The Watch - 'Star Wars' News Emergency Podcast

Episode Date: December 11, 2020

Chris and Andy break down the huge slate of 'Star Wars' programming that Disney announced at their investors conference this week. Hosts: Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I need sports to have to clear the room. Stand up and walk now. Hello and welcome to The Watch. My name is Chris Ryan. I am an editor at the Ringer.com and joining me on the other line. Mendo! It's an emergency pod! It's Andy Greenwald.

What's up, brother? You know, it's not like anybody's busy. They could have scattered this out a little bit. So Andy and I are here to do an emergency podcast on the slate of programming. that Disney announced today at their investors convention, at their investors meeting, they announced an absolute motherload of Star Wars and Marvel shows. And to me, Andy, we were recording our best of the year podcast with Sam Smail. And as we were doing this, you texted me.

I think it was the Obi-Wan announcement that Hayden Christensen was coming back to join you in McGregor on the Obi-Wan series. And you were just like, lull. And this was all happening while we were recording, but we felt remiss if we didn't address some of this stuff. I'm happy to just run through a list of the stuff here, but I wanted to see if you had an overall reaction to like, holy shit. Turner and Hoochback, Mighty Ducks back.

I love it. There's a lot of stuff on the margins of this, but the main announcement is the fact that Disney is going to be releasing, and I quote from this variety story. 35 new titles from Lucasfilm, Marvel Studios, Disney animation, and Pixar will be coming to the streaming service starting in 2021. So not all of this stuff is happening, obviously, next year. But they've had these these subsidiaries for a little while. And this is, I feel like, an announcement and in some ways

on the level of importance of Warner moving their movies to HBO Max, which just happened this week. I think it is, but I think it's worth comparing and contrasting the two announcements because I think the Warner announcement was seismic. But as we've seen, the fallout from it is not all positive. are feeling rattled, they're feeling undone, they're feeling shocked, or Christopher Nolan is just, you know, completely offended by all of it. What this today was, was an exercise, a demonstration, a display of dominance. And it is what a company can do when it operates from such an outrageous position of strength like Disney does. There were many reasons probably why the Mandalorian was really the only original content on Disney Blues for the first two years, ultimately, a year and a half of its

existence. Some of them pandemic-related, some of them probably related to other things. But in retrospect or in hindsight, they can pretend it was all part of a brilliant plan because they have the library to sustain them to get, what is it, 80, 90 million subscribers just on the strength of my daughter waking up at 645 this morning and saying she wanted to watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse Adventures on Disney Plus. She says it the right way, even though I don't. And then use the time to develop with many, many interesting talented filmmakers, have general meetings being like, okay, open the goofy's kimono and be like, here's what we've got, what interests you. And then also look at what the Mandalorian did and look at what it didn't do and be like, here's a recipe for how to succeed and how to do this. And so all of a sudden,

now they flip the switch and the gushers coming. And people seem pretty psyched. And obviously there were announcements in here that we're not going to cover like a Ryan Murphy's doing an American horror story anthology or it's always sunny Philadelphia. There's a lot of stuff. There's a lot of for FX. Yeah, FX on Hulu made a bunch of announcements. We'll hit that on Monday's episode of The Watch. And maybe I'm hoping Mallory can join us to give us a little bit more insight into the actual what the stories are going to be.

Because right now we just have log lines. Some of them we can obviously with our grasp of the Star Wars canon understand what they are. Some of them are a little bit over my head. I thought crucially, only two movies were talked about. They only mentioned two feature films. And that's why I think my mind immediately went to the Warner Brothers HBO Mac's story because clearly whether you're talking budgetarily or you're talking in terms of like where

you're putting your intellectual might, it's going towards Disney Plus. And it's not to say that the features won't be important that they won't launch more franchises within Star Wars. But they only talked about, Kathleen Kennedy only talked about two films. Star Wars Rogue Squadron, which is going to be directed by Patty Jenkins, who's obviously behind the Wonder Woman movies and the Wonder Woman in 1984 just coming out on Christmas Day, and a Star Wars feature in development from Thor Ragnarok director, Tycho Waititi, which I think you and I are probably,

