Minor spoilers ahead for The Mandalorian and Grogu.
There are major IPs and then there's Star Wars. Generations grew up with the Star Wars movies, as well as the live-action shows that are available for those with a Disney+ subscription. Fans waited years after The Rise of Skywalker's ending for the franchise to return to theaters with The Mandalorian and Grogu. Jon Favreau was behind the camera for the new blockbuster, and explained why it wasn't full of crossovers or cameos from the likes of Ahsoka and/or Thrawn.
There were big expectations for The Mandalorian and Grogu, especially from fans who watched the Star Wars movies in order. But rather than being an expansive narrative full of connections to other projects, the movie was a contained story about one specific mission. While speaking with EW, Favreau explained why he didn't bring in big crossovers from the Mando-verse, offering:
When we were discussing doing a fourth season of [The Mandalorian], which was put on hold, and then the idea of doing a theatrical presentation… It changed the way we approached how interconnected things should be. A fourth season of a show would have assumed that you saw three seasons previously and, frankly, everything else on Disney+. That's the nature of a serialized long-form TV story.
Honestly, I get it. Because while I would have loved to see Ahsoka, Thrawn, or Bo-Katan pop up in The Mandalorian and Grogu, these types of crossovers might have actually excluded moviegoing audiences. They could have appeared in a season of the TV show, but the movie had to be accessible for casual fans who might not be caught up on all the Star Wars lore from the shows. So Favreau and company left crossovers and bonus characters out of the movie.
Lots of Star Wars characters have shown up on The Mandalorian over the years, to the joy of the hardcore fans. But the character's pivot to the big screen meant new rules, require a story that was more easily digestible for folks who aren't as well-versed in the galaxy far, far away. I enjoyed how capsulated the story was, even if I was originally expecting to see characters like Moff Gideon show up.
It should be interesting to see if upcoming Star Wars movies follow The Mandalorian and Grogu's example in this way. It looks like Shawn Levy's Starfighter will be another standalone story, rather than one interconnected to various entries in the franchise as a whole. So it remains to be seen when the movies will become more serialized like the Skywalker Saga.
The Mandalorian and Gorgu is in theaters now as part of the 2026 movie release list. We'll have to wait and see if/how the story continues, either via another movie or a new season of TV. Only time will tell.
