This fall, The Mandalorian will shed light on a previously unexplored time period in the Star Wars canon. A lot happened in the decades between Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens, and the upcoming Disney+ series will fill in some of those gaps. Among other things, fans will learn how the sequel trilogy’s primary conflict began to take shape. Director and executive producer Dave Filoni has revealed that The Mandalorian plans on tracing the origins of the First Order.
Filoni teased the First Order’s appearance on the series during an interview with Entertainment Weekly. He reminded viewers that even though the Empire fell at the end of Return of the Jedi, not everyone wanted a part in the Rebel Alliance’s vision for peace across the galaxy.
“This doesn’t turn into a good guy universe because you blew up two Death Stars,” said Filoni. “You get that the Rebels won and they’re trying to establish a Republic, but there’s no way that could have set in for everybody all at once. You have in a Western where you’re out on the frontier and there might be Washington and they might have some marshals, but sometimes good luck finding one.”
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Showrunner Jon Favreau also pointed out that the First Order had clearly amassed a lot of influence by the start of The Force Awakens. With this, their rise to power probably took a great deal of time to achieve.
“Also, what could happen in the 30 years between celebrating the defeat of the Empire and then the First Order?” said Favreau. “You come in on Episode VII, [the First Order are] not just starting out. They’re pretty far along…So somehow, things weren’t necessarily managed as well as they could have been if [the galaxy] ended up in hot water again like that.”
The Mandalorian won’t be the first bit of Star Wars media to link the original and sequel trilogies. In 2015, Marvel published the Star Wars: Shattered Empire miniseries, which picked up shortly after Return of the Jedi. Author Chuck Wendig also penned the Aftermath trilogy of novels to examine the First Order’s beginnings. However, chronicling the dictatorship’s origins in a live-action TV series presents several new opportunities.
Are you excited to see how the First Order came into existence on The Mandalorian? Tell us what you think in the comment section below!
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