Is Kathleen Kennedy out at Lucasfilm? There’s a fairly substantial rumor that a long whispered-about changing of the Praetorian guards may be happening for real this time.
According to Matthew Belloni at Puck News, in an article titled “20 Surefire, 100 Percent Probable Hollywood Predictions for 2026 (Part One),” we’ll soon learn officially that Kennedy is stepping down as president of the Star Wars company. Dave Filoni and Lynwen Brennan will allegedly be her replacements. Filoni, of course, currently serves as the chief creative officer of Lucasfilm and created shows like Star Wars Rebels, Ahsoka, and The Mandalorian. Brennan, on the other hand, is the current president and general manager of Lucasfilm business.
This would mean that Filoni will have even more creative control over the direction of the franchise than he already has. As is the way with most things Star Wars, this is likely to be divisive amongst the fanbase. There’s nothing we love to do more than fight amongst ourselves, and while Filoni has plenty of supporters there are those who much prefer the Star Wars projects he had less involvement in, like Andor and The Acolyte.
Additionally, 2026 is already pretty major for the galaxy far, far away. The Mandalorian & Grogu marks a return to cinemas since 2019’s Solo: A Star Wars Story. So many film projects have been scrapped in the last five years, but the future does still appear to be on the big screen rather than the small screen. We’ve got Star Wars: Starfighter coming in 2027, and the mysterious Rey movie is not not dead yet. Meanwhile, there are zero live-action Star Wars series on the horizon.
For now, at least. Filoni’s era and area of expertise has been all about the small screen. Does him taking the reigns at Lucasfilm mean we’ll be going back to Disney+ for more limited series instead of major motion pictures? We shall see. It will be interesting to see how this all plays out to say the least.
(featured image: Gerardo Mora/Getty Images for Disney)
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