Roughly a year ago, Disney had one of their investor call presentations, and in it, they announced a slew of new Star Wars projects heading to screens big and small. However, since then, there have been more than a few doubts cast upon some of those projects. For example, it is unclear if the Rangers of the New Republic series will make it to the screens due to the firing of Gina Carano, the actress who played Cara Dune in The Mandalorian, who was expected to lead the series. Recently, another project was thrown into uncertainty. The Star Wars: Rogue Squadron film, directed by Patty Jenkins, was revealed to no longer be entering production in 2022 as originally planned. This caused some fans to doubt if it would make its December 2023 release date or if it would be canceled entirely. However, it seems the latter had been debunked.

Deadline recently reported that Patty Jenkins has left the role of director on the Cleopatra film, and they also stated this was due to her focussing more on Rogue Squadron and Wonder Woman 3. Their statement said,

“Jenkins fell off as director so she could focus on her next two projects: Wonder Woman 3 and Star Wars: Rogue Squadron.”

Deadline also went on to report that Kari Skogland will be taking over as director on Cleopatra. This should mean that the Rogue Squadron movie is still happening with Patty Jenkins attached to it. Although, there has been no confirmation officially from Disney or Lucasfilm.

Patty Jenkins being attached to both Wonder Woman and Rogue Squadron could explain the delay of Rogue Squadron’s start of production. It is possible that she could be working on Wonder Woman first and then moving to Rogue Squadron. It wouldn’t be the first time a director did a movie for Warner Brothers and then immediately hopped on a movie for Disney. James Gunn recently did The Suicide Squad for Warner Brothers and is now working on Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 for Disney and Marvel. It is also not uncommon for delays to happen during the pre-production phases of films, and there are a ton of factors that can affect the production schedule like availability, budgets, or studio involvement.

It is also worth noting that it is not uncommon for there to be a large period of time between a film’s announcement and its final release. Marvel has developed a reputation for having an almost assembly-line level of production on their films which has allowed them to produce several movies a year on a steady schedule. However, this isn’t a model that every studio can or should follow. Some films require more time. Wonder Woman 1984 was announced soon after the first and didn’t release until 2020. The Flash was announced all the way back in 2014, and it isn’t even expected to release until next year! There were even 4 years between the first two Matrix movies.

All this is to say that sometimes there are delays in a movie's production, but that doesn’t always spell doom for the film itself. For the most part, Lucasfilm, Marvel, and Disney are pretty committed to their schedules, but they have each also delayed several projects. Almost all of those projects have seen the light of day one way or another. That is to say that things bode well for Rogue Squadron, especially if Deadline’s report is accurate. Rogue Squadron also appears to be a stand-alone project that isn’t directly connected to any other Star Wars film. That would mean that production can take its time since it is not following another film. Hopefully, Rogue Squadron will release when Patty Jenkins and Lucasfilm have crafted and polished the story they want to tell, and that will definitely be a film worth waiting for.

Source(s): Comicbook.com

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