Today Lucasfilm have confirmed the episode count for the upcoming Disney+ series.
People have been wondering about the episode for The Book of Boba Fett for quite sometime. Initially it was believed to be six or seven episodes, but rumours later stretched that to eight and later Jordan Maison of Cinelinx reported it was nine (Maison has since disregarded the source).
Lucasfilm finally confirmed that the series will consist of seven episodes, one less than a typical season of The Mandalorian and one more than next years Obi-Wan Kenobi. Despite Fett having a smaller episode count than Mando, it took almost twice as long to film. Fett filmed for seven months from November 2020 until June of this year. For comparison, The Mandalorian, typically films for four months and Andor filmed for nine despite having five more episodes than Fett, not being reliant on the volume and episodes expected to be longer than. For some strange reason people think it’s weird that Andor filmed for nine months, but from the reasons I’ve outlined, you can see it’s quite normal.
I’ve always been told the reason Fett took so long to film was due to COVID-19 restrictions and guidelines with the team trying to make the production as safe as possible for all involved. Andor implored similar guidelines and safety for cast and crew was a priority, however Andor was also impacted by bad weather in the United Kingdom which at times halted on location shooting.
The Mandalorian season three is currently filming and is expected to wrap in March. The latest season of the Mando is also set to take slightly longer than previous seasons to film due to safety guidelines and members of the casts schedules.
We can also now surmise that each director outside of Robert Rodriguez, who is confirmed to direct multiple episodes, will likely only direct one episode each thanks to the episode count reveal. The confirmed directors of the series include Dave Filoni (The Mandalorian), Bryce Dallas Howard (The Mandalorian), Steph Green (Watchmen) and Kevin Tancharoen (Agents of SHIELD). Temuera Morrison initially stated Jon Favreau (The Lion King) was directing an episode, but Empire Magazine didn’t include him in the director list and only as an executive producer.
We’re now exactly one month away from The Book of Boba Fett debuting on our screens and I for one cannot wait to see my favourite Bounty Hunter back in business.