Ever since Disney acquired Lucasfilm, fans have been treated to more Star Wars content than ever before. Since the company launched its own streaming platform with Disney+, the Mouse House has been pumping out a couple of new Star Wars shows every year. It started with a proper final season to conclude The Clone Wars animated series and the wildly popular Lone Wolf and Cub-style adventures of The Mandalorian.
These shows have since been joined by animated series like Clone Wars sequel The Bad Batch and anime anthology Visions and live-action shows like the polarizing The Book of Boba Fett and the emotionally charged Obi-Wan Kenobi miniseries. These shows are available to enjoy at any time on the Disney+ library, but some of them warrant more rewatches than others
The Book Of Boba Fett (2021-2022)
The first of what will surely be many Mandalorian spin-offs, The Book of Boba Fett, started off with an interesting premise. Boba Fett and his new sidekick Fennec Shand take over Jabba the Hutt’s criminal empire. Unfortunately, the show couldn’t decide what it wanted to be. It kicked off as a family-friendly riff on a Star Wars gangster movie, then took a sudden left turn into The Mandalorian season 2.5 before pulling it all together for a clunky final battle.
Temuera Morrison is terrific as always in the title role, but the show woefully mischaracterizes Fett as a soft-edged pushover. He’s nowhere to be seen for almost two full episodes as Mando swoops in and takes over as series lead. The Book of Boba Fett had a lot of promise, but it was a mess from start to finish.
Star Wars: The Bad Batch (2021-)
A year after the end of The Clone Wars, Disney followed it up with a spin-off series, The Bad Batch, set in the aftermath of the conflict between the Republic’s clones and the Separatists’ droids. The spin-off is centered around the titular “Bad Batch,” a platoon of defective, genetically mutated clones who undertake daring missions during the rise of the Empire. Dee Bradley Baker anchors the series with a staggering vocal performance as not one, not two, but five distinctive clone characters: Hunter, Wrecker, Tech, Crosshair, and Echo.
The narrative arc of Clone Force 99 looking after young Omega felt like a rehash of The Mandalorian’s “Baby Yoda” storyline. But The Bad Batch has dazzling animation, lovable characters, thrilling action sequences, and a ton of exciting Easter eggs to make up for it.
Star Wars: Visions (2021-)
While Disney was focusing on legacy characters like Obi-Wan and Boba Fett and Luke Skywalker, Star Wars: Visions arrived as a breath of fresh air. Not only does every episode of this anime anthology series have its own original story set in a galaxy far, far away; they all have their own animation style.
Lucasfilm gave carte blanche to seven Japanese animation studios to produce nine short films. These shorts all have a nice, brisk runtime with their own self-contained narratives and their own beautiful, awe-inspiring visual style, so they hold up to a few viewings. As with any anthology series, some episodes are stronger than others. But there are no weak links in the first volume of Visions.
Obi-Wan Kenobi (2022)
Ewan McGregor gave a more nuanced performance than ever before when he reprised his role as the eponymous icon in the Obi-Wan Kenobi limited series. He plays a more grizzled, older Obi-Wan who has renounced the Jedi ways and is reluctant to return to his life of heroism. Vivien Lyra Blair’s scene-stealing turn as a young Leia Organa borrowed the spotlight from McGregor at every opportunity. Deborah Chow’s series mercifully leaves the well-worn setting of Tatooine behind early on for a fun-filled intergalactic adventure.
The series added new depth to Obi-Wan’s relationship with Darth Vader, building to an emotionally charged rematch. They both get a lot off their chest, from Obi-Wan declaring his friend to be “truly dead” to Vader telling his former master, “I am not your failure.” Against all odds, Obi-Wan Kenobi managed to justify its existence with the perfect combination of cosmic action, snappy humor, and moving character drama.
Star Wars: The Clone Wars – The Final Season (2020)
A few years after Netflix aired “The Lost Missions,” Disney+ brought back Dave Filoni’s fan-favorite animated series The Clone Wars for a proper final season. Season 7 was praised by both fans and critics as a fitting end to the series. The action set-pieces are more gorgeously animated than ever before, the storytelling is surprisingly complex, and the characters all end up where they need to be.
The nature of setting the series between two existing movies meant that Star Wars fans always knew where The Clone Wars was heading, but season 7 still managed to pack a few surprises. The devastating series finale, “Victory and Death,” wrapped up the show’s run in a neat bow with a focus on the central dynamic of Anakin (now Vader) and his apprentice Ahsoka Tano.
The Mandalorian (2019-)
Jon Favreau effectively saved Star Wars. Just when fans were losing faith in the saga’s new corporate overlords, Jon Favreau came along with The Mandalorian. The Star Wars franchise’s first live-action series harks back to the old sci-fi serials that inspired George Lucas in the first place. Pedro Pascal has created a new iconic Star Wars antihero with his compelling, nuanced turn as bounty hunter Din Djarin, who softens his edges when he takes a fugitive baby under his wing.
The Mandalorian has captivating multi-episode arcs like Moff Gideon’s search for Grogu, but each episode also has its own adventure-of-the-week storyline, so it’s easy to drop back in and rewatch a specific episode. Fans can revisit “Chapter 4: Sanctuary” for the Seven Samurai homage, or “Chapter 6: The Prisoner” for the double-crossing jailbreak, or “Chapter 14: The Tragedy” for Boba Fett’s breathtaking return to action.