Rangers Of The New Republic: 5 Ways It Can Tie Into Return Of The Jedi (& 5 For The Force Awakens) – Screen Rant

In the scope of Star Wars, how will Rangers Of The New Republic connect to Return of the Jedi or The Force Awakens?

Lucasfilm announced enough new projects to make a Star Wars fans head explode at Disneys recent Investor Day event. Among these projects are three streaming series spun off from The Mandalorian Ahsoka, The Book of Boba Fett, and Rangers of the New Republic that will run concurrently with its story threads.

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Of the three shows, Rangers of the New Republic is the one with the most connection to the Skywalker saga. It can explore the transfer of political power in the gap between Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens in more depth than any other Star Wars media to date.

The most interesting thing about the New Republic officers appearances on The Mandalorian has been seeing how the Rebel Alliance morphed into a governing body that polices the galaxy.

Between the Empires fall and the First Orders rise, the New Republic enjoyed a brief period of success. In the Rangers series, the New Republic will be at the height of its powers.

Essentially, Rangers of the New Republic will be a law enforcement procedural set in a galaxy far, far away. But the tragic undercurrent is that the enforcing body, the New Republic, is inevitably doomed to fall to its knees and concede power to a fascist dictator.

The New Republic already collapsed before the events of The Force Awakens. Rangers of the New Republic can connect the victory at the end of Return of the Jedi to the defeat at the beginning of The Force Awakens.

Lukes triumphant appearance in the second-season finale of The Mandalorian proved that Disney+s new roster of post-Return of the Jedi content overseen by the dream team of Favreau and Filoni can do justice to the legacy characters who got skewed beyond recognition in the sequels.

Alden Ehrenreich and Donald Glover could reprise their roles as young Han and Lando, respectively, while Billie Lourd could play a CGId-up young Leia like she did in The Rise of Skywalker.

Instead of telling the story of how Han and Leias son Kylo Ren trained under Luke and turned to the dark side, the sequel trilogy picked up after all that had already happened and there wasnt much story left to tell.

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With Luke, Han, and Leia all playing major roles in the formation of the New Republic after the events of Return of the Jedi, Ben Solos childhood could factor into the story arcs in Rangers.

In its exploration of a post-Return of the Jedi galaxy, The Mandalorian has made it clear that the Empire was still operational after Palpatines defeat; it just had a fraction of the power it once had.

The Imperial Remnants have existed in the background of The Mandalorian, only appearing in the context of the search for Grogu, but Rangers of the New Republic can put them at the forefront.

When The Force Awakens opens, the Empire is already back in full force except its now called the First Order with giant fleets of TIE fighters and Star Destroyers and a bigger Death Star than ever before. The sequel trilogy gave no indication about how the First Order rose to power.

George Lucas made an entire trilogy out of the birth of the Empire. Rangers of the New Republic can set the stage for the First Orders takeover.

If the young Luke Skywalker introduced in The Mandalorian crosses over into Rangers of the New Republic, then he could be seen spending time with the Force ghosts who watched over him at the end of Return of the Jedi.

An Obi-Wan ghost played by Ewan McGregor might seem strange (and a computer-generated Alec Guinness might be even stranger) and Yodas spirit appeared in The Last Jedi, but Hayden Christensen is primed for an appearance as Anakins Force ghost after his inclusion in the Special Edition of Return of the Jedi.

In The Force Awakens, Finns arc makes it clear that the First Orders Stormtroopers arent expendable cannon fodder; theyre brainwashed orphans. In theory, under all those helmets are a bunch of misunderstood Finns in need of better guidance.

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But Stormtroopers are still treated like cannon fodder for nostalgic purposes. And Finn reveals that he was in sanitation, negating his entire internal conflict. Rangers of the New Republic can explain exactly where the First Order got its troops from.

In the Special Edition of Return of the Jedi is filled with terrible additions like Jedi Rocks and the Sarlaccs beak. One addition that sort of fits is the victory celebration at the end, which shows worlds from the entire Star Wars saga Naboo, Coruscant, Bespin etc. celebrating the Empires defeat.

Before the First Order rises up, Rangers of the New Republic can take a couple of seasons to show the galaxy enjoying peace and prosperity after the fall of a dictatorship.

Palpatines return technically wasnt teased in The Force Awakens. In fact, it wasnt teased at all. It was announced in a random game of Fortnite and explained away in a couple of vague lines of dialogue in The Rise of Skywalker. But the latter movie did reveal that Supreme Leader Snoke, who supposedly took Palpatines place as the galaxys dark side ruler in the interim between trilogies, was one of his creations.

The Imperial Remnants obsession with cloning Grogu for his M-count in The Mandalorian has already hinted that a deeper exploration of these barely congruent plot points is on the way.

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Ben Sherlock is a writer, comedian, and independent filmmaker, and he's good at at least two of those things. In addition to writing for Screen Rant and Comic Book Resources, covering everything from Scorsese to Spider-Man, Ben directs independent films and does standup comedy. He's currently in pre-production on his first feature film, Hunting Trip, and has been for a while because filmmaking is expensive. Previously, he wrote for Taste of Cinema and BabbleTop.

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Rangers Of The New Republic: 5 Ways It Can Tie Into Return Of The Jedi (& 5 For The Force Awakens) - Screen Rant