Ryan Gosling's Star Wars: Starfighter footage debuts at Disney's D23

D23 Reveal

On Friday night at Disney's D23 fan event, director Shawn Levy presented the first official footage from Star Wars: Starfighter, the franchise's first film set after the events of 2019's Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. Ryan Gosling stars as Kade Auberon, a pilot Levy described as having the swagger of Gosling's Drive persona. The screenplay, written by Jonathan Tropper, is set at the furthest point in the Star Wars timeline, free of Skywalker family storylines. Levy told the audience the project embodies themes of hope and family and adventure that the franchise is known for, but in a timeline never explored.

Before the footage, Levy played a clip from The Mickey Mouse Club, where Gosling got his start, and declared the role the most pivotal of Gosling's career. Gosling appeared in a Mickey jacket, then switched to one bearing the logo of his character Kade.

I owe a lot to Disney... and I'm now here 30 years later and I'm back and it's changing my life again.

He described Kade as "a guy from the wrong side of the galaxy whose fate is intertwined with the fastest starfighter ever built."

The Footage

The footage opens with newcomer Flynn Gray's young character uncovering a starfighter in a rusty garage. Gosling's Kade enters and tells him not to touch anything. When the kid asks what the ship is, Kade calls it a decommissioned G17, the fastest starfighter ever built. The kid says he has never heard of it, and Kade replies, "There's a reason for that." The sequence cuts to a montage: speeder bikes over swamps, a skiff riding across waves, a droid flying a ship, and a man leaping a gap in a high-tech room. The title appears as the camera follows the nose of the ship, followed by a shot of Kade flying at high speed with pronounced white lines around the vessel.

The setting is a sea-filled planet, and the footage includes touchstones familiar to Star Wars fans, including a bridge reminiscent of the one Luke Skywalker and Leia swung over. No characters from previous Star Wars films appear.

Cast and Release

The supporting cast includes Matt Smith, Mia Goth, Aaron Pierre, Simon Bird, Jamael Westman, Daniel Ings, and Amy Adams. Filming wrapped at the end of 2025. Star Wars: Starfighter is set for release on May 28, 2027, the same date the original Star Wars hit theaters 50 years earlier, as Levy noted.

Franchise Pressure

The reveal comes after Lucasfilm's previous live-action Star Wars film, The Mandalorian and Grogu, became the lowest-grossing live-action Star Wars movie, bottoming out at $345 million worldwide against a $165 million production budget before marketing. Levy's recent track record includes Deadpool & Wolverine, which grossed $1.33 billion and became the highest-grossing R-rated film ever.

Gosling and Levy are also collaborating on a Marvel Ghost Rider film, announced at Comic-Con last month. Gosling previously spoke about Starfighter at Star Wars Celebration in Tokyo.

The reality is that this script is just so good. It has such a great story with great and original characters. It's filled with so much heart and adventure, and there just really is not a more perfect filmmaker for this particular story than Shawn.