Luke Skywalker will begin making appearances in Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge in 2025. This shares the official news about the meet & greet character coming to Disneyland and (hopefully) Hollywood Studios at Walt Disney World, plus other commentary about the evolution of Star Wars land and why this is a much more significant change than it might appear on its face.
Let’s start by discussing the gradual ‘erosion’ of the stringent story standards for Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge. This was first broached back in 2022, when Imagineer Scott Trowbridge explained how storytelling would evolve in the land with the introduction of new characters: “While we as visitors may be able to experience different stories throughout Star Wars history, the characters on Batuu can not. They will remain in their specific story and timeline and won’t intersect with other characters or stories that would not be appropriate for them.”
Since then, there’s been a steady stream of new characters into Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge, including Mandalorian and Baby Yoda at both Disneyland and Walt Disney World, as well as Boba Fett, Fennec Shand, Sabine Wren, and Ahsoka at Disneyland. There also have been a handful of characters out exclusively during special events. I spotted General Hera Syndulla during DVC Moonlight Magic at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, and it’s my understanding that others have appeared during Star Wars Nite at Disneyland.
As a general rule, Disneyland has seen many more characters in Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge than Walt Disney World. In addition to the above discrepancies, the BDX “Duckling Droids” appeared last year during Season of the Force, and there have been a multitude of little ways the land has been plussed and made to feel more alive in California.
There have been a lot of excuses/explanations for this over the years, starting with Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser imposing stringent story rules at Walt Disney World. But that’s been closed for over a year, so I’m slightly skeptical that a bunch of offices in space are dictating anything in terms of characters within the adjacent land.
A more plausible explanation is that the Imagineering and Lucasfilm teams that are continuing to develop new creative concepts for Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge are California-based. It’s easier for them to test characters or have the appropriate support technical staff for the BDX Droids, for example, at Disneyland. It’s a short drive rather than a cross-country flight.
Along with that, Walt Disney World leadership is notoriously-averse to limited time entertainment and characters, even when funded by the studio or streaming marketing budgets. There are several reasons for this, some of which actually are reasonable. We’ve been down that road before, though, so let’s cut to the chase with the debut of Luke Skywalker in Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge:
A Jedi… like his father before him pic.twitter.com/nbxXn8W1Zp
— Disney Parks (@DisneyParks) February 7, 2025
Disney Parks teased Luke Skywalker’s arrival in Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge with a video on Twitter of the character and R2-D2 in front of the Millennium Falcon at Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge. The post was simply captioned: “A Jedi… like his father before him.”
Even with just that, we could conclude that Luke Skywalker is coming to at least one of the Star Wars lands. Disney knows even this short and sweet video will draw endless speculation, and they aren’t so cruel as to tease us like that.
However, Disney’s reply makes this clearer: “Incoming transmission with more details expected 2.10.25 #SeasonOfTheForce #Disneyland.”
This suggests full details will be announced February 10, 2025 and that the Luke character appearances will only be in California, as opposed to Walt Disney World. At least at first.
Season of the Force is the Star Wars celebration at Disneyland, running this year from March 28 through May 11, 2025. It starts during Spring Break and before DCA Food & Wine Festival concludes, running for May the Fourth, before coming to a conclusion during shoulder season. The following week–May 16, 2025–is the start of Disneyland’s 70th Anniversary Celebration.
Basically, Season of the Force is Disneyland’s springtime event that’s meant to serve as a stopgap to get fans to the park before the kickoff of the 70th. Although Spring Break will be busy as always, there are weeks in April and May that are expected to be slower. This Star Wars event should help draw locals and fans to the parks during the downtime.
It’s worth noting that Luke Skywalker has never appeared in Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge. The video depicts the character in his black Jedi garb with a black glove. It suggests a young version of the character from the time period as “The Mandalorian,” as opposed to an older Luke.
If this is a young Luke Skywalker, it would be the biggest breaking of the sacred timeline of Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge to date. The land is supposedly set between Episodes 8 and 9 of the sequel trilogy, when Luke is an old man. “The Mandalorian” is set after the events of Episode 6. Although Din Djarin and Baby Yoda have appeared in the land already, it’s plausible for them to be consistent with the timeline. Mando wears a helmet to conceal his face; Grogu is a baby of the yoda species, and they age oddly (scientifically speaking, of course).
There’s no plausible way young Luke appears in Batuu. That alone makes this hugely significant, much more so than the other characters who have appeared in Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge. It opens the door for Darth Vader, Princess Leia, Han Solo, OG Yoda, and every other character guests have been clamoring for since the land debuted.
