When Disney acquired Lucasfilm in 2012, it made a bold decision about the cumbersome, labyrinthine mythology that had built up over the years around the main “Star Wars” series overseen and mostly directed by visionary George Lucas.
All of the video games, publishing initiatives, comic books and cartoons that had served to extend the life of the franchise were no longer considered canon. Instead, they were banished to a new distinction – Legends. The extended universe, as it was known to fans, was no more. Only the six “Star Wars” films (the original trilogy and more recent prequels) were officially considered lore.
But there was a curious carveout for “Star Wars: The Clone Wars,” a computer-animated series centered on a young Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi that began in 2008. While technically created by Lucas, it was largely the domain of Dave Filoni, a hardcore “Star Wars” nerd who famously dressed up as a little-known prequels character for the opening night of “Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith.”
That exception for Filoni’s “Clone Wars” would hint at the growing power of the man who would take the creative reins of the “Star Wars” universe.
Before Lucasfilm, Filoni had been a director and storyboard artist on the critically acclaimed Nickelodeon series “Avatar: The Last Airbender,” and was recruited by Lucas after legendary animator Genndy Tartakovsky, whose traditionally animated “Clone Wars” micro-shorts predate (and hugely inspired) the computer-generated “Clone Wars” series, turned down a leadership position at the studio.
In Filoni, Lucas found a more malleable protégé – a Padawan in “Star Wars” terms – someone who could carry forward Lucas’ storytelling ethos and entrenched investment in the traditions of “Star Wars.”
With the announcement that Filoni will take over from Kathleen Kennedy as president of Lucasfilm, the student has become the master. He will oversee the creative aspects of the company alongside co-president Lynwen Brennan, who will handle the business side.
Filoni will now be able to remake the galaxy in his own more conservative image at a time when “Star Wars” is at a crossroads, with fans burned out by a flood of Disney+ shows of varying quality but with hope coming from the first film in more than six years releasing in May. Understanding where Filoni has been — and which shows and films bear his fingerprints most distinctly — could tell us where the “Star Wars” franchise is going in the years to come.
An essential member of the Rebellion
After Disney’s Lucasfilm acquisition, several high-profile projects were quietly canceled, like the ambitious live-action series “Star Wars: Underworld,” which counted Oscar-winning screenwriter Tony McNamara and “Battlestar Galactica” mastermind Ron D. Moore among its writers, plus an animated series co-created by Seth Green (“Star Wars Detours”) that was finished. The message was clear – “Star Wars” was under new management.
But Filoni’s series were allowed to continue. “Star Wars: The Clone Wars” kept running until 2014, when it was followed by “Star Wars Rebels,” which utilized the same animation style and some of the same characters. Filoni co-created the new series with Simon Kinberg and Carrie Beck, who serves as Executive Vice President, Live Action Development & Production at Lucasfilm.
“Rebels” was hugely important to the new regime at Lucasfilm, since it was one of the first projects brought to life following the merger and, in story terms, inched the narrative closer to the events of the original 1977 “Star Wars,” a much more valuable part of the now-truncated timeline.
Filoni’s influence and power grew with subsequent projects, including a “Clone Wars” spinoff called “The Bad Batch,” a series called “Star Wars Resistance” (set among the timeline of the sequel trilogy) and “Star Wars Tales” (another “Clone Wars” spinoff utilizing a slightly more sophisticated animation style). But he perhaps got his biggest shot in the arm with 2016’s “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story,” set immediately before the events of 1977’s “Star Wars.” In the film, you can see Chopper, a droid introduced in “Rebels” (and voiced by Filoni), while elsewhere you can see the ship, the Ghost, from that series, fighting alongside X-Wings and other Rebel spaceships.
Briefly – and really for the most eagle-eyed viewers – Filoni had crossed over into live-action. It wouldn’t be the last time.
That’s no moon
When Jon Favreau had the idea for what would eventually become “The Mandalorian,” he took it to Kathleen Kennedy. Kennedy suggested that he speak to Dave Filoni, who had been noodling on a similar idea. The two had known each other — they’d met at Skywalker Ranch years earlier and Favreau had actually provided the voice for a Mandalorian character in “The Clone Wars.”
“They got along instantly, like gangbusters,” Kennedy told Vanity Fair in 2022. Yet there were differences in how Favreau and Filoni approached “Star Wars.” In the same article, the pair openly discussed their diverging viewpoints, especially when it came to the Child, the character colloquially dubbed Baby Yoda and the clear breakout of the show. “Honestly, it’s something I never would’ve done because Yoda is Yoda,” Filoni said.
Filoni served as second-unit director and executive producer on the TV series, which exploded in 2019 as a smash hit for Disney+ and instantly became one of Lucasfilm’s most important “Star Wars” properties.
