Several weeks after Rosario Dawson’s debut as the live-action Ahsoka Tano in The Mandalorian Season 2 episode “The Jedi,” it was announced that the former apprentice to Anakin Skywalker was getting her own spinoff series on Disney+. With “The Jedi” dropping an intriguing tie to Star Wars Rebels’ series finale, the last year has been filled with speculation and ideas about Rebels character who could appear on Ahsoka’s show. Well, it’s been announced that The Society actress Natasha Liu Bordizzo has been selected to play the live-action Sabine Wren, one of Rebels’ main characters, in the upcoming series.
This Ahsoka update comes from Deadline, which reports that Natasha Liu Bordizzo will star as a lead opposite Rosario Dawson and will inherit Sabine Wren performing duties from Tiya Sicar, who voiced the character in Star Wars Rebels. Sabine has been rumored to appear in Ahsoka since this past January, and while Sicar had expressed interest in getting to play the character in live-action, just like Katee Sackhoff did with Bo-Katan Kryze, apparently Lucasfilm decided to bring someone new aboard instead.
Natasha Liu Bordizzo made her film debut in 2016’s Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword of Destiny, along with playing the lead role of Helena in the short-lived Netflix series The Society, her other notable credits include The Greatest Showman, Guns Akimbo and Wish Dragon. Bordizzo is the second actor to join Rosario Dawson in Ahoksa, as it was reported a few weeks ago that Hayden Christensen will reprise Anakin Skywalker in the series. This will likely either be in flashbacks or as a Force ghost considering that Ahsoka will be set after her appearance in The Mandalorian, i.e. approximately five years after Return of the Jedi, when Anakin has been long dead. Christensen is also on deck to play Darth Vader in the Obi-Wan Kenobi series.
Sabine Wren, a Mandalorian and talented graffiti artist, was one of The Ghost’s crew members in Star Wars Rebels alongside Katan Jarrus, Hera Syndulla, Ezra Bridger, Zeb Orrelios and Chopper. When we left off with her at the end of Star Wars Rebels, which jumped forward a few years to after the Battle of Endor, Sabine departed with Ahsoka Tano to find Ezra, who’d disappeared with Grand Admiral Thrawn when the purrgil dragged Thrawn’s ship into hyperspace. Cut to The Mandalorian, upon defeating Morgan Elsbeth on the planet Corvus in “The Jedi,” Rosario Dawson’s Ahsoka demanded her opponent tell her the location of Thrawn.
With Grand Admiral Thrawn’s whereabouts still unknown, that almost certainly means Ahsoka Tano still doesn’t know where Ezra Bridger is. So if the search is still underway, it makes sense why Sabine Wren will appear in the spinoff. Ezra is also rumored to appear in Ahsoka, with Aladdin’s Mena Massound having reportedly been eyed for the role back in February, but for now, his involvement isn’t official yet. Behind the scenes. The Mandalorian’s Dave Filoni is writing Ahsoka and executive producing alongside Jon Favreau.
Ahsoka is supposedly expected to begin filming in March 2022, so it may be some time before we learn when it will premiere on Disney+. For now, keep checking back with CinemaBlend for more updates on the spinoff’s progress. The next Star Wars series, The Book of Boba Fett, premieres on December 29, and you can learn what else is in development for a galaxy far, far away with our upcoming Star Wars movies and TV shows guide.