maybe that's the thing that we are most excited for is to see what Tyco Waititi does in the Star Wars universe, and we were such huge fans of his Mandalorian episode from the first season. Do you want me to run through the Star Wars slate? Yes, and just to say that it is really significant what you said, that the building block of the company, overnight seemingly is its streaming strategy, right? It always kind of was, but now everything feeds into

this, including, again, stuff we're not even going to mention, but like, yeah, they're doing an alien TV show, as was long rumored with Noah Hawley in charge of it. I mean, they are, it's a gusher, right? It's all flowing into this, and this is the focus. There will be other movies, but I think they said at the top that the animated films and the Pixar movies are going to go day and date and break the, whatever it's called, the, what was it called? The window. Yeah, the theatrical. And go straight to the pluse, which is great in my household, but they significantly, before we get into it,

should say it seems like they are going to stick to putting Star Wars movies in movie theaters and Marvel movies and movie theaters, which, again, from a position of strength, they can do. And I'll just say... Let's get into the streaming stuff. Right here, I'll just say it's like 405 on the West Coast on Thursday.

So I think they are going to, or maybe on the precipice of announcing a bunch of the Marvel titles. Andy and I are just going to talk about the Star Wars stuff, just because... Unless Kaya blows up our chat window. Happy Hanukkah. And then we'll do double

emergency pod. But first off, let's get to the list of Star Wars production. So Andor, a Rogue 1 prequel series, and I'm just going to quote from the variety story

that has the log lines here. A Rogue one prequel season focusing on Diego, Luna's Cassie, and Andor, that's currently in production and will debut in 2022. This one next to the Taikey

Waititi movie is the one I'm most excited for. It's at least scripts from Tony Gilroy. am I correct? Yeah, I think Tony was going to be involved more and then it was just like, I'm not going to London right now.

But it's in production. And we like that character, we like that actor. We obviously like that writer. Cool. In. Okay. Obi-Wan Kenobi starring Ewan McGregor

and Hayden Christensen reprising their roles from their prequel trilogy, which will go into production in March 2021. Man, so this show, this is supposed to be directed by Debra Chow,

one of the great directors who's been working on Mandalorian. and had some script issues. I think that this is one of the few shows where at least we found out through reports that they had kind of gone back to the drawing board with what they were doing with this. But be that as it may,

I think it's going to really, this might be headline-wise the biggest thing to come out of this announcement in terms of you're talking about top three Star Wars character of all time in Obi-Wan and you're talking about bringing back two actors from an older generation of Star Wars productions. This is trouble to me.

I mean, I look forward to it. I'm excited about you and McGregor, but I think the thing that was exciting about it for people of our generation or level of skepticism was Obi-Wan is the coolest character other than Boba Fett, I think, and Han, right? That's the top three.

And we never really got to see him. He was so weirdly sidelined and kind of neutered and dull in the prequel trilogy that this felt like an opportunity to give it another go with a fresh start. And Hayden Christensen thing, maybe it gets people talking

and it scratches some fan itches, but it worries me. The kind of same, it's not ready to go trouble that plagued the post-Disney acquisition films, plus let's dip back into the well of stuff that kind of didn't work the first time. There's a reason why I think universally people

are excited about Boba Fett's role in the Mandalorian, because he's not the star of the show. It's because we got a little fan service, we got some cool new ideas, we got to see the armor, but we also got everything we liked about him in a younger, shinier model. And so this is one bears watching

for all those reasons. Yeah, I think the thing that you and I probably are going to be most interested in as these shows go into production and we start getting trailers and when they finally air is what genre they're playing in. Because Mandalorian so skillfully

brings on the sort of combination Western and samurai movie vibe, what's, what's Andor going to be like? Is Andor going to be a spy movie? Or a spy story?

