Star Wars: Jon Favreau Explains How Mandalorian, Ahsoka, Boba Fett and Skeleton Crew Connect

It's all connected in the Star Wars galaxy's Mando-Verse. In 2020, Lucasfilm president and producer Kathleen Kennedy announced Star Wars series set within the timeline of The Mandalorian, including spinoffs The Book of Boba Fett and Ahsoka, would connect and culminate in a "climactic story event" on Disney+. Set in the era of the New Republic five years after Return of the Jedi and decades before The Force Awakens, characters like Jedi Master Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) and armored bounty hunter Din Djarin (Pedro Pascal) would freely crossover from one show — and one story — to another. Mandalorian series creator Jon Favreau is modeling the approach after the Marvel Cinematic Universe, which the Iron Man director helped to launch in 2008.

"All those shows that we've worked on — Mandalorian, Ahsoka, Book of Boba Fett, now Skeleton Crew — they all exist within the same timeframe," Favreau told Entertainment Weekly. "They all exist after Return of the Jedi. So between Episode VI and Episode VII, there's 30 years there that are somewhat unexplored, certainly on the screen."

Favreau, who oversees the Mando-Verse with Star Wars executive producer and Executive Creative Director Dave Filoni, acknowledged that 30-year span known as the Rise of the First Order in Disney's official canon has been explored in novels and the extended universe. But in the television format, Favreau said, "There's a lot of room for us to tell stories, and there are a lot of characters that are in play because we know who's around at that time." 

"In The Mandalorian, we begin to introduce those characters. We begin to remind people who knew them already," Favreau said. "Or if you aren't familiar with the other works and you're just coming into this show, we're introducing them for the first time. This affords us the opportunity to have stories that interconnect and characters that go from one story to the other, and that creates a very rich fabric for us to explore." 

That fabric once included Star Wars: Rangers of the New Republic, a scrapped spinoff that Kennedy said would likely fold into future episodes of The Mandalorian and beyond, and the upcoming Star Wars: Skeleton Crew. During the Star Wars Celebration convention in May, Lucasfilm officially announced the new live-action series created by Spider-Man director Jon Watts and produced by Favreau and Filoni. 

Along with Season 3 of The Mandalorian, which continues the adventures of Din Djarin and Grogu with appearances by fan-favorites like Bo-Katan Kryze (Katee Sackhoff), Favreau and Filoni's Mando-Verse includes a spinoff focused on Ahsoka (Rosario Dawson) and the eventual return of Boba Fett (Temuera Morrison). The Mandalorian's third season premieres February 2023 on Disney+.