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Star Wars: Starfighter First Look: Ryan Gosling's New Era

•Patrick W.

Lucasfilm showed the first Star Wars: Starfighter footage at D23 — Ryan Gosling as pilot Kade Auberon, five years after The Rise of Skywalker. May 28, 2027.

Ryan Gosling as pilot Kade Auberon in Star Wars: Starfighter, directed by Shawn Levy

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The First Post-Skywalker-Saga Star Wars Film Gets Its First Look

Lucasfilm unveiled the first footage from Star Wars: Starfighter at D23 2026, shown exclusively to the crowd inside Anaheim’s Honda Center — it has not been released publicly online. Ryan Gosling plays pilot Kade Auberon, and director Shawn Levy confirmed the film is set five years after The Rise of Skywalker, making it the first fully standalone Star Wars story built for the post-Skywalker-saga era.

⚔️ This story is part of our Star Wars Live-Action Hub — every live-action series and film, rated and ranked.

Why It Matters for Dads

The reported footage opens in a garage, with Kade warning a boy off touching a decommissioned starfighter that turns out to be the fastest ever built — a scene that plays like a deliberate callback to the franchise’s original “kid finds a ship in the desert” DNA, before the film gets into orbital dogfights and biome chases. That’s a meaningful signal: after nearly a decade of Star Wars films tangled up in sequel-trilogy continuity, this one is explicitly designed to be watchable without three prior movies of homework.

That matters at home in a very practical way. A genuinely standalone entry means you can bring a kid who has never sat through the Skywalker saga straight into this one without a lecture beforehand — a rarer thing in modern Star Wars than it should be. Whether Levy delivers on that promise is the open question for 2027.

What’s Next

No public trailer yet — reporters who saw the in-room footage described it, but Lucasfilm has given no date for an online release. We’ll cover it in full the moment it goes public.

The Dadnology Take

Keeping the first footage in-room only is an unusual marketing choice, but the reported setup — a genuinely standalone story, five years removed from sequel-trilogy baggage, with a supporting cast this stacked (Amy Adams and Matt Smith in a Star Wars movie is not nothing) — is a real reason for cautious optimism. We’ll reserve judgment until we can actually watch something ourselves.

When does Star Wars: Starfighter come out?

May 28, 2027, in theaters worldwide.

Who stars in Star Wars: Starfighter?

Ryan Gosling plays pilot Kade Auberon, supported by Matt Smith, Mia Goth, Aaron Pierre, Simon Bird, Jamael Westman, Daniel Ings and Amy Adams. Shawn Levy directs from a script by Jonathan Tropper.

Is the Star Wars: Starfighter trailer online?

Not yet. The first footage was shown exclusively inside D23’s Honda Center to the crowd in the room — as of this writing, Lucasfilm has not released it publicly online.

Patrick W.Founder & Editor

Father of two, keen nature & landscape photographer, and smart-home tinkerer based in rural Germany. Camera gear gets tested outdoors in real conditions — not on a studio bench — and the house runs on a home network more elaborate than it strictly needs to be. Everything reviewed here has to survive real family life: school runs, sticky fingers, and the odd toddler stress-test. Reviews are never sponsored — no paid placements, no press-sample deals. How we test →

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Disclaimer: This review and its visuals were created with the help of AI. Some links may be affiliate links – we may earn a commission if you make a purchase, at no extra cost to you.

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