When George Lucas set out to make the original Star Wars movie, he made a surprising deal with 20th Century Fox. The studio, which was on the verge of bankruptcy at the time, agreed to give Lucas the full rights to all Star Wars merchandise in exchange for passing up a $500,000 director’s fee headed his way. In hindsight, it’s clear that Fox made a mistake. Back in 2012 (right before Disney bought the franchise for $4 billion), the total merchandising profits from Star Wars were valued at a whopping $20 billion.
The point is, Star Wars has never been exclusively a movie franchise, and George Lucas knew it right from the very beginning. But in the last five years, that’s become increasingly clear. Since the release of Episode IX: The Rise of Skywalker in 2019, Disney has yet to release a new movie set in that galaxy far, far away. Instead, the focus has shifted to Disney+ and a parade of live-action shows featuring new fan favorites like The Mandalorian along with classic characters such as Obi-Wan Kenobi and Ahsoka.
There are currently six different live-action Star Wars shows streaming on Disney + (plus one more on the way in December and an additional five animated series). So it seems safe to say that Star Wars is now primarily a television brand — or, at least, that would have been a safe assumption until very recently.
On Monday, August 19, a flurry of reports revealed that Disney’s latest streaming Star Wars show, The Acolyte, was canceled. This came as a bit of a surprise, not because the show was a hit (by most metrics, it was a flop) but because it was the first time that Disney had officially come out and canceled any of these live-action series. However, a closer look reveals that while things may seem fine on the surface, the truth is that the current state of live-action Star Wars TV is incredibly bleak.
Let’s start with The Mandalorian, Lucasfilm’s tentpole streaming series used to launch the entire Disney+ platform. After releasing a third season to mixed reviews, the studio announced plans for a Mandalorian & Grogu movie instead, leaving the show’s future beyond that uncertain. The second most popular Star Wars show, Obi-Wan Kenobi, was quietly canceled back in March 2024. Ahsoka is allegedly getting a second season, but its showrunner Dave Filoni seems more focused on his promised Star Wars movie (which is apparently set to wrap up the entire Mando-verse of streaming shows for good). Meanwhile, Andor Season 2 is set to put a planned end to that series. Looking past the early 2025, there are zero plans for new live-action Star Wars shows.
It sure does seem like the era of live-action Star Wars TV is over. And by all accounts, it’s a failure, going out with a whimper, not a bang (the bang will apparently be saved for the big screen). This pivot back to movies is almost undeniable, but the reason why Star Wars is abandoning live-action TV is a little trickier to explain.
One possible answer is that Disney+ was merely a stopgap between films. After the total critical failure of Rise of Skywalker, Disney needed to take a good long break before trying another movie. Streaming shows offered a short-term alternative to keep the brand going strong while the films could rebuild.
But that’s probably giving Lucasfilm and Disney more credit than they deserve. The reality is that the launch of Disney+ forced the company to crank up its content assembly line to dangerous speeds, leading to a breakdown in quality control for both Star Wars and Marvel. Fans struggled to keep up, and much of what they did watch was a noticeable step down in quality. Each new show saw diminishing returns (The Mandalorian saw a drop in viewers with its third season, while The Acolyte started strong but quickly became the least-watched live-action show in Star Wars history), leading to this current moment when Disney finally had no choice but to pull the plug entirely.
(To be clear, I think The Acolyte, and many of these other shows, have plenty of great ideas and memorable scenes, and I would have loved to see what showrunner Leslye Headland had planned for Season 2. However, it’s also undeniable that overall quality control has been drifting for a long time.)
While Marvel’s streaming project will continue on thanks to that franchise’s unstoppable momentum, Star Wars feels much more fragile by comparison. Stopping now, before Lucasfilm hits an actual point of no return, is the smartest move left following a series of increasingly dumb ones.
At this point, the only thing that can save Star Wars is the thing that started it all: movies. Well, that and merchandise, of course.
