When Disney bought Lucasfilm, it threw the franchise into overdrive, and between 2015 and 2019, we got five movies, nearly doubling the total number of Star Wars films made since 1977. And yet, since 2019, there’s been nothing on the big screen. Starting with the 2026 movie schedule, that all changes, as at least two Star Wars movies are definitely happening, and it appears that people who make movies, like Tom Cruise and Steven Spielberg, are just as excited as the rest of us.
Star Wars: Starfighter director Shawn Levy revealed to The New York Times that not only does the cast have A-list stars like Ryan Gosling, but the likes of Steven Spielberg and Tom Cruise have been visiting the set. Cruise even got dirty by getting behind a camera and jumping into the mud to film part of the movie. According to Levy…
Last week, Steven Spielberg was here. And now Tom Cruise is wielding a camera, ruining his very nice shoes.
Steven Spielberg has a long association with George Lucas, so it’s not surprising that he stopped by for a visit. He likely wanted to see what this new film would be doing with the franchise his friend launched almost 50 years ago. One imagines that Spielberg and Levy could have had one hell of a conversation about the past and future and Star Wars, and I would have loved to have heard that.
And then one day, Tom Cruise flew in on a helicopter.
Shawn Levy says that he suggested Tom Cruise pick up a camera and start filming as a joke, but Cruise took him seriously, ending up “up to his ankles in mud and pond water” to film a lightsaber battle. And honestly, does it shock anybody that Tom Cruise, a guy who throws himself off mountains, would just jump at the chance to shoot part of a Star Wars movie?
According to the story, Cruise was only there visiting and ended up behind a camera for fun, so don’t expect to see him appear in Star Wars: Starfighter (although we’ve seen more than our share of Star Wars celebrity cameos in the past, so anything is possible). But now, when we’re all watching Starfighter in 2027, and you watch the big lightsaber fight, you’ll know who to thank for it. Levy continues…
Now, when you see the movie, you’ll know that part of it was shot by Tom. I mean, how cool is that?
It’s pretty cool. I’m already excited for Star Wars: Starfighter, and while the movie is over a year away, we’re only a few months from the release of The Mandalorian and Grogu that will mark Star Wars' official return to theaters. It’s about to be a very exciting time to be a Star Wars fan again, for both the very famous and everybody else, too.
