Continuing to fly the flag for the Star Wars franchise on the small screen, The Mandalorian is only two weeks away from its return to Disney Plus for Season 2. And co-creator Jon Favreau is already talking about its future, confident (as much as anyone can be in these uncertain terms) that he and his team will be able to start making a third this year.
"We’re operating under the assumption that we’ll be able to go forward,” Favreau tells Variety. "We’re in very small situations and oftentimes we have a lot of characters in masks. And we also have a lot of digital work that augments things. So we’re a show that’s probably well-equipped to be flexible based on the protocols that are emerging surrounding work restarting.”
Yet while Disney is no doubt eager to build on the success of the first season and spawn a Mandalor-verse of spin-offs. Favreau's a little cagier. "I learned a lot from my experience over at Marvel, where it was very organic, how it would evolve," he says. "You’re paying attention to a larger story arcs and characters that could come together, but also smaller stories of individual characters that could go off [on their own thing]. The key here is keep maintaining the quality and never scaling to the point that we’re losing sight of what’s important to us and what people like about the show."
As for the possibility that the characters could make the leap to the big screen, Favreau is not in a mad rush. "We're definitely open to it,” he explains, "and excited to see where the story leads us and have that flexibility — because there’s no rulebook now."
The Mandalorian Season 2 kicks off on Disney Plus on 30 October.