‘Starfighter’ Director Shawn Levy Confirms New ‘Star Wars’ Movie Isn’t a Prequel or Sequel [Exclusive]

Coming off last summer’s Deadpool and Wolverine, Shawn Levy has been handed the keys to another blockbuster franchise in the form of Star Wars: Starfighter. The Ryan Gosling-led space adventure is set to blast into theaters on May 28, 2027. Collider’s Steve Weintraub caught up with Levy to discuss all things Starfighter while the director was promoting the fifth and final season of Stranger Things.

Levy was quite honest about how the new Star Wars movie fits into the franchise, stating, “Well, for one thing, it is different in that it is an all-new non-sequel, non-prequel adventure. It’s new characters, it’s a new timeline. It inherits legacy themes, but it’s really trying to give Star Wars [fans] — and just movie audiences — something fresh, something new. And with a spirit of play and big-hearted adventure with moments of real levity that, frankly, A New Hope had in a revolutionary way.” He went on to say:

“We’re really trying to sort of take that tone as a North Star every day. My crew, my DP, Claudio Miranda, Gosling is my kind of central collaborator in the lead role. It’s certainly been a dream come true. My 10-year-old self is on set with me every day. In fact, he’s going to catch a flight tonight to go back to the set and keep shooting on Monday. But it’s a huge invigorating opportunity because Lucasfilm has been so encouraging of me doing something new. There’s no pressure to be derivative or limited by an obligation to what came before. There’s just a love of what came before.”

What Do We Know About ‘Star Wars: Starfighter’?

​​​​​​Levy also lavished praise on cinematographer Miranda, a frequent collaborator with Top Gun: Maverick‘s Joseph Kosinski, calling him “a huge gift to a Star Wars movie.” He highlighted the cinematographer’s skills when asked about his contributions, saying:

“I’ll give you two things real quick, beyond his artistry, which is self-evident in everything from Life of Pi to Benjamin Button. Claudio is — I call him the Professor because he loves the nerdy figuring out of prep. He likes to design camera platforms that don’t exist. He likes to think about lenses and format in ways that are innovative. And so the rigor of his innovative thinking is a huge gift to a Star Wars movie that wants to break some new ground visually and be a visceral kinetic ride, which is the other thing he brings. Claudio, in both Top Gun: Maverick and F1 showed this. His sense of how to put people in the action in a visceral way, not just in an observational way, but a subjective and participatory way, in that cockpit, in that driver’s seat. He does it like no one else does it, and I wanted that superpower for Starfighter.”

Starfighter is the first Star Wars movie to not be a sequel, prequel, or spin-off since 1977. The film stars Gosling as the lead of an ensemble cast that will also include Flynn Gray, Matt Smith, Mia Goth, Aaron Pierre, Simon Bird, Daniel Ings, and Amy Adams. Plot details are being kept more secret than the Death Star plans, but it will be set several years after the events of The Rise of Skywalker, which (presumably) saw the final defeat of the First Order and Palpatine’s Sith Cult.

What’s Happening in the Fifth Season of ‘Stranger Things’?

In the wake of season four’s cataclysmic season finale, Hawkins, Indiana has been torn asunder by dimensional rifts from the Upside Down, courtesy of arch-foe Vecna (Jamie Campbell Bower), and Max (Sadie Sink) is in a coma after a psychic duel with the villain. However, after a season spent with the cast divided between Hawkins, California, and a desolate Russian gulag, our heroes are together again, and they’re ready to take down Vecna once and for all. It will premiere its first four episodes on Netflix on November 26.

Star Wars: Starfighter will open in theaters on May 28, 2027. Stay tuned to Collider for future updates.

Release Date

May 28, 2027

Writers

Jonathan Tropper, George Lucas