The holidays came early for Marvel, Star Wars, and Disney fandom this year thanks to… an annual investor call?
Yes, in true entertainment conglomerate fashion, the House of Mouse unveiled an impressive slate of upcoming film and TV projects this afternoon to the company’s shareholders – including 10 new Star Wars TV shows, 10 new Marvel TV shows, 15 new Disney live action, animated, and Pixar television series’, as well as 15 new film projects ranging from live action and animated – which in turn means that the curtain was raised for the general public as well. All of the announced projects are expected to bow at some point over the course of the next few years, with many debuting first on the company’s Disney+ streaming service. That sound you hear? It’s Mickey’s new and improved money-printing machine.
So what did they announce exactly? Here’s a list of everything Disney announced on the Marvel and Star Wars front during today’s investor day presentation:
Star Wars
We hope you like Star Wars because we’re all in for quite a lot of it.
Unsurprisingly, Disney+’s breakout hit The Mandalorian will be continuing for the foreseeable future. A direct spin-off of the show featuring Rosario Dawson as Jedi Ahsoka Tano was officially unveiled, along with another post-Return of the Jedi set series Rangers of the New Republic. The previously teased Obi-wan Kenobi TV series – featuring Ewan McGregor and Hayden Christensen returning as Ben Kenobi and Darth Vader (live action Clone Wars flashbacks please) – and the Cassian Andor Rogue One prequel show were confirmed along with some behind the scenes footage and concept art from the latter. Additionally a long rumoured project centering on Lando Calrissian was confirmed, along with the female-centric series from Russian Doll showrunner Leslye Headland, and The Acolyte, a horror-mystery series set in the pre-prequel High Republic era. No news on the supposed Boba Fett series, which is surprising given the character’s explosive return on a recent episode of The Mandalorian. Perhaps he’ll just show up in all of the new shows?
“Everything I did, I did for the Rebellion.” Andor, an Original Series set in the Star Wars universe, is streaming in 2022 on #DisneyPlus. pic.twitter.com/q2IT2qzEeR
— Star Wars (@starwars) December 10, 2020
Several of the rumoured Star Wars film projects such as Rian Johnson’s new trilogy and Taika Waititi’s teased project remained under wraps, but the surprise movie announcement was that of a Rogue Squadron feature film from Wonder Woman director Patty Jenkins. For those of us who’ve always enjoyed the space dogfights of a galaxy far, far away (along with all the Expanded Universe/Legends books and games) this is thrilling news. All we ask is that Wedge Antilles get more than five seconds of screen time.
— Patty Jenkins (@PattyJenks) December 10, 2020
But it’s not all live action Star Wars TV and movies on the horizon. The animated Star Wars: Rebels spin-off The Bad Batch, about the adventures of a group of elite clone troopers, got the official treatment, along with an R2-D2 and C3PO centered series A Droid Story and Visions, which is apparently an anime-influenced anthology series in the vein of The Animatrix. Count us in for that one!
Mostly lost in all the other big announcements from Lucasfilm was the confirmation of the Willow TV series is still go and that a new Indiana Jones movie – with Harrison Ford – will start shooting this spring.
Marvel
Not to be outdone by space wizards and masked troopers, Marvel Studios talked up the upcoming WandaVision, Falcon and the Winter Soldier, and Loki TV shows – unveiling new trailers and clips for all three – and provided more details on the Hawkeye, Ms. Marvel (starring Toronto’s Iman Vellani), Moon Knight, and She-Hulk (starring Canada’s Tatiana Maslany) shows that are all either currently in production or in development.
Check out the sizzle reel for the Ms. Marvel Disney+ series below:
Ms. Marvel, a newer character to Marvel comics has grabbed the world’s imagination and we are excited to announce Iman Vellani as Kamala Khan.
Ms. Marvel, an Original Series from Marvel Studios, is coming late 2021 to #DisneyPlus. pic.twitter.com/ArHe8vMCXd
— Marvel Studios (@MarvelStudios) December 11, 2020
Take a look at the first trailer for Falcon and the Winter Soldier below:
And here’s the first clip from the Loki series with the Tom Hiddleston character once again back from the dead somehow:
Some new Marvel Cinematic Universe TV properties were also announced, including Secret Invasion featuring Samuel L. Jackson and Ben Mendelsohn’s Talos, Armor Wars featuring Don Cheadle’s War Machine, and Ironheart, a series about Tony Stark’s comic book successor Riri Williams starring Dominique Thorne. We can expect crossovers aplenty between all of these shows!
But what about the movies? Marvel still makes those, right? While the pandemic pivot to streamable comic book entertainment is not surprisingly, that doesn’t mean Disney or Marvel are giving up the big screen Infinity Gauntlet quite yet. Marvel confirmed that after finally regaining the film rights, the Fantastic Four will at long last be coming to the MCU in the near future. Updates were also given on James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 and Captain Marvel 2 from Candyman director Nia DiCosta. The upcoming Shang-Chi and The Legend of The Ten Rings, starring Mississauga’s own Simu Liu, also got a full title and cast announcement, which you can see below:
The third Ant-Man movie also got a title and some new cast members announced. Director Peyton Reed returns for Ant-Man: Quantumania and officially adds Jonathan Majors as Kang the Conqueror and Kathryn Newton as Cassie Lang.
And in non space or superhero news, Disney also announced that Fargo‘s Noah Hawley is currently developing an Alien series for FX set in the future sci-fi world of xenomorphs and Weyland-Yutani. Interesting!
There’s probably a lot more Marvel and Star Wars news we’ve missed here, but we almost can’t handle anything more at this point. Our only question is: Where was all this bingeable content at the start of the pandemic?
