Herring's Prediction
Give it ten years: the man who brought BB-8 to life thinks the Star Wars sequels will sit alongside the prequels as fan favorites. In a new interview with Gamereactor, puppeteer Brian Herring said the backlash around Disney’s trilogy echoes the heat George Lucas’ prequels took two decades ago — and that history will repeat itself.
“I think the sequels are no more polarizing than the prequels were when they came out,” Herring said. “All the people who are upset about the sequels are too young to remember how upset the people when the [prequels] came out were, except they now have the internet.” He added a clear timeline for the turnaround: “I think in 10 years’ time, you’re going to see [the same] with the sequels, because the sequels have a huge fan base and I meet them all the time, but they’re all much younger than the people complaining on the internet...”
That “huge fan base,” in Herring’s view, will age into nostalgia just as the kids who grew up with Darth Maul and Jar Jar Binks did. He wasn’t trying to convert anyone, either. “It’s perfectly fine,” he said, “if you don’t like them, you don’t like them. Everything’s not for everyone.” He then nodded to a familiar sci-fi refrain: “These things are all generational and I think Battlestar Galactica said it best, ‘this has all happened before, it will all happen again.’”
Prequels Then, Sequels Now
Wind back to the early 2000s and the mood was rough. Veteran fans tore into The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones, and even Revenge of the Sith on release. Over time, that picture changed. Younger viewers who imprinted on those movies grew up, while later projects set around the era helped fill in character arcs and connective tissue. Prequel discourse softened, and in many circles flipped.
Herring argues the same cycle is underway for Rey, Finn, and Poe. The Force Awakens hit theaters in 2015, which now sits more than a decade behind us. Rise of Skywalker followed in 2019 and remains the series’ most recent big-screen entry for those characters. With the internet amplifying every reaction in real time, the initial storm around the sequels may have looked bigger than the prequel era’s pushback, but Herring believes the pattern is identical — just louder.
There’s a practical side to that optimism. When a generation claims a set of films as “their” Star Wars, they bring that energy to conventions, social media, and eventually to studios’ bottom lines. Nostalgia matters in this franchise, and a 10-year window lines up with when childhood favorites tend to become adult comfort watches.
What It Means for Rey, Finn, and Poe
Studio plans around the sequels remain fluid. Disney has indicated it wants to continue the stories of Rey and company, though timelines are hazy. Earlier this week, Finn actor John Boyega said he’d spoken with Dave Filoni about a possible return, a small but telling sign that conversations are happening. Momentum like that tends to build as sentiment warms.
Questions hang over previously announced projects, including a standalone movie centered on Rey Skywalker that drew fanfare at Star Wars Celebration 2023. In a separate thread, Lucasfilm is incubating new movies with Simon Kinberg. According to comments made to Deadline in January, Kathleen Kennedy said Kinberg turned in a lengthy treatment that was “very good, but not there,” before the team reworked the story and pushed for another draft. None of that guarantees a greenlight, yet it shows the sequel-era characters are still in active development conversations.
If Herring’s timeline proves right, the industry might benefit from patience. Allow a little space, let younger fans grow into their voice, and reintroduce these heroes with sharper ideas and a better sense of what resonated. The blueprint isn’t mysterious; the prequels made the same climb with help from later stories and a fan base that aged into appreciation.
The Road Back to Theaters
Before any sequel-era revival, Lucasfilm is steering audiences back to cinemas with projects outside the Skywalker family tree. The Mandalorian & Grogu is slated to be the franchise’s next big-screen swing, a familiar pairing designed to spark broad interest. A healthy box office there would make it easier to bring Rey and friends back with confidence.
None of this settles the old arguments about pacing, plotting, or lore choices across The Force Awakens, The Last Jedi, and The Rise of Skywalker. It does, however, frame the conversation in cycles rather than absolutes. Give fans time, add new context, and watch how opinion bends. If that curve holds, BB-8’s operator might be right — the galaxy far, far away tends to come around.
