What Is the Plot and Timeline of Star Wars: Starfighter?

Easily the biggest news to come out of Star Wars Celebration 2025 was the reveal that Deadpool & Wolverine’s Shawn Levy is directing Star Wars: Starfighter, a new standalone, live-action film starring Ryan Gosling. Starfighter is shaping up to be the next Star Wars film released after 2026’s The Mandalorian and Grogu, with production starting this fall for a May 28, 2027 release.
But beyond those basics, we know very little about the plot of Starfighter right now. Lucasfilm only revealed one crucial detail – the film is set about five years after the events of Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. That places Starfighter further down the Star Wars timeline than any Star Wars movie or series to date.
What do we know about this period of Star Wars lore? Not a whole lot, frankly. That said, we can certainly speculate based on how The Rise of Skywalker ends and how the pre-Disney Legends universe handled this era. Let’s take a closer look at the big questions that linger after The Rise of Skywalker and how Starfighter may address them.