Rumor: Jon Favreau “Almost Never On Set Of Productions” For ‘The Mandalorian’

John F. Trent |

Apr 25, 2023

(L-R): Din Djarin (Pedro Pascal) and Grogu in Lucasfilm's THE MANDALORIAN, season three, exclusively on Disney+. ©2023 Lucasfilm Ltd. & TM. All Rights Reserved.

A new rumor claims that The Mandalorian Executive Producer Jon Favreau is “almost never on set of productions” for The Mandalorian and connected Star Wars shows.

This new rumor comes from scooper WDW Pro and one of his alleged inside sources. After detailing that Favreau’s initial success with The Mandalorian made Kathleen Kennedy’s management of Star Wars look terrible after the disaster of the Disney sequel trilogy, he detailed that Kennedy made a power play to undermine Favreau with fellow Executive Producer Dave Filoni turning Favreau’s vision for The Mandalorian into a Clone Wars tie in.

Specifically he quoted his source saying, “Kennedy elevated Filoni and turned Favreau’s MCU style vision into a Clone Wars battle.”

He continued, “Now, Favreau’s almost never on set with the productions. He’ll probably continue to make his money, be the nice non-confrontational exemplar that he is. But hope is gone. The magic sauce was Din combined with a mystery character that was supposed to connect somehow to Luke’s, somehow to what happened with the sequels. Now, it’s just episodic cartoon serial stuff. The magic is gone. All of it so Kennedy could hold on to power.”

This rumor directly contrasts comments Favreau has made himself as well as those made by the Armorer actress Emily Swallow.

Speaking to Esquire Middle East, Favreau said, “I take full responsibility for everything people like or don’t like in this show. There’s no outside pressure on me from the studio, Lucasfilm, Disney, anyone.”

He added, “There’s pressure from within on whether or not something feels right. We challenge each other on whether something feels like it’s authentic to Star Wars, if it feels like it’s consistent with things that came before,” he explained.

“A lot of what you’re seeing is us embracing the complications that come with the choices that we make in our storytelling,” he explained.

Swallow also detailed that Favreau was most definitely on the set of The Mandalorian Season 3. In a recent interview, Discussing Film asked her, “You have worked with a different director on nearly every episode of The Mandalorian that you’ve been featured in. What is it like to bounce between different directors and their own distinctive styles during your time on set?”

She responded, “It has been a much more cohesive experience on this show than on other series I’ve done. I think Jon doesn’t shy away from choosing directors who have unique styles, but there is such a concerted effort to make sure that everyone is on the same page in terms of the story that we’re telling and the creative tone of the show.”

“[Favreau] makes himself so available, just to make sure the heart of the story is consistent and it doesn’t get too crazy, because we don’t shoot episodes one at a time. A lot of it depends on what set we have up and when because the sets are so expensive, so we’ll shoot a few days of episode three, then a few days of episode six, and then a few days of episode two,” she added.