Star Wars Forces of Destiny

Disney never ceases to amaze. They are currently running a great new Initiative called, Star Wars Forces of Destiny. This is a new drive to bring to light new inspiring stories from iconic Star Wars characters.  And true to Disney there are so many levels to this announcement.

The first level is the most visual, in fact they grabbed my attention and then led me to find this great new offering from Disney/LucasFilm.  There are 8 shorts on Disney Site that are really very good.  "The Choices we make,the actions we take, moments both big and small shape us into Forces of Destiny." This is the tagline that opens each of the animated shorts.  What follows is 2-3 minutes of pure Star Wars goodness.

Fans will be excited to discover that talent from across Star Wars films and animated TV series reprise their roles for the Forces of Destiny shorts: Daisy Ridley as Rey, Felicity Jones as Jyn Erso, Tiya Sircar as Sabine Wren, Ashley Eckstein as Ahsoka Tano, John Boyega as Finn, Lupita Nyong’o as Maz Kanata and more.

The shorts are all very well made and are being shown on the Disney Channel and the above link.  Each tells a real quick story that has that Tagline as the core premise.  It's the decisions we make that shape our lives.

Now to the second level of what I think Disney is doing here.  As you can see from the voice talent there are a lot of the female leads mentioned.  This is due to the fact all of these stories available right now are based on Female characters, of which, Star Wars and Disney excels.  Each female character decides and acts on their own with confidence and determination.  This is doubly smart for Disney as they get extra fans looking at Star Wars.  As a big Star Wars fan, I'll watch anything that comes out regardless of the lead.  Give me a Rhodian as the lead and I'd be fine.  But what happens with these great girls/women is that we get a lot of girls and women who might not focused on the Star Wars universe yet.  Extra ticket sales and merchandise $$$ down the road.  Another quick note, no-where on the page or in the trailers, unless I missed it, does anyone address how the lead roles in these shorts are all female.

And now to the Third level of Disney Ingenuity, the toys...and other items.  After doing a little bit more clicking around I found the toys and books and such.  They need to pay for it somehow and making money is one of their goals.  Starting out, the books look great.  Readers for the younger kids, maybe 5-11 years.  And again a change in that they are mainly girl characters again, getting the girls into the Star Wars. Each of the ladies have their own movable action figures.  There are also a number of supporting characters.

This again shows how well the marriage of Lucasfilms and Disney has worked out for the better.  I'm looking forward to whatever comes next!  

May the Force be With You...

PostScript:  When looking this up, be aware the there is a D&D version of a SW games called Star Wars Force AND Destiny.  Cool, but not the same thing.