Is it going to be an espionage story? Is Obi-Wan going to be, I don't know, like a noir? I'm curious as to what kind of playgrounds they're going to play in. Yeah,

and we have no way of knowing. So we just got to hope for the best. The Rangers of the New Republic and Asoka direct spin of the Mandalorian from John Favreau and Dave Faloni, and Asoka obviously means that Rosario Dawson is going to cement her place in the Star Wars universe. Emergency Pod, emergency text. She's just texting me right now saying, I'm so amazed they announced it already.

Then she, then hard emojis. So clearly, this just got done. This is my exclusive reporting. But how could it not? I mean, obviously they would have been making this deal beforehand once they, she filmed this last December, you know, so that episode. But I think this is thrilling. Obviously, I'm the world's biggest Rosario Dawson fan,

and she should always be starring in TV shows. But that episode did everything right. It introduced an incredibly cool, iconic character to a different generation of fans, or at least in a different, you know, people who hadn't seen her in the cartoon, being helmed by Dave Faloni, who created the character,

and as Mallory explained to us breathlessly and beautifully the other week, you know, this is his Gatsby, for God's sake, right? Like, this is everything he's wanted to do, and this is the character that means so much to so many people who love Star Wars in such a particular way. Slam dunk.

Slam dunk. And the other one, I assume, is Caradoon spinoff, right? Yeah, I would imagine that's a Carl Weather's Caradoon thing. But, you know, prove me wrong. But I feel like those two things are the make goods. And hell, maybe Oliphant is involved in that. I'm not sure of it. They've had a bunch of really cool guest stars

and recurring characters on Mandalorian that they could pull for. The other way to think about this that I think is really smart. Maybe not when comes in. there? I don't know. Yeah, this ranger show doesn't necessarily need to be as good or as, sorry for the pun, wide ranging as The Mandalorian is, which is clearly now that's the backbone of this new televised universe. All it really needs to do is be the same level of quality or just a touch below and be on at a different time of the year. That way you get that, you know, you get that same kick out of your Disney Plus subscription for longer. It's just smart and hard to see a downside.

Here to the pretty much break my brain. Lando, a new spinoff series from Dear White People creator Justin Simeon following Landau Calerician. I will note that in the official announcement of this, they did not specify whether this is a Donald Glover or a Billy D. Williams iteration of the character. I would assume it's going to be Glover. I would assume that they are working that out, but. Or are they doing two timelines? I mean, one of the things Rise of Skywalker did that we did notice at the end is like, set up a backdoor streaming spinoff where he goes off with that other character.

And could you get into a Billy D. Williams with flashbacks to Donald Glover, who he could be like basically a guest star on the show? I think it's interesting. It speaks to how much Disney wanted to literally blow the competition out of the water at this event that they announced it. They didn't need to. You know what I mean? This is clearly very early in the process. The Justin Simian piece makes it worth watching and makes it interesting. I think as far as both of we are concern. But could not imagine two bigger question marks. Billy D. Williams is not young. I know that we are super into putting very old people in positions of power in America in December 2020. One of the things that they announced that I'm very excited for is Jeff Bridges in a show literally

called The Old Man. Yeah, Jeff Bridges is like 20 years younger than Billy D. Williams. So, so there's that. And then there's the Donald Glover piece. Like he had said, I believe, around when he was doing press for solo that he would love to keep playing the character. His portrayal was one of the highlights of that otherwise low light of a movie. But his dance card is super full. Solo has actually grown in people's estimation, though, I feel like. Use eye statements, Chris, because he's taught that in college. Donald, I just mean, if he does it, and clearly they've reached out to him and they're

trying to figure it out, and he's already in the FX Disney Hulu family with Atlanta, and maybe, you know, going to Manhattan Beach for a couple months every year and splitting screen time with Billy D. is appealing to him, then it's a win. if they recast, it's interesting. It doesn't mean it's bad, but it's interesting. So the last one here that I'll mention is probably the one that I am most curious about because I think it could be an exciting left turn for this entire thing, this entire store's thing. And that's the accolite, a female-centric series set in the final days of the High Republic era from Leslie Headland. Now, we've had Leslie on the show before. She obviously did Russian doll

