Star Wars: Rick Famuyiwa Addresses Grand Admiral Thrawn Coming to Live-Action

By Patrick Cavanaugh

Once relegated to the Star Wars Legends corner of the galaxy far, far away, Star Wars Rebels brought Grand Admiral Thrawn back into the fold as a major threat, with Ahsoka then revealing in The Mandalorian that she was in pursuit of the ruthless villain. It was heavily assumed that Thrawn would be involved in the upcoming Star Wars: Ahsoka, which the first trailer for the series confirmed today, though with two more episodes in Season 3 of The Mandalorian, some fans are thinking Thrawn could make his live-action debut in a matter of weeks. The Mandalorian director Rick Famuyiwa spoke with ComicBook.com at Star Wars Celebration about the pressure of bringing iconic characters to life in the live-action series, possibly including Thrawn. New episodes of The Mandalorian premiere on Disney+ on Wednesdays.

"The show has had its fair share of big surprises in the past," Famuyiwa recalled. "What's great now is that there's a great crew of people who've been telling stories in this world and, obviously, Dave Filoni pre-dates what I've been doing, what Jon's [Favreau] been doing, and so the fact that characters that have existed from the creations of Dave and his storytelling are starting to make their way into live-action, it just makes organic sense. And we've had Ahsoka as one of the first introductions that way, and certainly Dave is getting ready to prep that show and they're putting it together now, so, yes, I think there will be a lot of characters that have been in his brain and he's been putting out there in the world of animation that will make their way into the world of live-action."

The director is clearly well trained in the ways of Star Wars publicity, making sure not to explicitly confirm that Thrawn was about to arrive in The Mandalorian and even avoided explicitly confirming that Thrawn would appear in Ahsoka. Still, given the depth of impressive characters that have made their debut in Filoni's series like Star Wars: The Clone Wars and Rebels, Thrawn might not be the only exciting character from animation that could appear in the closing episodes of Season 3 of The Mandalorian or in Star Wars: Ahsoka.

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New episodes of The Mandalorian premiere on Disney+ on Wednesdays and Star Wars: Ahsoka premieres in August.

Are you looking forward to Thrawn's live-action debut? Let us know in the comments or contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter to talk all things Star Wars and horror!

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