Suffice to say, there’s likely more erosion of the sacred timeline to come. Disney announcing the New Mission featuring Mandalorian & Baby Yoda for Millennium Falcon Smugglers Run already increased the odds of storytelling inconsistencies at both Walt Disney World and Disneyland by 2026. The appearance of Luke Skywalker just accelerates this, albeit on a seasonal basis.
Turning to commentary, I have consistently and repeatedly been advocating for Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge to have a soft reboot.
I’m not going to rehash all of that here, but the bottom line is that I’d like to see Batuu be freed of its stringent storytelling rules and timeline, and use the setting of the land as a jumping off point for new adventures. (See Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge Needs to Break the Rules for my take on all of that.) I’m most certainly not using “sacred timeline” as a term of reverence.
A soft reboot of the Star Wars land would be an opportunity to introduce beloved characters, use the catwalks in the land for mini-shows, and make the land more lived-in thanks to droids and additional performers. They could also doing a test run of a dinner show in Starcruiser at Walt Disney World for a future purpose-built venue in the land. All of this would breathe new life into the land and help it finally realize its full potential.
As I’ve mentioned repeatedly, I do not believe the Mando mission for Smugglers Run is the only Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge enhancement in the pipeline. I’ve heard nothing credible recently, but my expectation is that Imagineering will want a marketable ‘package’ of additions, improvements, regimaginings, etc. for 2026 to go along with that. This Luke Skywalker tease further reinforces that for me.
From my perspective, the question now is when Luke Skywalker will come to Walt Disney World, not if he will. It is inevitable that the character will, just like Mandalorian and Baby Yoda before him. Guest demand will be too strong, to the point that local leadership at Walt Disney World won’t have a choice.
It’s one thing with all of the Disneyland-exclusive characters who casual guests don’t even recognize (not ashamed to admit I had to Google a couple of them when we first saw them–cool as the character looks, I had never heard of General Hera Syndulla before that DVC party). It’s another entirely with Luke Skywalker and R2-D2. It would be crazy to not bring this duo to Walt Disney World.
The better question is whether Disney will want to play that card, so to speak, in Summer 2026 as part of the aforementioned (potential) marketing package of changes and additions that breathes new life into Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge. Or will they want to pull that lever this summer, introducing incremental changes that draw locals to Disney’s Hollywood Studios.
My guess is that Walt Disney World will wait. To whatever extent locals can be drawn out to DHS this summer, that’ll already happen with the two new stage shows. And Luke Skywalker, awesome as he is, isn’t enough alone to entice a large number of tourists to plan trips to Walt Disney World that they otherwise wouldn’t have taken. There’s just far more upside to waiting and having a suite of enhancements that have cumulative drawing power.
The calculus is different for Disneyland, where Luke Skywalker will be a big draw for locals from late March through mid-May. Not only that, but it gives the entertainment, Imagineering, and Lucasfilm a chance to test the character on a limited-time basis before a further rollout (presumably) next summer on both coasts. In my view, that’s the win-win approach.
Ultimately, I’m really pleased by this. I know diehard Star Wars fans who love the strict rules of Batuu will disagree, and that’s perfectly understandable. I love that Imagineering had the opportunity to take a big swing with Galaxy’s Edge, but over 5 years later, it still hasn’t quite lived up to its promise.
Breaking the rules could fix that, making Batuu a vibrant canvas for adventures that comport more closely with guest expectations. It could make the land feel alive and exciting, even if it becomes less coherent from a storytelling perspective. It could also make the land perform better with casual visitors, who hear “Star Wars land” and expect to be able to see Darth Vader, Luke Skywalker, Yoda, C-3PO, and other characters they actually know and care about.
The arrival of Luke Skywalker on Batuu reassures me that the other entries on my wishlist for Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge also have a realistic chance of changing within the next 2 years. It’s also reassuring that maybe Disney is listening to guest feedback about Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge and acting accordingly. The land has so much unrealized potential, and a soft reboot of Galaxy’s Edge could be exactly the shot in the arm that’s needed.
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YOUR THOUGHTS
Are you excited to see Luke Skywalker and R2-D2 in Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge? Do you think these characters will eventually make their way to Walt Disney World? Expect this duo, along with other original trilogy characters, to appear in Batuu along with the new Mandalorian & Baby Yoda Smugglers Run mission in Summer 2026? Do you think Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge should break its own rules or stick to the fixed timeline and story? Would you like to see Darth Vader and regular Yoda in the land? Think Galaxy’s Edge should focus on fun, canon, or a mix of both? Do you agree or disagree with our assessment of Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge? Any questions? Hearing your feedback–even when you disagree with us–is both interesting to us and helpful to other readers, so please share your thoughts below in the comments!
