Movie and TV News

At the end of “Aftermath”, the Bad Batch set a course for J-19, the location of planet Saleucami, a place we last saw in The Clone Wars season 2. So it’s time to meet an old friend! But the episode also tackles an issue central to the show, is it ok for a young child to be with a bunch of deserted soldiers who are on the run from the Empire? Click through for my spoiler review of “Cut And Run” and let’s discuss the latest Bad Batch episode!

May 4th didn’t just give us new toys, the very first Bad Batch episode was released on Disney+. The Bad Batch are not new characters, we all know them from season 7 of The Clone Wars. So how is their own show? Is it any good? I am not spoiling anything when I say yes, the show is quite good. Of course it could be even better, but it’s only the very first episode and the show has a lot of potential. So click through for my spoiler review of the very first The Bad Batch episode “Aftermath” and let’s discuss the adventures of a group of misfit clones that try to find their way in a post Order 66 galaxy.

The Bad Batch is debuting in just over a month in a 70-minute premiere on May the 4th. Click through for additional details and the complete trailer.

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It is finally happening! Production for the Obi-Wan Kenobi Disney+ series will begin in April! The series will be set 10 years after the events of “Revenge of the Sith”, which means it’s almost a decade before the events of “A New Hope” and Luke is a young child.
The full cast of the series was also announced! Click through for the details!

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Disney+ is adding a lot of vintage content to their platform this April. Fans can look forward to Volume I & II of Tartakovsky’s Clone Wars, Ewok movies Caravan of Courage and The Battle for Endor, and the animated Ewoks season 1 & 2. And, while they are not adding the infamous Star Wars Holiday Special, they are adding the very popular Boba Fett cartoon that was a part of the special: The Story of the Faithful Wookiee. Still missing from the line-up is the Droids cartoon. 

If you haven’t signed up for Disney+ yet, click here to get started!

Get ready for The Bad Batch! Set to debut on Star Wars Day!

Gina Carano is no longer employed by Lucasfilm. Late Wednesday night the news broke that following a controversial post by Carano on her Instagram Lucasfilm decided to cut all ties with the actress. I will show a screenshot of Gina Carano’s (deleted) controversial Instagram post after the jump and provide some commentary. Before you click through to read the full story I want to remind everyone to be polite and civil in the comments!

We will most likely not see Cara Dune ever again

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The Mandalorian received a nomination as “Best Television Series (Drama)” for the upcoming Golden Globes earlier today! The other nominees in the category are “The Crown”, “Ozark”, “Ratched” and “Lovecraft Country”.
Last year The Mandalorian was completely overlooked by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association that awards the Golden Globes. The HFPA is an organization of ca. 90 foreign journalists who report on US entertainment news for foreign media.
Do you still care about these award shows? The Golden Globes have somewhat of a shifty reputation in entertainment circles, because a club of fewer than 100 journalists from countries like Russia, India, South Korea, Bangladesh, Austria or Germany decide on who wins what and earning a membership in the organization is somewhat of an intransparent process. But a Golden Globe win is still coveted by most in Hollywood. However, the only memorable thing about last year’s Golden Globes was certainly Ricky Gervais’ roast of Hollywood actors and few probably remember any of the winners. Unfortunately Gervais won’t host the show this year, instead Tina Fey and Amy Poehler will co-host. The Golden Globes will be awarded on February 28th. Will you watch the show to see if The Mandalorian can win?

Golden Globe Award

Lucasfilm is busy constructing a huge outdoor set near Little Marlow, which is a small village in the UK. A British tabloid (The Sun) got hold of photos made by a drone flying over the set and the photo reveals the scope, it’s quite large and massive. So if you want to see the photo, then please click through. If you consider a photo of an outdoor set a spoiler, well, then just don’t click, it’s easy!

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I talked about the Nielsen streaming ratings for the USA before. The Mandalorian season 2 fares really well and has been in the top 10 throughout its second season, rising as high as number 3 on the list, behind two Netflix shows. The season 2 finale which featured the return of Luke Skywalker however improves on the already good ratings by becoming the first non Netflix show ever to top Nielsen’s streaming charts. Beating “The Office” in the number 2 spot, which is still the best rated show available on Netflix.

Of course Nielsen only measures ratings in the US, so we don’t know exactly how things are worldwide. Netflix has a lot more subscribers and is available in more countries. However, it is impressive that a Disney+ show can beat any of the shows on Netflix in the US, since Netflix has more subscribers. This is yet another testament to the huge success of The Mandalorian and of course the immense popularity of Luke Skywalker. Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni really are Lucasfilm’s MVPs. Now if only Hasbro capitalized on the success of the show and announced a ton of Mandalorian action figures very soon…

You can find the full list of the top streaming shows on the Hollywood Reporter website.