with Natasha Leone. She's done so much stuff that we're in. into, this seems like the highest upside, but also like I have no idea what this is going to be. Leslie Headland's sensibility, along with maybe Justin Simions, are probably the least likely to be in this world. But man, I can't wait to see what it is. This is the one. I mean, this is the one that is both most interesting to me, obviously because we are fans of Leslie and because it feels like it's the most original and potentially the most left turn in terms of genre. But, But look, over the last year and certainly for longer, the very smart people at Lucasfilm have been taking generals with literally everyone.

And what they say in the meetings is what's interesting to you, not just what's interesting to you in terms of the action figures we have spread out here on the table. What's interesting to you in terms of the types of stories you want to tell? And then I think they see it as their job to connect the two. So, you know, you want to tell this type of story. Well, have you considered this piece of... the universe puzzle. And I think they chose really wisely in choosing Leslie to be sort of the recipient of that particular Fulbright scholarship. Like, I'm sure they have many other things in development,

but she's the total package in terms of being an ace writer, an ace director, clearly a top level showrunner too, cool person, and also someone who just, she loves this stuff too. You know, every time we talk about her, I bring this up. But in my interactions with her, she's been very clear, like she wants to make the biggest movies in the world. Yeah. And so I think this is a really exciting play for all of them and a good partnership. For a couple of years now, going back, I think even to when we used to do this podcast at Grantland, I think you and I have been trying to scratch an itch with this stuff, with the Star Wars stuff

specifically, but even for the Marvel stuff. And like I said, we'll get to the Marvel stuff on Monday once it gets announced. But we had this sort of feeling like, look, we didn't make the rules. We didn't decide that this thing was going to be the most popular. thing and the only thing people wanted to talk about and the biggest sort of pop cultural phenomenon of our lifetimes. But if that is the case, can we carve out some spaces

within this world for people to try shit? And I think we always joked about like, make a gritty sitcom set at Moss Isley, like do things that are like, you know, what's a cop show on Star Wars like? Like, what is the... And they did that in some ways with Mandalorian by saying like, gun smoke, but in space.

and it's obviously energized the entire franchise. To me, that's what the accolade promises for. It's like, could you make a cerebral-headed dromedy set in the political environs of the High Republic? Like, I don't even know that much about, like, the High Republic. Like, I pretend I do, but I'm just like, yeah, sure, right. I know exactly what you're saying. The final days of the High Republic area, like,

she could be making Veep set in this, like, the political era of... Do you remember when the prequels came out in Southern? we were expected to pretend like we always knew the word Corrassant. Yeah, right. Then they added it to Return to the Jedi at the end. And maybe they referred to it in the trilogy. I'm sure many of our listeners will say they did, you Nimrod. But I distinctly remember being an obsessive child fan of Star Wars and the prequel's coming out and everyone just tossing around Corrassant like they knew it was a soft sea.

Yes. I didn't know that. But so yeah, there's a lot there. I think Mallory is like biting into like a piece of wood right now as we say that. So I'll quickly run through the... Do you want to transition? to John Malaney and Andy Sandberg doing Chippendale Rescue Rangers, or should we leave that for a future podcast? No, I'll just quickly run through the rest of the titles that they mentioned.

