7 Years Later, Ryan Gosling’s Star Wars: Starfighter Could Undo Disney’s Worst Mistake

Seven years after Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker brought the Skywalker Saga to an end, Lucasfilm finally has a theatrical project prepared to move the galaxy forward instead of finding another road back to familiar territory. Ryan Gosling’s Star Wars: Starfighter will tell an original standalone story set approximately five years after Episode IX, with Shawn Levy directing and Jonathan Tropper writing. Lucasfilm has now confirmed Gosling plays Kade Auberon, a new character whose mysterious past draws him into an adventure involving what the actor calls the fastest starfighter ever built.

The Mandalorian and Grogu already returned Star Wars to cinemas in May 2026, ending the franchise’s theatrical drought after The Rise of Skywalker. Yet that movie continues characters and mythology established on Disney+. Star Wars: Starfighter, arriving May 28, 2027, is something Lucasfilm has spent years struggling to put on the big screen: a genuinely new theatrical story set beyond the sequel trilogy.

Disney Waited Too Long to Move Star Wars Forward

Credits: Lucasfilm

Disney’s biggest post-Rise of Skywalker mistake was not abandoning theaters forever; it was allowing the movie side of Star Wars to remain directionless for so long after the Skywalker story ended. The Rise of Skywalker opened in December 2019 as the conclusion to the nine-film saga. After that, the franchise flourished on television with The Mandalorian, Andor, Ahsoka, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and several animated projects, but theatrical development became a revolving door of announced filmmakers and projects. Lucasfilm itself has continued listing films from Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, James Mangold, Taika Waititi, and Simon Kinberg among projects in development.

That hesitation created a peculiar problem. The Skywalker Saga had supposedly ended, yet much of live-action Star Wars continued operating around recognizable eras, characters, institutions, and iconography. There is nothing inherently wrong with returning to successful corners of the galaxy. Andor alone proved old chronology can produce remarkable television. But cinema needed a fresh horizon. For a franchise built on adventure, repeatedly looking over its shoulder eventually becomes a creative cul-de-sac. Starfighter is positioned to break that habit.

Star Wars: Starfighter Finally Gives the Galaxy Somewhere New to Go

Credit: Shawn Levy/Instagram

Lucasfilm describes Star Wars: Starfighter as an “all-new standalone adventure” and says it takes place during a period never previously explored on screen. More importantly, its confirmed setting approximately five years after The Rise of Skywalker means the movie can explore what happened to the galaxy after the First Order collapsed without being shackled to another Skywalker chapter. Shawn Levy has been unusually explicit about wanting new territory. At D23, he said the story takes place in “a period of time that has never been seen before,” while still retaining the hope, family, and adventure he considers fundamental to Star Wars.

That sounds like the balance Disney should have chased immediately after 2019. Ryan Gosling also gives Lucasfilm a protagonist without decades of continuity attached to him. The actor says Kade Auberon comes from the “wrong side of the galaxy” and is linked to the fastest starfighter ever built. Lucasfilm’s broader synopsis centers on a cynical rogue whose mysterious past sends him hurtling into a dangerous adventure. The supporting cast is equally fresh, with Flynn Gray, Matt Smith, Mia Goth, Aaron Pierre, Jamael Westman, Daniel Ings, and Amy Adams joining Gosling.

That is why the title’s ‘worst mistake’ argument holds up. Disney did eventually get Star Wars back into theaters with The Mandalorian and Grogu, but it will have taken more than seven years after The Rise of Skywalker to put a new post-sequel-era theatrical adventure in front of audiences. If Starfighter succeeds, its most valuable contribution may have little to do with introducing another famous hero. It could prove that Star Wars does not need to keep mining the same eras to feel like Star Wars.

Sometimes the safest way to preserve a legacy is to stop staring at it.

Star Wars: Starfighter opens in theaters on May 28, 2027.