A few official news items dropped this week. While some are encouraging, others not so much.
Star Wars Del Rey books, through their Twitter account, announced on March 9th, that the long awaited original novel set in the world of The Mandalorian will not be published. It was originally slated for release on November 2nd, 2021.
Del Rey goes on to say that The Mandalorian novel author, Adam Christopher, is already working on another project for them. No mention if this will be a Mando-themed book or not. The ever-expanding world of The Mandalorian, was the cause for the cancelation.
Although a bummer for sure, the lack of updates on the project since it’s original announcement, had been a cause of concern for some (mainly me).
As we saw with season 2 of The Mandalorian, Din Djarin’s world was quickly expanding with new worlds visited, new and old character introductions and a live changing event (letting go of his adopted son, Grogu).
With all of Star Wars connected through the official canon, it might have been difficult to keep all the pieces together if Adam C. had been working on the book during or after the conclusion of season 1 with little to no knowledge of what was instore for season 2.
Very excited for any official novel based on this world when and if we get one and can’t wait to see what Adam Christopher and Star Wars Del Rey are working on.
If you are like me and love those visual guides that Star Wars released for all of their movies, then you were happy when one was announced for The Mandalorian.
Well, sorry to say that DK Books also announced on March 9th that The Mandalorian Ultimate Visual Guide has been temporarily postponed.
Although disheartening, this postponement makes a bit more sense than the full cancellation of the original novel. A lot of secrets and cameos were revealed during season 2 of The Mandalorian and if the Visual Guide covered season 2, they risked those revealed been leaked before hand or not include them in the book and then it would feel incomplete (looking at you The Rise of Skywalker Art of book).
I would prefer for a massive Ultimate Visual Guide to be released at the end of the series and not have a new one for each season. We’ll have to wait and see when it will come out.
The final bit of news came from yesterday’s Disney Investor call where CEO Bob Chapek was asked about firing Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy and replacing her with Dave Filoni:
“We’ve been thrilled to have the creative talent, the likes of Kathy Kennedy to run [Lucasfilm] and look forward to her running it for many years to come.”
Disney CEO Bob Chapek
For years, certain parts of the Star Wars fandom have asked for the firing of the Lucasfilm President due to what they consider to be a failure in leading the company in the direction they think it should go.
Kathleen Kennedy has been instrumental in the revival of Star Wars since George Lucas decided to sell the company to Disney. She has seen the start and completion of a new movie trilogy, two standalone movies, the release of the first Star Wars live-action series, new animation projects like Star Wars Rebels, Star Wars Resistance and the conclusion of The Clone Wars animated series, and not to mention the ever-expanding Disney Plus series.
We here are very proud of what she’s accomplished and are looking forward to where she takes the company next.
Thanks to Jordan Maison for live-tweeting the Disney Investor call.
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