Star Wars Movies Won’t Be Made Specifically for Disney+

Star Wars fans hoping for full-length, original films set in a galaxy far, far away for the upcoming Disney+ streaming service we have some bad news. Feature-length Star Wars movies won’t be made for the service.

In an interview with Barron’s, Disney CEO Bob Iger explained that while spending on a television series such as The Mandalorian makes sense for Disney+, the large budgets for the feature films means that they need to be made for theaters first — though they would eventually come to the service later on, after theatrical run.

“Almost every movie the studio makes is a $100 million-plus movie, and we’re not looking to make movies at that level for the service,” Iger said. “We’re looking to invest significantly in television series on a per-episode business, and we’re looking to make movies that are higher-budget, but nothing like that.”

“We wouldn’t make a Star Wars movie for this platform,” Iger continued. “When everybody goes out on the weekend and you have a movie that opens up to $200 million, there’s a buzz that creates that enhances value. We like that. And eventually the movies we’re making are going to [end up on] the service.”

While that’s likely disappointing for fans who may have liked the idea of tuning into Disney+ for the full action-packed splendor of a Star Wars movie made especially for the service, Iger’s comments make sense. Star Wars: The Last Jedi, for example, cost $317 million to make, but brought in $1.3 billion at the box office. Even in the best circumstances with Disney+ subscriptions, there’s no way a made-for-streaming Star Wars movie would be able to pull off that kind of profit — especially since it’s still unclear exactly what Disney+ will cost subscribers.

That doesn’t mean that Star Wars fans will be disappointed, though. Not only will fans get to see Diego Luna reprise his role as Cassian Andor from Rogue One: A Star Wars Story in a live-action TV series for Disney+, but Jon Favreau’s The Mandalorian will debut on the service as well. Little is known about The Mandalorian, but a series synopsis has confirmed that the show would be set after the events of Return of the Jedi but before the rise of the First Order, something that means it could bridge the gap to The Force Awakens.

“The Mandalorian is set after the fall of the Empire and before the emergence of the First Order. We follow the travails of a long gunfighter in the outer reaches of the galaxy far from the authority of the New Republic,” the synopsis reads.

The lack of big Star Wars movies also doesn’t mean that Disney is dismissing the idea of making movies for Disney+. Star Wars might not be getting big-budget films for streaming, but there will be first-run movies for the streaming platform, likely for other franchises and properties.

“The studio is being asked to create five or six additional movies in 2019 to launch in this Disney service,” Iger said.

Disney+ launches sometime in 2019.

Are you disappointed there won’t be first-run Star Wars movies for Disney+? Let us know in the comments below.