theaters made its way to Disney+ as well, though the version of it I saw in theaters included the last trailer as the final footage, while the Disney+ version had a different trailer with new footage, and this trailer above is the same as the Disney+ one though it has extended or different footage as well; it’s a lot, but just know the show is almost here and is really shaping up to be something totally unique and special. Find our reviews of the opening three episodes sometime throughout the day on September 21 (I’m still not sure if I’m going episode by episode or just reviewing all three together, so we’ll see!).
The Bad Batch Season Two:
The animated show, whose trailer at Celebration this year teased the return of the Wookiee Jedi, Gungi, Emperor Palpatine, crabs, clone commandos, and new outfits for the crew, but unfortunately no adjustments to their whitewashed appearance, mentioned a fall 2023 release date, but at D23 they confirmed instead a January 4, 2023 premiere, with two episodes, for a 16-episode season. Part of me thinks this means The Mandalorian S3 is not coming out in February anymore, but I could be wrong and I wouldn’t be surprised if they overlapped them a little, as a 16-episode season would mean Mando couldn’t start until April (but hey, maybe a few extra months for polish will help, and without a movie coming in 2023, they can spread the love around a little more now).
Ahsoka:
Nothing terribly new for Ahsoka was revealed at D23, beyond a few photos of the shoot so far that don’t reveal much beyond the Rebels finale mural again as seen in the blurry trailer from Anaheim ’22, but before the show started Cinelinx’s Jordan Maison dropped the scoop (and was later confirmed by the trades and fan-favorite for the role Mena Massoud): Eman Esfandi (The Inspection, King Richard) will play live-action Ezra Bridger! I was a little surprised they didn’t confirm this at the show, but maybe they are trying to pretend this isn’t what the show is about and…I think we all know. Let’s stop with the secrets, Lucasfilm!
Skeleton Crew:
Jude Law was at D23 for film Peter Pan & Wendy, where he plays Captain Hook, but he swung by to share his excitement for this show as well, including a quote regarding seeing familiar characters around him, though part of me wonders if he means recognizable creatures and aliens rather than well-known characters, but it’ll be interesting to see either way. Skeleton Crew is out next year and deals with kids lost in space, relying on whomever Jude Law’s character is, set in the same timeframe as The Mandalorian and other shows of that era, and above is the first image from the show.
Young Jedi Adventures:
Set during The High Republic era, which begins its second Phase of storytelling on October 4, the animated series for preschoolers Young Jedi Adventures will star Jamaal Avery Jr. & Emma Berman, as it,
“…follows a group of Younglings as they embark on missions and ultimately learn the valuable skills needed to become Jedi: compassion, self-discipline, teamwork, patience, and friendship. Kai Brightstar (Avery), a Jedi Youngling who hopes to follow in the footsteps of the great Master Yoda and become a Jedi Knight. He teams with pilot Nash Durango (Berman), on adventures across the galaxy.”
The image above depicts the show’s animation style and I really, really, really need to know about the damn cute blue teddy bear Jedi!! One of the illustrators took to Twitter to share another image of Durango and the teddy bear person and it’s just all so adorable I’m jealous we didn’t have this as kids.
Non-Star Wars Lucasfilm Projects:
For convention goers, they released the first look for Indiana Jones 5, so we’ll have to wait to see the footage that made star Harrison Ford cry, while they also showed off a new trailer for the Willow TV series, which is looking mighty epic! Really time to rewatch the movie, it’s been like 20 years.
Ryan is Mynock Manor’s Head Butler. You can follow him on Twitter @BrushYourTeeth. You can follow the website on Twitter @MynockManor and Instagram @mynockmanor.