Today, Disney and Lucasfilm announced that Star Wars: Episode VIII, originally scheduled for release in summer 2017, will now debut on December 15, 2017.

The move follows the extraordinary success of Star Wars: The Force Awakens, which was the first Star Wars movie to premiere outside the traditional summer blockbuster window and smashed numerous records, including biggest domestic and global debuts of all time as well as the biggest domestic second and third weekends, en route to becoming the highest grossing domestic release of all time with over $861.3 million and the third biggest global release ever with $1,886.7 billion.

Written and directed by Rian Johnson, Star Wars: Episode VIII is currently in preproduction and will begin principal photography in London next month. Kathleen Kennedy and Ram Bergman will produce and J.J. Abrams, Jason McGatlin, and Tom Karnowski will executive produce. Stay tuned for exciting updates in the coming weeks.

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This is when battlefront 2 will also release. Good for the game because the hype will be through the roof!

I sort of figured a new Star Wars every December after Force Awakens delays didn't hurt it at all.

I'm surprised, but not disappointed.

I always assumed Dec 2017. So it's actually news to me that the original plan was [northern] summer 2017.

They saw how well the brand did during Christmas and how connected it was with fans and families, I imagine it will also boost all the merch and tickets they will sell during that important part of the year so I can't say I'm surprised with this.

I do hope if we ever get a Battlefront 2 that it;s not a complete casual mess and has an actual server browser.

Same here: seemed like they would have an annual release schedule.

FUG

1.5 years really seems like not quite enough time to make a Star Wars movie.