The Ninth Jedi Trailer Expands Star Wars: Visions Into Full Anime Series
Lucasfilm and Production I.G have confirmed that Star Wars: Visions Presents – The Ninth Jedi, an eight-episode limited anime series, will premiere on Disney+ and Hulu on August 5, 2026. The project turns one of the most beloved shorts from Star Wars: Visions into the first full-length entry under a new banner built specifically for longer-form Visions storytelling.
The full trailer and a teaser poster premiered during a panel at Anime Expo 2026 in Los Angeles, where supervising director Kenji Kamiyama, director Shunsuke Tada and producer Hitoshi Ito introduced the footage to attendees, according to ABC7. StarWars.com later published the trailer alongside the official poster on its own newsroom.
From Two Shorts to an 8-Episode Visions Presents Series
The next chapter in a story that began with the fan-favorite “The Ninth Jedi” short from Star Wars: Visions Volume 1, and continued with “The Ninth Jedi – Child of Hope” in Star Wars: Visions Volume 3, Star Wars: Visions Presents – The Ninth Jedi will follow Kara’s newest adventure in a galaxy far, far away. The 8-episode limited anime series is part of an all-new Star Wars: Visions Presents banner, which allows filmmakers to tell longer-form Star Wars: Visions stories.
Lucasfilm’s own description, cited by Gizmodo, frames the move as an expansion of the anthology format itself rather than a one-off spin-off — the Star Wars: Visions banner will be used to tell more long-form stories in this manner, meaning The Ninth Jedi is likely to be the template rather than the exception going forward.
The original 2021 short introduced Kara as the daughter of a lightsaber maker tasked with delivering weapons to a warlord seeking to revive the Jedi Order, while its 2025 Volume 3 sequel, “Child of Hope,” stranded her on a derelict ship with a droid companion. The new series picks up from there with a fuller narrative canvas and, per StarWars.com, Lah Kara continues to train in the ways of the Jedi under Margrave Juro amid an epic journey of self-discovery as she and Juro’s small fellowship of Jedi-in-training embark on a quest to save her father.
Kara’s Fellowship Faces the Masked Nawaam
The trailer’s biggest new reveal is Nawaam, a masked antagonist first referenced but never shown in “Child of Hope.” According to Star Wars News Net’s breakdown of the footage, Nawaam was first mentioned in Child of Hope by the Jedi Hunters, who said they had been offered a 100-million credit bounty to destroy Kara, and that Nawaam was committed to exterminating all Jedi.
In the new footage, the character declares an intent to impose order on the galaxy while overseeing a kyber-crystal-fuelled superweapon, echoing the anthology’s habit of reworking familiar Star Wars iconography through a different genre lens. Anime news outlet AniTrendz noted the trailer shows Nawaam “bring order to the chaos that surrounds us,” alongside a scheme built around a kyber-powered superweapon.
Despite the villain’s Sith-coded presentation, the trailer complicates that reading late on, hinting he may not be a straightforward dark-side foil for Kara’s fellowship — a twist that plays into the anthology’s long-running interest in blurring Jedi and Sith archetypes rather than restating them.
Kamiyama Returns as Kimiko Glenn and Simu Liu Reprise Roles
Star Wars: Visions Presents – The Ninth Jedi is directed by Shunsuke Tada and written by Mitsuyasu Sakai, with Kenji Kamiyama serving as supervising director to keep continuity with the original short he created. Production credits list executive producers James Waugh, Jacqui Lopez, Josh Rimes, Justin Leach, and Mitsuhisa Ishikawa; producers Hitoshi Ito and Kanako Shirasaki, and co-producer Caroline Keller.
Most of the English dub cast returns from the shorts, with Kimiko Glenn (Lah Kara), Andrew Kishino (Juro), Masi Oka (Ethan), Patrick Seitz (Homen), JP Karliak (Gramps), and Simu Liu (Lah Zhima) reprising their roles, while ABC7 reports Neil Kaplan joins as narrator and new additions to the English cast include Feodor Chin, Young Mazino, Chase Sui Wonders and Keone Young. The Japanese-language track keeps its original ensemble, with Chinatsu Akasaki (Lah Kara), Tetsuo Kanao (Juro), Hiromu Mineta (Ethan), Hinata Tadokoro (Homen), Chō (Gramps), and Shinichiro Miki (Lah Zhima), while Akio Otsuka returns to voice The Narrator.
Streaming Access for New Zealand and Australia
Disney+ operates day-and-date in both New Zealand and Australia, so local anime and Star Wars fans should be able to stream the August 5 premiere alongside US and Japanese audiences without a regional delay, matching how Disney has handled prior Visions volumes in the region. Production I.G’s involvement also continues the studio’s high profile in Western markets following its work on titles fans already associate with Kamiyama, from Ghost in the Shell spin-offs to his supervising role here.
For a franchise that has spent recent years split between live-action Disney+ shows and blockbuster films, handing an eight-episode order to a Japanese animation studio built around one anthology short signals Lucasfilm is willing to let Visions grow well past its festival-short roots — and, if the studio’s own framing holds, The Ninth Jedi won’t be the last Visions story to make that leap.
Read also: Anime Expo 2026: Cyberpunk Edgerunners 2 and Ghost in the Shell Lead Reveals
Join the Conversation