Today I want to talk about the upcoming Rogue Squadron movie. Scheduled for release in 2023 and helmed by Patty Jenkins. Patty Jenkins made herself a name with Wonder Woman in 2017, which was her first big budget movie (she only had a couple of TV credits before). The sequel to that movie, Wonder Woman 1984, was released a short while ago and let’s say the reception to the movie is very, very mixed. So some people may wonder if Star Wars fans need to be worried about Rogue Squadron. Click through for a discussion!

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We’ve waited to post this until the official announcement to avoid spoilers this weekend, but it looks like we have another Disney+ series set in the timeline of The Mandalorian to look forward to next December: Star Wars: The Book of Boba Fett. The finale of The Mandalorian revealed this in the most awesome way, and since then it’s been speculation on whether this would be the subject matter of The Mandalorian season 3, or an all-new series, and now we have our answer. There’s going to be a lot of Star Wars to look forward to next Christmas!

I guess there is a lot to talk about after the season 2 finale of The Mandalorian. And when I say “a lot” I am still understating things. The review for the episode will follow later, but for now let’s talk about the Mandalorian season 2 finale. So click through if you need to get things off your chest or want to share your impressions!

The pentultimate season 2 episode of The Mandalorian may be more pivotal than previous episodes, even if it may not be as epic or as action focused. There is so much to talk about! So click on the banner below or here to read my spoiler review of “The Believer”!

Click through to get the spoiler talk going on the latest episode of The Mandalorian: “The Believer”. 

And finally, we have our next official feature film announcement: Rogue Squadron. Coming to theaters in December 2023, and directed by Patty Jenkins.

Unfortunately, this won’t be the Rogue Squadron from the Original Trilogy but will be set after the events of The Rise of Skywalker. 

Rogue Squadron will introduce a new generation of starfighter pilots as they earn their wings and risk their lives in a boundary-pushing, high-speed thrill-ride, and move the saga into the future era of the galaxy.

Also announced today is a new animated Disney+ adventure film: Star Wars: A Droid Story. 

This epic journey will introduce us to a new hero guided by R2-D2 and C-3PO.

Probably one of the more intriguing new show announcements is The Acolyte. Not much is known other than this quote:

The Acolyte is a mystery-thriller that will take viewers into a galaxy of shadowy secrets and emerging dark-side powers in the final days of the High Republic era.

It looks like the direction they are taking for the pseudo-Solo sequel will be a Lando event series titled, you guessed it…. Lando. 

This will be created by Justin Simien, but there was no word on whether or not we will see any of the stars from Solo reprising their respective roles.

The Cassian Andor series has an official title now: Andor. Andor will start streaming in 2022. And, it looks like the Obi-Wan Kenobi officially takes place 10 years after the events in Revenge of the Sith, and Hayden Christensen will be back to reprise his role as Darth Vader! Production begins in March 2021 on Obi-Wan Kenobi

The first two new upcoming live-action series have just been revealed, both taking place during The Mandalorian timeline: Rangers of the New Republic and Ahsoka. 

Both series will be helmed once again by Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni, and at least 1 of these will drop on Christmas 2021!

Are you following along? Click here for the live stream. They’ve already teased 10 new Star Wars series over the next few years. More detailed information to come towards the end of the live stream.

NRG, a global “insight company”, has conducted more than 350,000 interviews to find out which entertainment franchise is considered to be the most bold, thought-provoking and inclusive. And the top rated franchise is: The Mandalorian! Click through for the full list of the top 20 rated franchises!

The Mandalorian is popular

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There is certainly a lot to discuss after the most recent episode of The Mandalorian, titled “The Tragedy”. Many things happened in an explosive and action filled episode. Click here or on the banner below to read the spoiler review and to leave your thoughts about the episode in the comments.

According to Nielsen, who release a list of the top 10 most watched streaming content in the US, The Mandalorian made it into the top 3 in the final week of October, when season 2 premiered. Nielsen base their numbers on estimates of course, since streaming services don’t release any detailed information. According to Nielsen the 9 available Mandalorian episodes in the time between October 26th – November 1st accumulated 1.032 billion minutes of viewing time, only trailing The Office and The Queen’s Gambit on Netflix. Netflix has more subscribers of course. According to Brian Fuhrer of Nielsen the numbers for the Mandalorian are quite extraordinary, given the lower subscriber count for Disney+. Actually, The Mandalorian is the only non Netflix content on the list. Nothing from Amazon Prime or Hulu made the top 10.
Incidentally, these Nielsen numbers also refute any reports on YouTube about the Mandalorian season 2 opener only being watched by 40-50,000 people or so.

Successful launch of season 2