Development Disney CEO
Bob Iger said in February 2020 that spin-offs of the live-action
Star Wars series
The Mandalorian (2019–2023) were being considered, and there was potential to add characters to the series to then give them their own series. A month later,
Rosario Dawson was cast as
Ahsoka Tano for the
second season of
The Mandalorian, appearing in "
Chapter 13: The Jedi" which was written and directed by executive producer
Dave Filoni. Filoni co-created Ahsoka with
Star Wars creator
George Lucas for the animated series
Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008–2020), and later included her in his follow-up animated series
Star Wars Rebels (2014–2018). In December 2020,
Lucasfilm announced several spin-off series from
The Mandalorian including
The Book of Boba Fett (2021) and
Ahsoka, also known as
Star Wars: Ahsoka. The new series were set in the same trimeframe as
The Mandalorian—during the 30 years between the films
Return of the Jedi (1983) and
Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015)—and were planned to culminate in a "climactic story event". Filoni indicated that this would involve a conflict with the remnants of the
Galactic Empire which
Ahsoka helps build towards. The series were being concurrently developed by
The Mandalorian creator
Jon Favreau and Filoni, with Filoni creating, writing, and serving as lead producer and
showrunner on
Ahsoka. Lucasfilm's
Kathleen Kennedy, Carrie Beck, and
Colin Wilson were also set as executive producers on the series.
Ahsoka was initially reported to be a
miniseries, but Disney was not listing it as such by February 2023. That April, when the series was revealed to have eight episodes, Filoni was announced to be making a film that would serve as a culmination of the interconnected stories of
The Mandalorian and its spin-offs. In November, Filoni revealed that he was now chief creative officer at Lucasfilm and would be directly involved in the planning of future films and series. He was considering a
second season of the series at that point, and Lucasfilm officially announced that Filoni was developing the season in January 2024, to be made before his planned film.
Writing At the end of
Rebels, protagonist
Ezra Bridger is taken to an unknown location with antagonist
Grand Admiral Thrawn. In an epilogue, Ahsoka joins
Sabine Wren to search for Ezra, setting-up a future story that Filoni wanted to tell. He described bringing Ahsoka and Sabine together as "a unification of
Clone Wars and
Rebels". Following speculation and reports about the series, Filoni confirmed that
Ahsoka would be continuing the story he established in the epilogue of
Rebels, and would explore aspects of Ahsoka from
The Clone Wars and
Rebels that he had not been able to so far. When asked if the series was effectively a fifth season of
Rebels, Filoni said that was "one way of looking at it" but he also saw all of his
Star Wars projects as one larger story. Ahsoka takes on Sabine as her
Padawan learner in the series, something Filoni had been planning for the characters since the end of
Rebels. The relationships between masters and apprentices became a key theme throughout the
first season, which also explores Ahsoka's relationship with her former master
Anakin Skywalker.
Casting stars as
Ahsoka Tano, reprising her role from
The Mandalorian Rosario Dawson was confirmed to be reprising her role as Ahsoka Tano from
The Mandalorian with the series' announcement in December 2020; Ahsoka was voiced in the animated series by
Ashley Eckstein. In October 2021,
Hayden Christensen was set to reprise his role as Anakin from the
Star Wars films, while
Natasha Liu Bordizzo was cast as Sabine a month later, replacing
Tiya Sircar who voiced the character in
Rebels.
Ivanna Sakhno was also cast in November.
Mary Elizabeth Winstead was added to the cast in January 2022, and
Ray Stevenson joined the next month. Stevenson previously voiced
Gar Saxon in
Rebels and
The Clone Wars. In September,
Eman Esfandi was cast as Ezra, who was voiced by
Taylor Gray in
Rebels. At
Star Wars Celebration London in April 2023, Winstead was revealed to be portraying
Rebels character
Hera Syndulla, replacing voice actress
Vanessa Marshall; Sakhno and Stevenson were revealed to be playing new antagonists
Shin Hati and
Baylan Skoll, respectively; and several actors were announced to be reprising their roles from previous
Star Wars projects:
Diana Lee Inosanto as
Morgan Elsbeth from
The Mandalorian,
Genevieve O'Reilly as
Mon Mothma from the
Star Wars films and the series
Andor (2022–2025),
David Tennant as the droid
Huyang from
The Clone Wars, and
Lars Mikkelsen as Thrawn from
Rebels. The third episode of the first season introduces
Evan Whitten as
Jacen Syndulla, Hera's son;
Ariana Greenblatt plays a young Ahsoka for flashbacks to the
Clone Wars in the fifth episode; and
Anthony Daniels reprises his
Star Wars film and television role as the droid
C-3PO in the seventh episode. Dawson, Bordizzo, Winstead, Sakhno, Esfandi, Christensen, and Mikkelsen returned to star in the second season. In January 2025,
Rory McCann was cast to replace Stevenson—who died in May 2023—as Baylan Skoll.
Design The design leads from
The Mandalorian and
The Book of Boba Fett returned for
Ahsoka, including production designers Andrew L. Jones and
Doug Chiang, costume designer
Shawna Trpcic, hair designer Maria Sandoval, and prop master Josh Roth. Trpcic died soon after the first season was released.
Legacy Effects also returned to create puppets and animatronics. The first season begins with an
opening crawl similar to the ones that are reserved for the
main Star Wars films. The crawl for
Ahsoka is differentiated from the films by red text and simpler formatting. As with the previous live-action
Star Wars series,
lightsaber hilts were connected to glowing tubes to create on-set interactive lighting. Filoni felt some of the previous series had taken the lightsaber brightness too far and wanted the light levels in
Ahsoka to be closer to those in the
Star Wars films. The technology for hiding batteries for the lighting in the lightsaber hilts was improved from
The Mandalorian.
Filming The series is produced with visual effects studio
Industrial Light & Magic's
StageCraft virtual production technology, which was developed for
The Mandalorian. This involves filming on a "volume" set surrounded by a circular
LED video wall that digital backgrounds can be displayed on in real-time. Traditional
blue screen stages as well as outdoor locations are also used for some scenes. The directors and cinematographers spent eight months creating and editing
previsualizations of each episode using
virtual reality cameras and headsets ahead of filming.
Principal photography for the first season began on May 9, 2022, at Manhattan Beach Studios in
Los Angeles,
California, under the
working title Stormcrow. Filming lasted six months and
wrapped in October 2022. Filming for the second season began on April 28, 2025, in the United Kingdom.
Music At
Star Wars Celebration London in April 2023,
Kevin Kiner was revealed to be composing the score for
Ahsoka after doing so for the animated series
The Clone Wars,
Rebels,
The Bad Batch (2021–2024), and
Tales of the Jedi (2022). As with the animated series, Kiner collaborated with his children Sean and Deana on the score. It combines influences from
Japanese cinema, which the Kiners started leaning into for Ahsoka in
Tales of the Jedi, with the more traditional sound of
Star Wars film composer
John Williams. In addition to Kevin's Ahsoka theme from
The Clone Wars, the score includes returning themes for the main
Rebels characters, and some of Williams's themes from the films for key scenes.
Walt Disney Records released two soundtrack albums featuring the first season's score: the first volume was released on September 15 and the second on October 6. == Release ==