Taika Waititi says his 'Star Wars' film will bring ‘new characters’ and new stories to franchise

We’ve known that Taika Waititi will be directing a Star Wars film for a couple of years now. But in those many months, we really haven’t learned very much about what that movie will be about.

We still don’t know much about that movie, frankly, but in a recent interview with Total Film, Waititi shed some light on what fans can expect.

Here’s what he had to say about his project in a galaxy far, far away:

"Look, I think for the Star Wars universe to expand, it has to expand," Waititi said. "I don't think that I'm any use in the Star Wars universe making a film where everyone's like, 'Oh great, well that's the blueprints to the Millennium Falcon, ah that's Chewbacca's grandmother.' That all stands alone, that's great, though I would like to take something new and create some new characters and just expand the world, otherwise it feels like it's a very small story."

And there you have it — it looks like in the post-Skywalker era, at least Waititi’s movie will expand its cast of characters and explore new aspects of the Star Wars franchise. Does that mean that in addition to Chewbacca's grandmother, we won’t see IG-11, the droid Waititi voiced in The Mandalorian? All signs sadly point to yes, though we can still catch IG-11 and his tragic journey in The Mandalorian’s past episodes on Disney+. 

And while we’ll likely have to wait until late 2023 to see Waititi’s Star Wars feature, we can see more of his work in the Marvel Cinematic Universe in just a few short weeks when Thor: Love and Thunder premieres in theaters. Waititi has also recently shared some details about that film, specifically that Christian Bale’s Gorr the God Butcher is the “most sympathetic” villain in the MCU. 

Thor: Love and Thunder is just one of the many big blockbusters expected to light up the box office this summer. Jurassic World Dominion is out now, and Jordan Peele's sci-fi horror mystery Nope opens July 22 in theaters.