Star Wars Celebration is coming house to have a good time the fiftieth anniversary of Star Wars.
The large Lucasfilm fan conference will maintain its subsequent version in Los Angeles, timed to commemorate the discharge of the very first Star Wars film, it was introduced Sunday in Tokyo, Japan, the location of this 12 months’s occasion.
A supply near Lucasfilm instructed The Hollywood Reporter that the Los Angeles Conference Heart will doubtless play host to the seventeenth Star Wars Celebration. The venue beforehand held the fourth version of Star Wars Celebration in Might 2007, which honored the thirtieth anniversary of Star Wars.
The 2025 Star Wars Celebration returned the occasion to Japan for the primary time since 2008, marking simply the second time it has been held in Asia in its 25-year historical past. The Tokyo occasion was the quickest Star Wars Celebration to promote out, with over 105,000 company in attendance, an 8 % enhance from the 2023 conference in London, in response to Lucasfilm. Demonstrating the really international enchantment of the Star Wars franchise, 55 % of this 12 months’s company got here from the Asia-Pacific area, with 47 % from Japan and an extra 31 % from the U.S. Altogether, followers traveled to the occasion from 125 international locations, in comparison with 64 international locations for the earlier version.
Regardless of the sellout and growing customer numbers, there have been some grumblings. The sensation in and out of doors the conference was that this 12 months’s version was not as expansive because the Celebration held in London in 2023.
“There’s not sufficient distributors and never sufficient to do,” stated one man from Los Angeles, who has been to London and twice to the Anaheim editions, who declined to present his identify. The person voiced what Celebration veterans had seen themselves. The breadth of product and merchandise wasn’t as giant as earlier years, there have been fewer interactive installations and even the life-size starships that loomed over the attendees. There have been additionally fewer panels and fewer in the best way of main information bulletins, no less than of the broad viewers selection.
“However I bought to sing “Comfortable Birthday” to Hayden in order that was cool,” piped within the man’s British good friend, referring to Hayden Christensen, the actor who performed Anakin Skywalker within the prequel Star Wars motion pictures and who proved to be maybe the preferred of Star Wars actors that populated the autograph and picture op line.
Followers lined up for over two hours for a second with Christensen, who has not acted in any main manufacturing and even took a break from display screen work since wrapping up his Star Wars work within the aughts. The actor was additionally charging essentially the most, by a major margin. A photograph with the Christensen price round $208, with the subsequent closest being Ahsoka star Rosario Dawson, who had an asking worth of $181. An op with Diego Luna was round $160. Not that was a deterrence for followers, whether or not first-timers or veterans. For non-Asians, the faraway vacation spot was “geek tourism,” and fairly frankly, nothing was getting in the best way of their fandom.
Sam Dungey and his fiancée Alisha, who flew in from England, partook within the picture op with Christensen, and had been over the Yavin moon with their expertise. Dungey instructed the actor of his latest engagement and bought a hearty “Congratulations” from him (these being hardcore followers, the marriage is deliberate for, appropriately sufficient, Might 4, 2026).
“He was my childhood,” Dungey stated of Christensen. “I grew up with the prequels, that was my Star Wars. I get emotional simply eager about it.” His fiancée stated that the couple hope to in the future carry their youngsters to a Celebration.
The ability of Pressure was positively on present throughout generations and throughout cultures. Some attendees spent hours moving into costumes and make-up simply to parade the conference middle and pose for images. One native man spent two months creating an AT-ST Walker, a two legged armored transport, from cardboard.
That type of ardour doesn’t go unnoticed to the actors. Dawson, who has spent numerous hours getting out and in of make up for her function in Ahsoka, stated throughout a panel she understood the dedication it took for somebody to try this, particularly in the event that they had been modeling themselves after her character, and was grateful for that type of affect the present has had.
The Tokyo Star Wars Celebration featured over 26 hours of franchise programming throughout 3 principal levels, plus some 100 hours of fan panels and podcast content material on supporting levels and conference areas. A number of main franchise bulletins had been made in Tokyo. Ryan Gosling made a shock look with director Shawn Levy to disclose the identify and launch date for his or her upcoming spinoff characteristic, Star Wars: Starfighter. Jon Favreau, Kathleen Kennedy, Star Wars guru Dave Filoni, and stars Pedro Pascal and Sigourney Weaver additionally lit up the occasion on its first day by displaying the first footage of The Mandalorian & Grogu, the Star Wars movie spun off from Disney+’s hit The Mandalorian TV collection.
Different highlights included Andor creator Tony Gilroy and stars Diego Luna, Kyle Soller, Adria Arjona, Genevieve O’Reilly, Alan Tudyk and Denise Gough premiering the primary episode of season two of the critically acclaimed Disney+ collection. And Hayden Christensen additionally drove the followers wild, turning as much as Ahsoka panel and revealing that he’ll reprise his fan-favorite function of Anakin Skywalker for season two of that Disney+ present.
On the animation facet, Lucasfilm revealed {that a} Darth Maul animated collection, Maul: Shadow Lord, will arrive in 2026. And the critically-acclaimed Star Wars: Visions animated anthology mission is increasing, with a brand new banner, Star Wars: Visions Presents, giving animators a longform showcase, with The Ninth Jedi being the primary spinoff standalone restricted collection.
Kathleen Kennedy, Tony Gilroy, Diego Luna, Shawn Levy, Ryan Gosling, Sigourney Weaver, Pedro Pascal, Jon Favreau, Grogu, Rosaio Dawson, Hayden Christensen and Dave Filoni pose for a photograph for a Star Wars Celebration Japan photoshoot at Tokyo’s Zojoji-temple.
Lucasfilm
Staging this 12 months’s Star Wars Celebration in Japan was its personal homecoming of kinds. Famously, Japanese cinema — and the work of Akira Kurosawa specifically — was a profound affect on George Lucas as he created Star Wars. Lucas drew closely from Kurosawa’s The Hidden Fortress whereas shaping the narrative perspective and character archetypes for Star Wars, and he repeatedly returned to the Japanese grasp’s filmography for shot concepts and storytelling inspiration throughout the franchise. Examples of Japanese iconography abound all through the collection, such because the samurai armor foundation of Darth Vader’s imposing helmet or “Jidaigeki,” the Japanese phrase for samurai interval drama, serving because the spark for the identify “Jedi.”
“Japan’s wealthy storytelling, historical past, artwork, and standard tradition have influenced Star Wars for almost 50 years, and Star Wars has made its personal mark in Japanese storytelling,” stated Carol Choi, evp, APAC built-in advertising & Japan managing director at Disney.
“Components just like the Jedi, modeled after samurai, and the non secular features of the Pressure, influenced by Bushido, spotlight the profound affect of Japanese tradition on the collection,” Choi defined
This ongoing cultural alternate was highlighted all through this 12 months’s Star Wars Celebration, with varied panels devoted to Kurosawa’s affect on Lucas, and Star Wars‘ affect on Japanese anime.
Choi added, “Star Wars has drawn deep inspiration from Japan and, by way of its storytelling and visible design, launched features of Japanese tradition to international audiences throughout generations.”