Quickly, Filoni became more involved in helping shape “The Mandalorian.” He wrote and directed the first season episode “The Gunslinger,” and for the second season, he wrote and directed the episode “The Jedi,” which introduced Ashoka (now portrayed by Rosario Dawson), a character that he’d created for “The Clone Wars,” into live-action. She would appear in “The Book of Boba Fett,” a “Mandalorian” spinoff (in an episode co-written and directed by Filoni) and star in her own spinoff, “Ahsoka,” which was wholly written by Filoni (he also directed one episode).
“The Mandalorian and Grogu,” a big-screen expansion of the series, hits theaters this summer and will be a test of whether this streaming hit can work on the big screen, without the dramatic Skywalker mythology that permeated the Kennedy-produced sequel trilogy. The film was directed by Favreau but co-written and produced by Filoni, who also makes a cameo appearance, reprising his role from “The Mandalorian” television series.
After being named an executive creative director for Lucasfilm in mid-2020, Filoni was promoted to chief creative officer at the studio in 2023, his influence continuing to grow. And while he would appear publicly with Kennedy, often smiling and talking about the unlimited potential of the franchise, according to an insider who worked with the company, their relationship grew contentious over differing creative opinions.
Animation and beyond
Filoni was particularly territorial about what he saw as his domain – animation. This is understandable. He got his start in animation and his productions served as the bedrock of this era of Lucasfilm animation and, to be fair, for much of the live-action material as well.
And while there were several other animation initiatives within Lucasfilm, including an ongoing partnership with LEGO, according to a source who worked with the studio, Filoni wasn’t keen on “Star Wars Visions,” the international anthology series that saw animated series produced by some of the world’s leading animation studios. Championed by Kennedy, there have been three seasons of the anthology with a new spinoff series, “Star Wars Visions Presents,” framing a series of standalone shows. The first, “The Ninth Jedi,” is an anime series set to debut later this year.
When reached for comment, a Lucasfilm spokesperson declined to offer specifics on further projects in development.
Filoni has always been something of a maverick, and we’re not just talking about the fact that the Pennsylvania native wears a cowboy hat like he just stepped off of Taylor Sheridan’s ranch. I remember a moment when I was talking to him at New York Comic-Con, shortly after the debut of “Star Wars Rebels.” I was amazed that he was able to insert Rex, a character from the classic Disney attraction Star Tours, voiced once again by Paul Reubens, into the show. Under the new rules of Lucasfilm, this move made the character canon.
Filoni just looked up at me and said, “Whoops.”
But there are some who have said that spirit has gotten away from him in recent years.
“You want to know how big Filoni’s ego has gotten?” asked one insider. They pointed to the fact that you can go to Disneyland and buy merchandise emblazoned with quotes from Filoni’s “Ahsoka” scripts.
But the stark difference between “Ahsoka,” a lightsaber and mythology-heavy sci-fi series, and “Andor,” a gritty and openly political drama show, may best outline where Filoni’s “Star Wars” interest lies.
Filoni was publicly supportive of Tony Gilroy’s critically acclaimed live-action series “Andor,” but behind the scenes, he discussed his dissatisfaction with the show, according to one Lucasfilm insider who spoke with TheWrap. Lucasfilm denied this characterization of events.
Gilroy openly deviated from events depicted in Filoni’s “Star Wars Rebels,” including Mon Mothma’s daring escape from Coruscant. Filoni never spoke out against the changes, but Gilroy told Entertainment Weekly last year about the approach he and his brother Dan Gilroy took, saying, “We are hijacking canon. In canon, she’s rescued by the Gold Squadron and the speech that they gave in the cartoon, which was a canonical show, [is on that ship]. And Danny’s like, ‘Do I have to stick to this f–ing speech?’”
“Andor,” which won the Best Writing for a Drama Series Emmy last year, was famously greenlit by Kennedy and was one of the rare “Star Wars” live-action shows to have zero input from Filoni. There are noticeably no nerdy Easter eggs or appearances by characters from an animated series or one of the novels.
In an interview last week, Kennedy teased that the “Star Wars” project that is probably closest to fruition next is a new trilogy of films written by Simon Kinberg, who co-created (with Filoni) “Star Wars Rebels.”
Those who are skeptical of Filoni’s tenure at the top of Lucasfilm are worried that the franchise will trade more complexity and narrative adventurousness with something more conventional and, indeed, more cartoonish, the insider told TheWrap.
We will have to wait and see, since the future of the franchise lies not in a galaxy far, far away, but in the next few years, with Filoni attempting to gain his footing and show the world that he’s truly gone from Padawan to Jedi Master, the way George would have wanted.
