Star Wars is about to get Spirited Away in dazzling Studio Ghibli team-up

Update: On Friday, November 11, Studio Ghibli tweeted a single image of a small Yoda figurine. Moments later, the official Star Wars Twitter account retweeted the post alongside the "eyes wide open" emoji, which all but confirms that Ghibli is developing some form of Star Wars anime-style movie or TV show, likely centered around everyone's favorite diminutive Jedi Master.

Check out the tweet below:

Original story follows.

Star Wars might be about to get Ghibli-fied after the iconic Japanese animation studio teased a potentially huge team-up with Lucasfilm.

Posted a 15-second teaser on its official Twitter account, Studio Ghibli has set the internet ablaze by dropping a major hint that it's working on something Star Wars-related.

Check out the teaser below:

At this stage, we've no idea what the collaboration between the titanic companies will be. The teaser video simply shows the two entertainment giant's logos before ending, but we're sure Ghibli and Star Wars fans will be frantically theorizing about what this joint project will be.

And that's certainly the case. Multiple Star Wars and Ghibli fans have already taken to social media, with many making the same connection we have – i.e, that Ghibli must be working on a Star Wars movie. If you're interested, learn more about every current Star Wars film and TV series in development by checking out our new Star Wars TV shows and movies explained guide.

Regardless of what the collaboration really is, Lucasfilm is clearly open to working with other studios – movie and TV production companies or otherwise – over the next few years. Recently, Lucasfilm's games division confirmed that it was co-developing a new Indiana Jones title with Machine Games, the videogame studio behind Wolfenstein's revival. Star Wars: Eclipse, a High Republic era-set game, is also coming from Quantic Dream. That's alongside Lucasfilm's burgeoning slate of Star Wars TV shows, which are all set to debut on Disney Plus in the coming years. 

Presently, there are three Star Wars TV series set to arrive in 2023: The Mandalorian season 3, Ahsoka Tano's standalone series, and The Bad Batch season 2. Other TV shows in the works include Skeleton Crew and The Acolyte, the latter of which recently entered full production and received a sizeable cast upgrade.

As for Studio Ghibli, the legendary Japan-based animation company is working on How Do You Live?, its next major film. Iconic director Hayao Miyazaki is on writing and directing duties, with frequent collaborator Joe Hisaishi producing the score.

Analysis: what could Studio Ghibli and Lucasfilm's collaboration be?

Clearly, a Studio Ghibli and Lucasfilm team-up is major news. They're titans of the global entertainment industry, so any kind of collaboration between them would be worth watching.

The most obvious project would be a Star Wars-led one, with many fans suggesting an anime-style movie or TV show could be in the works. But what if it's not as grand as that? Ghibli might simply be making an episode for season 2 of Star Wars: Visions, the next entry in the animated anthology Disney Plus show that originally launched in September 2021.

What are the other alternatives? Lucasfilm's other tentpole franchises are Indiana Jones, which is getting a fifth movie installment in 2023, and Willow, which will receive its own Disney Plus series (a follow-up to the 1988 fantasy film of the same name) on November 30. Maybe Ghibli is teasing a collaboration with Lucasfilm about one of those IPs instead. The fantastical world of Willow lends itself to such a anime adaptation but, as Star Wars: Visions showed, Ghibli could easily turn a universe like Indiana Jones' into some anime-esque.

Unfortunately, Ghibli's original tweet gives no indication about when we'll find out what it's teaming up with Lucasfilm for. Hopefully we'll know something official soon but, until then, we're sure the two companies will be sitting back and enjoying the amount of speculation this tease has already generated.

For more Ghibli-based content, read our ranking of every Studio Ghibli film to date. Alternatively, read our guide on the best anime worth watching, or find out how to watch the Star Wars movies in order.