Star Wars, the Bad Batch, the animated follow-up to the animated series Star Wars, the Clone Wars, which I'm sure. To be clear, that is not a Star Wars-centric reimagining of Anna Lili Amherpore's cannibal movie. No. That got her the job in Breyer Patch. Not even Kathleen Kennedy could make that happen. Star Wars visions and anthology collection of short films set in the Star Wars universe from 10 different Japanese animation creators, which will debut in 2021, a droid story, an animated series from Lucasfilm animation and Lucasfilm Visual Effects team that sets R2D2 and C3PO on a new adventure. That's pretty significant news. And then obviously, they'll keep making Mandalorian, and that makes up all of the 10 promised Star Wars titles. As of recording, here's what we

know about the Marvel stuff. Essentially, Marvel Studios by contrast has already announced eight titles for Disney Plus, almost all of which are in some stage of development or production. Those are Wanda Vision, Falcon and the Winter Soldier, Loki, those are all expected to debut in the first half of 2021, the animated series What If? And then live action, Mrs. Marvel, Hawkeye, Moon Knight, which we talked about, She Hulk, and an untitled series focusing on Sam Jackson's Nick Fury are all in the pipeline as well. So by the way, Hawkeye's in production with Jeremy Renner. Like, there was this moment when everyone seemed to be having like a, are we sure we want to do this? Because he was in the news, was doing some not great things.

Yeah. His reputation not at an all-time high. And certainly if he's fallen off. Certainly not as an app maker as well, yeah. No, or as a pop singer. So it's certainly not even the reverence we talk about him on this podcast like we used to. But yet that's how crazy this year is and also how crazy Disney is. He's on set with Haley Steinfeld.

Like they're making that show and it's clearly based on the Matt Fraction run. It's wild. It's wild. It's almost to the point where there was the pandemic, and we were like, everything shut down. Who knows when we'll have shows again? But as we know in California, television is an essential service, apparently. And so all this shit went into production, whether it was a good idea or bad idea.

And it's coming. So we thought people's foot was off the gas. With Sam Esmail on a pod, people can hear next week. And he was talking about visiting the Manhattan Beach warehouse where they shoot Mandalorian. And he's like, and that's it. That's where they shoot it. And all I'll say. I feel like everything else Rosario just texted me is redacted,

but she did say, I didn't know about any of these other things they were announcing, they're so good at secrecy. They are. It's impressive. I will honor her secrecy, but I am excited for that. Any last final thoughts on this Star Wars Lee? I think what we'll do is probably take the weekend to process this a little bit and then maybe bring Mallory on. She can tell us where we're going with all of it.

I just think that as one half of a podcast that has spent years, questioning and chin-scratching about like, what does any of this even mean anymore? Like, oh, no one likes Star Wars in China. Like, is this next generation going to be on board for this? Did they overpay for this IP? Have they totally screwed themselves? I think the answer is no. And I think the answer is no because of John Favreau and the Mandalorian.

And that's pretty amazing. That all, obviously, people would be checking for Star Wars content and Star Wars TV shows were always going to get initial eyeballs and clicks, but that it was done well. and done well in a way that felt so effortless at its universe expanding and brand building that suddenly just a few months later we're seeing this enormous slate and being like, yeah, that could work. It could be cool

or better than that. It could be good. Like, that is, that's kind of... It's pretty enticing, man. It's pretty cool. It's brand redefining. Yeah. And so respect to John Favro who basically should have a statue next to Uncle Walt at this point,

because he did Iron Man and he did The Mandalorian. It's pretty hard to thread the needle of quality versus quantity. And obviously, the jury's out as to whether they can do it on this scale. But this seems like an appropriate scale. And they'll have some misses in here. There'll be some stuff that didn't work out. But I feel like this is, if this matters to you, this is the kind of vision that we saw with the Marvel rollout of the first few phases of

the Marvel movies where everything seems to be building towards something. And they've obviously unlocked something with Mandalorian. They've figured out people just want to spend time here. We can worry about what it all means a little bit further down the road. And can I also say I'm just impressed by the franchise building and commitment to flooding the zone also exhibited by this podcast because we are now in two hours, 20 minutes. It's a nonstop potting. And we still got the takes. We do.

So good job by us. Okay. Thank you so much for joining me, man. And we will be back on Monday. We'll have Mal on. We'll talk about Mandalorian, and we'll talk more about any other announcements to come out of this. Everybody have a great weekend. Was this a spinoff podcast?

Is that what this was? It's a backdoor pilot.