Disneyland warps space and time
A tweak in the Galaxy’s Edge storytelling opens it to characters from across the ‘Star Wars’ narrative
The introduction of the Mandalorian, Baby Yoda and other new “Star Wars” characters in Galaxy’s Edge means for the first time, Disneyland will be telling more than one story in Black Spire Outpost along the vast timeline of the epic science fiction saga.
The Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge themed land at the Anaheim theme park was always envisioned as a big canvas for telling many “Star Wars” stories all at once with a wide host of characters, according to Walt Disney Imagineering’s Scott Trowbridge.
“It is a place that can connect with the entire range of ‘Star Wars’ storytelling, from the High Republic era a thousand years ago all the way to where we may be going a thousand years in the future,” said Trowbridge, who oversees the “Star Wars” portfolio at Imagineering.
What’s changed since Galaxy’s Edge opened in May 2019? Disney+ debuted in November 2019 and exploded in popularity during the COVID-19 pandemic — bringing a vast library of new “Star Wars” TV shows and movies to the streaming service, some of which have yet to even roll out.
“Since then, we’ve been telling stories across a much broader range of time,” said Trowbridge, who was the creative lead for the Galaxy’s Edge themed lands at Disneyland and Disney’s Hollywood Studios. “We haven’t really activated that in the parks.”
Until now. Disney+ has opened up a wide array of “Star Wars” storytelling possibilities in Black Spire Outpost, the outer rim village on the planet of Batuu that serves as the home of the Galaxy’s Edge themed lands in California and Florida.
It’s taken longer than expected, but breakout characters from the newest “Star Wars” stories on Disney+ are starting to appear at Galaxy’s Edge at Disneyland.
Bounty hunters Boba Fett and Fennec Shand from “The Book of Boba Fett” showed up in Galaxy’s Edge at Disneyland in late May. Din Djarin and Grogu — better known as the Mandalorian and Baby Yoda — from “The Mandalorian” will be dropping by Black Spire Outpost in Batuu West at a later date.
Boba Fett and his mercenary partner were the first new “Star Wars” characters introduced to Galaxy’s Edge since the grand opening of the themed land in 2019, which brought Kylo Ren, Rey, Chewbacca, Resistance spy Vi Moradi and a few stormtroopers to Batuu.
“At the time that we opened, almost all of our storytelling was set around a pretty limited chunk of time and a limited chunk of characters — Kylo, Rey and that central Episode 7, 8 and 9 story set,” Trowbridge said during an online video interview. “That was the ‘Star Wars’ storytelling that our audiences were participating in and the storytelling that we invited them to be a part of when they came into the park. Everything in the land was working in that same time bubble.”
The “Star Wars” galactic calendar marks time on either side of the attack on the Death Star, known as the Battle of Yavin. Dates fall before the Battle of Yavin (BBY) or after the universe-saving attack (ABY). Until recently, Galaxy’s Edge was set between “The Last Jedi” in 34 ABY and “The Rise of Skywalker” in 35 ABY.
The introduction of Boba, Fennec, Mando and Grogu to Galaxy’s Edge marks the first time characters from outside that very limited timeline of 34-35 ABY have shown up in the “Star Wars” land.
“Although it was designed into the land from the very start, the idea of expanding beyond a single moment in time is now ready to be put into action,” Trowbridge said. “Had it not been for the twists and turns of a global pandemic, it is likely we would have done this earlier.”
The subtle adjustments made by Imagineering and Lucasfilm to the Galaxy’s Edge storytelling rules allow for characters from different stories and eras in the sweeping “Star Wars” timeline to appear in the themed land at the same time — as long as their stories don’t intersect and disrupt the Force.
Since Galaxy’s Edge is canon, it’s a bad idea from a storytelling standpoint to casually introduce Mando or The Child into Batuu in 35 ABY. That means those characters can’t die in stories taking place over the next quarter century of the “Star Wars” timeline. Lucasfilm and Imagineering would not want to impact untold stories or tie the hands of future storytellers.
“The Mandalorian” and “The Book of Boba Fett” are both set in 9 ABY. Dropping Mando and Boba into 35 ABY in Galaxy’s Edge would mean canonically they won’t and can’t die for another 26 years in the “Star Wars” universe — diminishing any life-or-death drama the bounty hunters encounter.
Change was always intended to be a constant in Black Spire Outpost. The introduction of new characters in town simply required an added layer of storytelling rules to keep the diverse stories and eras from mixing in ways they never would or should.
“It was always the plan that we would evolve,” Trowbridge said. “We would never have locked the thing at one point in time and tried to live with one story for 50 years and ignore all ‘Star Wars’ storytelling.”
Imagineering’s solution to the simple yet complex storytelling challenge: story bubbles.
Story bubbles help avoid storytelling and timeline conflicts and allow multiple stories to be told at the same time in Galaxy’s Edge — something that has not happened until now.
“The whole place is not participating unilaterally across a single story all the time,” Trowbridge said. “We can move between those stories.”
Each character or set of characters now stays in their own story bubble in Galaxy’s Edge so they don’t accidentally bump into a tale being told elsewhere in the land. In theatrical terms, each story has its own stage. In practice, that means “The Mandalorian” characters won’t set foot in an area of Black Spire Outpost where the sequel trilogy storyline is unfolding and vice versa. Invisible buffers keep the stories from overlapping in the sprawling, 14-acre land.
That allows stories from both 9 ABY and 35 ABY — as well as tales from any part of the vast “Star Wars” universe — to be told at the same time in Galaxy’s Edge without impacting the timeline or canon of any of the science fiction epics.
In many ways, story bubbles have always been used in Galaxy’s Edge — allowing Kylo Ren to interrogate a Disneyland visitor about the whereabouts of the Millennium Falcon while standing around the corner from the iconic starship.
The best way to think of Galaxy’s Edge now is like Disney+ — where you can switch between different “Star Wars” stories using a remote control without getting them confused in your head.
“Just like we do when we’re watching ‘Rogue One’ and then ‘The Mandalorian,’ we are aware of these different stories,” Trowbridge said. “Sometimes we know things the characters don’t. Sometimes we know their fate before they do. Galaxy’s Edge operates the same way.”
Audiences — whether TV viewers or theme park visitors — are accustomed to flipping between “Star Wars” stories without the storylines and timelines contradicting each other.
“We may be seeing little snippets of things that have happened in Batuu, but they’re not necessarily from the same moment,” Trowbridge said. “I think of those as little bubbles of stories. Little flashbacks and flash forwards that we can walk into and out of. They don’t ever contradict the story or contradict each other.”
Just as in the movies, the key to “Star Wars” storytelling in a theme park setting is authenticity.
“Each one of those snippets has to feel like I’m actually seeing a real moment that happened in Black Spire Outpost and these characters are here in this moment,” Trowbridge said. “Their story intersects with this place and I can step into that and participate in it. Then later on, I can participate in another bit of storytelling that’s unrelated, but that’s still an authentic piece of ‘Star Wars’ storytelling.”
Trowbridge won’t say which “Star Wars” stories are coming next to Black Spire Outpost or which ones can and never will show up on Batuu — but he does say there are many more stories to tell in Galaxy’s Edge.
“There’s a lot of ‘Star Wars’ storytelling yet to come and we’re going to connect and keep up with that ‘Star Wars’ storytelling,” Trowbridge said. “We built this place so guests could participate in ‘Star Wars,’ and that means participating in the ‘Star Wars’ that’s in their heads right now.”