Following its merger with Fox, Disney on Tuesday sketched out its future plans for two of its most towering franchises — the Star Warssaga and Avatar.
Three new as-yet-untitled Star Warsfilms will hit the big screen every other year just before Christmas starting in 2022, the mega-studio announced.
That means that there could be a three-year wait between the December release of Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, the final film in the original series begun in 1977, and the next big-screen Star Warsflick.
Several Star Warsprojects are in the works, including a trilogy by David Benioff and DB Weiss, the creators of HBO's Game of Thrones, and a separate trilogy by Last Jedidirector Rian Johnson.
A spokeswoman for Disney, contacted by AFP, did not offer additional details about the upcoming scheduled films, which will expand upon the cinematic universe created by George Lucas.
Disney paid $4 billion for Lucasfilm in 2012.
In September last year, Disney CEO Bob Iger admitted after the lacklustre performance of Solo: A Star Wars Story, a one-off film in the franchise, that the Star Warsrelease schedule was too frenetic.
After six films in 38 years, from 1977 to 2005, the rhythm had picked up considerably.
A total of four films came in rapid succession, from the release of Star Wars: The Force Awakensin 2015 to Soloin May 2018.
"I made the timing decision, and as I look back, I think the mistake that I made — I take the blame— was a little too much, too fast," Iger told The Hollywood Reporter last year.
Meanwhile, the studio pushed back its plans for the next films in director James Cameron's uber-successful Avatarfranchise— one of the biggest prizes for Disney in the Fox merger.
Avatar 2will come a year later than expected in December 2021, followed by Avatar 3in 2023, Avatar 4in 2025 and Avatar 5in 2027.
Avatarremains the top-grossing film of all time, with $2.79 billion in worldwide box office sales, but superhero extravaganza Avengers: Endgameis hot on its heels at $2.24 billion and rapidly climbing.