Rogue One series gets new director: Black Mirror's Toby Haynes steps in for Disney+
The streaming network has called in the British director due to the pandemic upheaval.
Top-rated British director Toby Haynes, who has helmed Doctor Who, Black Mirror and Utopia, is stepping in to direct the first three episodes of the Rogue One spin-off series for Disney+
Haynes is taking over from Tony Gilroy, according to Deadline, after he decided to stay in New York while the COVID-19 pandemic was causing so much upheaval to the industry and travel.
Gilroy, who wrote The Bourne movies and co-wrote the 2016 Rogue One film, will continue to act as executive producer and showrunner on the series while it's being filmed in the UK.
Haynes has an impressive CV that would appear perfectly suited to the job. He directed the Star Trek-influenced, Emmy Award-winning 2018 episode of Black Mirror, U.S.S. Callister, as well as five episodes of Doctor Who during the Matt Smith era and Amazon Prime Video's upcoming Utopia series, a reboot of the Channel 4 series about a group of young adults drawn together by a bizarre graphic novel.
Haynes also directed last year's Channel 4/HBO movie Brexit: The Uncivil War, starring Benedict Cumberbatch, as well as The Reichenbach Fall episode of Sherlock in 2012.
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The Rogue One series centres around Cassian Andor (played by Diego Luna, as he did in the film) and is in pre-production, with plans to start shooting in London next month. It is a prequel to the 2016 blockbuster and is set in the early days of the rebellion against the Empire.
The show had been described as a “spy thriller” when plans for it first were revealed last year.
It also was announced at the time that Luna would return as Andor, while Alan Tudyk would reprise his role as K-2SO, Andor’s droid sidekick.
Dixney+ has escalated its plans for Star Wars spin-offs after the success of season one of The Mandalorian. As well as Rogue One, a second season of The Mandalorian is coming, while another series is planned about the young Obi Wan-Kenobi, in which Ewan McGregor will return to the role.
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