While it never seemed to move beyond its initial concept, director Patty Jenkins says her Star Wars film about X-wing pilots, Rogue Squadron, is not dead.
In an appearance on TCM’s Talking Pictures podcast, Jenkins told host Ben Mankiewicz she was still working on a script for Rogue Squadron. The film was previously presumed to be canceled, along with several other announced-but-unshot Star Wars films of recent years.
In Jenkins’ case, she left the film to develop a third Wonder Woman film — but then that project wound up falling apart.
“When I left Star Wars to do Wonder Woman 3, and I started working on that, we talked about, ‘Well, maybe I’ll come back to Star Wars after Wonder Woman 3,’ so we started a deal for that to happen.”
“When Wonder Woman 3 then went away, Lucasfilm and I were like ‘Oh, we’ve got to finish this deal.’ We finished the deal right as the strike was beginning, so I now owe a draft of Star Wars.”
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Jenkins’ pitch for the movie was essentially Top Gun set in the world of Star Wars. Rogue Squadron was announced by Lucasfilm and Disney in December of 2020. They were confident enough in the project at that time to even produce a teaser hyping the movie.
Lucasfilm said Rogue Squadron would “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.” But not long after the announcement of the film, Lucasfilm started announcing delays; the movie was originally expected to open in theaters in 2023. Now … who knows?
You can listen to Jenkins’ full appearance on Talking Pictures below.
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