The opening of Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge was such a big deal that Bob Iger once joked that Disney wouldn’t ever need to promote it; just announce it was open, and the people would come. For the most part, he hasn’t been wrong, as the land is still incredibly popular, if only for the fact that Rise of the Resistance is one of the best theme park rides ever created.
And yet, not everybody loves the Star Wars land that we got. While many fans hoped that the theme park land would let guests visit popular Star Wars locations from the past, the decision was instead made to create a new Star Wars planet to set the land, and that decision came directly from the top of both Disney and Lucasfilm.
Bob Iger And Kathleen Kennedy Killed The Original Plans For Galaxy’s Edge
In an interview with WDW Radio, which has recently resurfaced, former Walt Disney World VP Dan Cockerell discussed the fact that originally, Walt Disney Imagineering had the idea to build a version of Star Wars desert planet Tatooine, and were reasonably far into design of the land when they got a call telling them to change direction. According to Cockerell…
They said, ‘Well, yesterday Bob Iger met with Kathleen Kennedy… and they had a conversation. They had a meeting. And Kathleen Kennedy, her point of view was, there are way more Disney Star Wars stories ahead of us than behind us. So we really should think about, do we want to build a Tatooine, and build what all the fifty-somethings remember Star Wars is, or do we want to build something else which is going to appeal to all the upcoming generations who are going to know the new stories.' And that day, Tatooine was killed at the Studios.
Tatooine wouldn’t just be killed at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, but also at Disneyland, as near identical versions of the land were built on each Disney coast. The world that was Tatooine became Batuu, a planet that is in the galaxy’s outer rim. The land was also set in the middle of the Sequel Trilogy, with only the characters from those films available to meet with guests.
The Idea Had Promise, But It’s Been Proved A Failure
On paper, the reasoning behind the decision to go with an original location makes a lot of sense. The future of Star Wars was bright at that point, and the expectation was that we’d be getting lots of Star Wars movies from Disney every year after the Sequel Trilogy was completed. However, that didn’t happen. The franchise stalled, and while many loved Rey, Finn and the rest, they, like Star Wars more broadly, haven’t been embraced by younger audiences the way the original characters were in their generation.
Over time, we’ve seen Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge slowly ignore its timeline, bringing in Boba Fett, the Mandalorian and other characters from the era between Original and Sequel trilogies. Next month, Disneyland will officially abandon the Sequel era timeline and bring in several original trilogy characters, including Luke, Han Solo, and Leia.
This, combined with the fact that modern Star Wars series on Disney+, like The Mandalorian and The Book of Boba Fett, routinely return to Tatooine as a nostalgia play, would seem to make clear that trying to move the theme park away from that was the wrong call.
Still, Kathleen Kennedy wasn’t wrong. When The Mandalorian and Grogu arrives this summer, Disney will have made as many Star Wars movies as George Lucas ever did. When Star Wars: Starfighter comes out next year, we will have crossed the pivot point, where most Star Wars movies have been made by Disney. There is still likely more Star Wars in front of us than behind us, so Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge will likely continue to change as it does.
