Star Wars Day rumor suggests Disney Plus has a big surprise for you

Star Wars logo
(Image credit: Lucasfilm)

Back when Disney bought Lucasfilm in 2012, the creators of Robot Chicken were working on an animated Star Wars comedy series in the wake of their successful specials about a galaxy far, far away. Unfortunately, the show never aired, and was considered lost to time after Disney took over Star Wars and pushed ahead with the sequel trilogy.

That series was called Star Wars: Detours, and a new rumor suggests it'll return on Disney Plus very soon in a completed form. The series boasted voice acting from the likes of Seth MacFarlane, Seth Green and Dee Bradley Baker, among many others, and was meant to be a funny take on what happened between the prequel and original trilogies. 

The Vulcan Reporter now claims Detours is planned to release on Disney Plus, with the initial run of 39 completed episodes being expanded to approximately 52, including some specials. The report says it's likely to release as a surprise for May 4, 2021 – Star Wars Day, a significant moment in the calendar that Disney Plus marked last year by releasing The Rise of Skywalker on the service.

Back in 2018, it was reported that new applications for Star Wars Detours trademarks had been filed. 

We reached out to Disney Plus's UK PR agency to see if there's any official comment on the report, which should purely be taken as rumor for now. We'll update if we hear back.

An easy win for Disney?

While it was clear the show had made considerable progress in production at Lucasfilm, Disney presumably had its reasons for scrapping Detours. At the time, Star Wars spoofs were big business, with animated shows like Family Guy and Robot Chicken producing three separate Star Wars parodies apiece – and Lucasfilm seemed to appreciate them, with George Lucas voicing himself in Robot Chicken's first special. 

Now, Disney seems to be thinking a little harder about other content in its vault – earlier this month, the 2D Clone Wars series re-emerged on the service, alongside more obscure Star Wars-themed oddities. Detours, however, would be a whole other deal – this is a show that no one has seen before. 

It's worth saying that Lucasfilm already has plans to mark Star Wars Day in 2021 – with the premiere of The Bad Batch animated series

Samuel Roberts

Samuel is a PR Manager at game developer Frontier. Formerly TechRadar's Senior Entertainment Editor, he's an expert in Marvel, Star Wars, Netflix shows and general streaming stuff. Before his stint at TechRadar, he spent six years at PC Gamer. Samuel is also the co-host of the popular Back Page podcast, in which he details the trials and tribulations of being a games magazine editor – and attempts to justify his impulsive eBay games buying binges.