Adam Driver spent D23 weekend back in business with Disney. Just not the part of Disney the Ben Solo crowd wanted.
Asked by Deadline at the event whether Kylo Ren could ever return, Lucasfilm co-president Dave Filoni said the movie isn’t there and fans won’t find it there. “The force is not with us in that regard,” Filoni said, adding that he loves the love fans feel for it.
That is as close to a final answer as Lucasfilm has given since Driver revealed last October that he and Steven Soderbergh spent two and a half years developing The Hunt for Ben Solo, a post-Rise of Skywalker redemption story that Bob Iger and Alan Bergman rejected because, in Driver’s telling, they didn’t see how Ben Solo was alive.
Driver Came Back To Disney Through Marvel
The same weekend Filoni’s answer made the rounds, Driver beamed into Marvel’s D23 presentation from an empty Pinewood soundstage to announce himself as Nathaniel Milbury, the Mister Sinister alias, in the X-Men reboot dated for May 5, 2028.
So Disney found a way to put Adam Driver back in a tentpole. It just did it on the side of the company that doesn’t have to explain how a dead character is walking around.
The Campaign That Won’t Quit
The fan effort has been relentless.
Supporters flew a banner plane over Disney after last November’s earnings call, hired a skydiver, and parked a digital billboard truck outside the Hollywood premiere of The Mandalorian and Grogu in May.
Daisy Ridley was supportive of the enthusiasm without endorsing a revival, and CBN’s position hasn’t moved either: Disney was right to kill it, and it shouldn’t come back.
Ben Solo died on screen. Reviving him to chase a hashtag is the kind of legacy-character stalling that put Star Wars where it is.
Where Star Wars Actually Stands After D23
Deadline’s D23 takeaway calls Star Wars the Disney label most in need of resuscitation, and the numbers explain why.
The Mandalorian and Grogu topped out at $345 million worldwide, the lowest-grossing live-action Star Wars movie ever, on a $165 million budget before marketing.
Nothing new was announced for the movie side in Anaheim.
Lucasfilm showed first footage from Star Wars: Starfighter and confirmed Ryan Gosling’s character name, Kade Auberon, debuted the Ahsoka Season 2 teaser trailer with Filoni on stage, and put the show’s costumes on the show floor. That was the slate.
Deadline’s box office comp for Starfighter is telling: not Shawn Levy’s Deadpool & Wolverine and its $211 million opening, but Fantastic Beasts spinning off Harry Potter to a $74 million debut, a lower bar than Mando and Grogu‘s $81.7 million opening. We break down what that comp means here.
The trade puts a lot of pressure on Levy and Gosling to sell something brand new next Memorial Day weekend.
That is the context for Filoni’s answer.
Our sources say a massive Star Wars reboot is coming, Lucasfilm is going big on the 50th anniversary next year, and Filoni, who took over from Kathleen Kennedy this year, just told the sequel trilogy’s loudest fans that its loose ends are not the priority.
Star Wars: Starfighter opens May 28, 2027. X-Men, with Driver, hits theaters May 5, 2028. Watch Driver’s Marvel video in the full D23 panel here.
