In late February Lucasfilm revealed Star Wars: The High Republic, a new storytelling initiative set to launch August 25th with the novel, Light of the Jedi followed by a series of novels and comic books. The High Republic is set in a brand new era for the franchise, 400 years before the events of the films. This is Disney’s first real attempt to forge something entirely new with Star Wars and try to break away from the Skywalker saga.
Though fans who have only seen the films may scratch their heads at the decision to jump backward, The High Republic actually follows a strong tradition in the old Expanded Universe of using the past as a launchpad to bring new ideas into Star Wars canon. Interestingly, Disney made sure The High Republic was a period of time that had yet to be explored even in the old Legends canon. It’s a smart move that prevents any potential comparisons, which is exactly what Disney is hoping to avoid.
Rise of Skywalker has proven to be incredibly divisive, with a disproportionately large amount of the fanbase displeased with the finale to the sequel trilogy. It’s been made abundantly clear that Episode IX was the end of the Skywalker saga, and Disney is eager to move on. They could have chosen to move forward; Lucasfilm certainly did before they were purchased.
The old Legends canon followed the adventures of Luke, Han, Leia, and their kids— something Disney can’t really do, seeing as that is exactly what the sequel trilogy has just covered. What Star Wars is like beyond this point hasn’t been explored much, with the exception of the Dark Horse comic, Star Wars: Legacy, which was set 125 years after the movies. Legacy was a great story, but it had to juggle all of the continuity that had been established before it in order to work.
Therein lies the problem: if Disney wanted to go forward, they would have to envision a world post-Rise of Skywalker. This means any narrative would still be influenced by the Skywalker saga in some way. It would also require writers to fill all the gaps and plot holes from Episode IX to ensure the new stories would make sense. That’s a lot of work that could simply be avoided.
Creating a new era like The High Republic is an easy solution, as it distances the franchise from any lingering bad feelings without having to clean up or address any of their missteps. This decision didn’t come out of nowhere either; it’s actually been hinted at for months. Disney has been subtly setting up The High Republic since 2019, first mentioning the era in the 2019 audiobook, Dooku: Jedi Lost and more recently in Marvel’s miniseries, The Rise of Kylo Ren.
In addition to The High Republic, Disney has made subtle references to other past eras from the old canon like Knights of the Old Republic in both The Clone Wars and Rebels. While those events have yet to become official, it’s entirely possible that some mention of The High Republic will appear in other Disney produced media. With the recent announcement of Rosario Dawson playing Ahsoka Tano in The Mandalorian Season 2, anything is possible. Disney has clearly had a plan for Star Wars’ future, and it starts in the past, with The High Republic.