Star Wars: Starfighter has officially begun filming, but it’s important Lucasfilm learns from past mistakes to get Shawn Levy’s movie right. When Disney purchased Lucasfilm in 2012, the House of Mouse hoped to have yearly Star Wars movies. Everything went wrong in the wake of Solo: A Star Wars Story and the end of the sequels.

Star Wars will finally return to the big screen with next year’s The Mandalorian and Grogu, and production has now begun on Shawn Levy’s Starfighter – a standalone movie set five years after The Rise of Skywalker. This feels like the most important upcoming Star Wars movie, finally pushing the timeline forward.

Lucasfilm became known for behind-the-scenes drama with the anthology films, and there have been so many canceled Star Wars movies. How can the studio get this one right?

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Lucasfilm Need To Trust The Team To Do What’s Right

Lucasfilm didn’t really have a pipeline in place when the studio was acquired by Disney in 2012, and the first few years saw constant behind-the-scenes drama. Tony Gilroy recently said Rogue One was “a corpse on the table” when he took over, and Phil Lord and Chris Miller had sH๏τ 80% of Solo before they were fired.

To be fair, there is some evidence that the pause in Star Wars movies has given Lucasfilm a chance to get the house in order. Production on The Mandalorian and Grogu was completed without any problems; but the studio does have a particularly strong relationship with Jon Favreau, showrunner of The Mandalorian seasons 1-3.

Starfighter is the next step, and it is vital that production runs smoothly on this project. The studio needs to have a good relationship with Levy – there can be no repeat of the Solo problems – and the creative team need to be trusted to make the best movie they can.

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A Unique Tone & Style Works For A Star Wars Story

What does a good Star Wars story look like? The last few years have seen the franchise change shape, with the incredible success of Andor and the positive reaction to Skeleton Crew proving the galaxy can be a lot more diverse in tone and style. Andor showrunner Tony Gilroy has suggested Star Wars can even do horror.

Starfighter isn’t horror, of course (although the cast does boast accomplished horror star Mia Goth). But the point is that Star Wars doesn’t have to be all the same. There are positive signs here, with Claudio Mirando (F1, Top Gun: Maverick) signing up as cinematographer for what will hopefully be a fast-paced action movie.

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Starfighter Has An All-Star Cast… So Let Them Shine

Starfighter boasts the most star-studded cast in Star Wars history, with a cast including the likes of Ryan Gosling, Matt Smith, Mia Goth, and Amy Adams. But a great cast has to be allowed the chance to shine, and that means Starfighter‘s script and direction has to give them every opportunity.

There have, sadly, been far too many occasions where Lucasfilm wasted stellar cast. The most striking example was in the sequel trilogy, where neither John Boyega’s Finn nor Oscar Isaac’s Poe Dameron really fulfilled their potential. If Starfighter is to succeed, that bad habit must be broken.

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Star Wars Needs To Get Over Its Nostalgia Fix

Disney deliberately chose to play the nostalgia card with The Force Awakens, but that particular card has been overplayed – and it’s limited the franchise’s appeal to the next generation of viewers, with only two Star Wars shows (The Acolyte and Skeleton Crew) really aimed at Gen Z.

If Star Wars is to have a future, then the franchise needs to get over its nostalgia fix. Starfighter is a chance to do just that, introducing us to a whole new part of the timeline, one that has never been explored before. If Lucasfilm do this right, then Starfighter will set up the next 50 years’ worth of stories.