Fans were treated to a few huge surprises at this year’s Star Wars Celebration in London, from the reveal of first look footage from shows like The Acolyte and Skeleton Crew to updates about the highly anticipated second season of Andor. But the most exciting stuff revolved around the new Disney+ series Ahsoka, which got a trailer as well as a major confirmation about casting: Lars Mikkelson will be playing Grand Admiral Thrawn!
Mikkelson provided the voice of Thrawn in the Star Wars Rebels animated series and will not be playing him in live-action. Thrawn was first introduced in a series of Star Wars novels by Timothy Zahn in the early ’90s and went on to become a mainstay for the franchise.
Lars Mikkelson (Thrawn) teases Star Wars: Ahsoka
Another thing that makes Ahsoka so exciting is that its showrunner is David Filoni, the creative lead on both the Rebels and Clone Wars animated series. Ahsoka will include lots of major characters from Rebels, including Sabine Wren (Natasha Liu Bordizzo), Hera Syndulla (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), and Ezra Bridger (Eman Esfandi). The show looks like a live-action sequel to Filoni’s beloved animated series.
“His writing is very good,” Mikkelson told Collider when asked about reuniting with Filoni for Ahsoka. “It’s very strong. And all the characters have their own drive, and you will probably not know what’s it all about until that very last scene and I like that. I like that writing, that takes its audience so seriously, that you can see for yourself that we drag it right to the reveal. What was the whole thing about?”
The Expanse star Wes Chatham joins the cast of Ahsoka!
We’ve also learned that actor Wes Chatham has joined the cast. Chatham is best known as Amos from the sci-fi show The Expanse. Deadline has heard from multiple sources that Chatham will play Thrawn’s right-hand man in Ahsoka.
The cast of Ahsoka is pretty stacked at this point. We recently also learned that David Tennant will be portraying the droid Huyang, who he also voiced in Rebels. Ray Stevenson and Ivanna Sakhno will play the villainous Baylon and his apprentice Shin Hati. Oh, and Hayden Christensen is also set to reprise his role as Anakin Skywalker, Ahsoka’s former Jedi Master.
The show is looking like a hit! Ahsoka is due out on Disney+ this summer.
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