Of all the characters featured in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, Forest Whitaker’s Rebel extremist Saw Gerrera seems to be the one that will act as connective tissue between the standalone anthology film and the rest of the Star Wars universe. Originally appearing in several episodes of Star Wars: The Clone Wars, Gerrera will next pop up in Star Wars Rebels, where he’ll be voiced by Whitaker, and may return again in future avenues as well, as teased by Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy.
In a new interview with Empire, Kennedy talked a bit about Gerrera’s initial role in Rogue One, and future plans for the character:
“With Saw Gerrera, we just became very intrigued with him as a character [from The Clone Wars] and how he fits inside this story. To be honest, we originally thought we were going to develop Saw into something much larger, but we couldn’t accommodate it. So he is not in the movie as much as we would like to have him in the movie, which creates the opportunity to explore his character even further in our future development.”
How much of Saw we’ll see in the future remains to be seen, but with more prequel anthology films on the horizon like Han Solo and the long-rumored Boba Fett movie, as well as a wealth of new material in animated series, comics, novels, and video games, anything is possible.
Whitaker himself seems excited about the prospect of further exploring the character, adding:
“I’m curious about what else they’re about to do. Because they seem to really like the character, which is great!”
Saw Gerrera fans can see him in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, which is in theaters now, and catch his return to television during Star Wars Rebels‘ third season, which returns on January 7 at 8:30pm ET on Disney XD.
Originally published December 29, 2016. Updated November 30, 2022.
