It’s little wonder that Star Wars fans are more disenfranchised with the handling of the beloved sci-fi saga than they’ve ever been when almost everything Lucasfilm touches encounters behind the scenes problems of some kind. The Mandalorian may have largely escaped unscathed, but there’s still rumors that a civil war is brewing at the studio between Jon Favreau and Kathleen Kennedy.
The Last Jedi and The Rise of Skywalker split opinion straight down the middle, Gareth Edwards was replaced for Rogue One’s reshoots, Phil Lord and Christopher Miller were booted out of Solo, Josh Trank and Colin Trevorrow were both given their marching orders and Game of Thrones showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss walked away from the franchise almost as soon as their proposed trilogy had been announced.
The upcoming Obi-Wan Kenobi series for Disney Plus still has a lot of goodwill with the fanbase, but that’s almost entirely down to their long-held desire to see Ewan McGregor reprise his role. After all, it hasn’t exactly been smooth sailing. For one thing, while the crew were gearing up for production, they found themselves getting sent home as the studio announced a major delay, reshuffling the entire creative team and re-working the story from the ground up in the process.
With Favreau and Dave Filoni’s Mandalorian protege Deborah Chow now at the helm, fans were hoping that Obi-Wan would be getting back on the right track sooner rather than later, but we’ve now heard that it remains far from plain sailing. According to our intel – which comes from the same sources that initially told us McGregor would be returning as Obi-Wan months before it was confirmed, and that Ahsoka Tano will be in The Mandalorian – Lucasfilm still aren’t happy with how the project is coming together.
King Arthur: Legend of the Sword writer Joby Harold only assumed scripting duties in April after Hossein Amini’s departure, but we’ve heard that Lucasfilm aren’t particularly impressed with his work so far. Not only that, but the crew is said to be disappointed with how much Disney is paying them (it’s reportedly not very much due to their financial struggles from COVID-19) despite the high-profile nature of the series, with the general feeling that the Obi-Wan Kenobi camp isn’t in a good spot right now.
Shooting is still expected to begin on schedule, but tensions are reportedly high from both a creative and technical point of view, and the last thing Disney and Lucasfilm need right now is another Star Wars production plagued by rumors of discontent.
