Disney+ - Star Wars: Visions: Volume 2 available May 4 

By Mulder, 02 february 2023

In a little over 3 months, on the occasion of Star Wars Day that fans of the famous saga will celebrate all over the world, Disney+ and Lucasfilm will offer to discover exclusively on the platform the second volume of the anthology animation series "Star Wars: Visions". Starting May 4, subscribers will have the opportunity to watch 9 never-before-seen short films produced by 9 studios from different countries and cultures, which, through their wide variety of styles, will open up new perspectives on this legendary saga by pushing its limits.

The Season 2 shorts were created by El Guiri (Spain), Cartoon Saloon (Ireland), Punkrobot (Chile), Aardman (UK), Studio Mir (South Korea), Studio La Cachette (France), 88 Pictures (India), D'art Shtajio (Japan) in collaboration with Lucasfilm Ltd. and Triggerfish (South Africa).

James Waugh, Executive Producer of the series and Executive Vice President of Franchise Development for Lucasfilm, said, "We've been thrilled with the response to the first season and we're thrilled that so many people have embraced the project. From the beginning of this journey, 'Star Wars: Visions' was a way to pay tribute to the saga by bringing in some of the greatest contemporary artists. Animation is booming worldwide, and we're blown away by the current creative momentum, which continues to push the boundaries of the discipline. After a first season that focused on the big names in Japanese anime, we have broadened our focus to include some of the world's most talented creators. Today we are very proud to reveal the list of studios we have chosen. Each of these new shorts is inventive, emotionally rich, wildly daring, and opens up new perspectives on what makes a Star Wars story, while remaining true to the values of the universe."

James Waugh, Jacqui Lopez and Josh Rimes are the executive producers of this volume 2 consisting of the following 9 shorts:

Sith (Studio El Guiri), written and directed by Rodrigo Blaas
Rodrigo Blaas is an Emmy Award-winning animator with over 20 years of experience in animation. Co-founder of Stromboli studio in 1997, he joined Blue Sky in 2000 to work on Ice Age before being hired at Pixar, where he collaborated on feature films such as Nemo's World (2003), The Incredibles (2004), Ratatouille (2007), Wall-E (2008) and the short film "La luna" (2011). More recently, he teamed up with Guillermo del Toro on the series "Troll Hunters", took over the artistic direction of Mikros Animation Paris, and created, in 2021, El Guiri Studios in Madrid with his partner, Cecile Hokes. He also wrote and directed the short film Alma (2009).
 
Screecher's Reach (Studio Cartoon Saloon), directed by Paul Young
Paul Young is one of the co-founders of Cartoon Saloon, an Irish Film and Television Academy Award-winning and Oscar, Emmy and Bafta nominated studio. He has produced the animated features My Father's Dragon, The Wolf People, Brendan and the Secret of Kells, Song of the Sea, Parvana: A Childhood in Afghanistan and series such as Puffin Rock, Dorg Van Dango and Viking Skool.
 
In the Stars (Studio Punkrobot), written and directed by Gabriel Osorio
After studying fine arts at the University of Chile, Gabriel Osorio specialized in 3D animation, working on commercials, films and series. In 2008, he founded Punkrobot Studio, a structure in which he directed various content for children, including Flipos, Muelin y Perlita, Soccer Girl" and TV spots. In 2016, his short film Story of a Bear became the first Latin American project to win an Oscar in the animated short film category.
 
I Am Your Mother (Studio: Aardman), directed by Magdalena Osinska
Magdalena Osinska has worked at Aardman for eight years. She has directed frame-by-frame, CGI, 2D and live-action commercials, including the Wallace & Gromit commercials The Great Sofa Caper and Share the Orange, supervised the development of the children's series Joyets, and directed films such as Spirits of the Piano and Zbigniev's Cupboard. A graduate of the National Film and Television School in Beaconsfield (UK), the Lodz Film School and the Warsaw School of Fine Arts, she is working on the feature film JASIA, inspired by her grandmother's memories of the Second World War in Poland.
 
Journey to the Dark Head (Studio Mir), directed by Hyeong Geun Park
Rising South Korean animation star Hyeong Geun Park had already made a name for himself when he debuted in the medium in 2017. He's animated dozens of blockbuster game trailers and tried his hand at various animation series, including Dota: Dragon's Blood: Book 3 (2022) and Lookism (2022).  Journey to the Dark Head is his first full-length production.
 
The Spy Dancer (Studio La Cachette), written and directed by Julien Chheng
Julien Chheng is the president of La Cachette, the animation studio he co-founded in 2014 with two other École des Gobelins alumni, Oussama Bouacheria and Ulysse Malassagne. He trained in visual development at Disney and animated various characters on the animated features The Rabbi's Cat, Mune: The Guardian of the Moon and Ernest and Celestine. In 2021, he won an Emmy Award for Primal, for which he was the animation director and one of the executive producers. In 2022, he directed with Jean-Christophe Roger the feature film Ernest and Celestine: The Journey to Charabia, nominated at the César Awards.
 
The Bandits of Golak (Studio 88 Pictures), directed by Ishan Shukla
Ishan Shukla started out in computer graphics in Singapore. For more than ten years, he supervised various projects for commercials, series and music videos. His film Schirkoa (2016) received dozens of awards, was screened in 120 international festivals and was one of the Oscar finalists in this category. Ishan Shukla went on to form his own studio to work on animated features for adults, including a version of SCHIRKOA that is scheduled to screen at various festivals this summer.
 
The Pit (Studios: D'art Shtajio and Lucasfilm Ltd.), written, directed and produced by LeAndre Thomas and co-directed by Justin Ridge
California-based writer/director LeAndre Thomas is a member of Lucasfilm's "Franchise Team", where he has worked for over 11 years on a variety of series such as Light & Magic (documentary), The Mandalorian, Obi-Wan Kenobi (live action) and Tales of the Jedi (animation). Justin Ridge is one of the executive producers of the Star Wars Resistance series. He has also produced the animated series Star Wars Rebels, The Clone Wars and films such as Storks and Company and Avatar: The Last Airbender.
 
Aau's Song (Studio Triggerfish), written and directed by Nadia Darries and Daniel Clarke 
Born in the Cape Flats, South Africa, and co-founder of Goon Valley Animation, Nadia Darries has been working on prestige animated films and motion design projects since 2015 as an animator, project manager, art director and director. For Triggerfish Animation Studios, she has collaborated on the BBC films stick man, revolting rhymes and Highway rat, among others. Daniel Clarke, a Cape Town-based designer and director, works in animation, film and illustration. He has been a set designer, art director and director on projects such as the feature film Khumba, the Stick Man series and The Whale and the Snail. In 2018, he released alongside James Clarke and Daniel Snaddon, the graphic novel Kariba.

Season 2 of "Star Wars: Visions" will be available exclusively and in its entirety on Disney+ starting May 4, 2023. 

Synopsis: 
Star Wars: Visions is a collection of animated shorts presented "through the lens of the world's best anime creators" in the first volume that offers a fresh and diverse perspective on Star Wars. Created outside the constraints of the franchise's traditional canon, the films offer creative freedom to each director and production studio, while remaining true to the themes and emotional identity of the Star Wars saga. Additional volumes feature animation styles from companies around the world.

Star Wars: Visions
Based on Star Wars by George Lucas
Executive producers: Jacqui Lopez, James Waugh, Josh Rimes, Justin Leach
Producer : Kanako Shirasaki
Running time : 13-22 minutes
Production company : Lucasfilm
Distributor Disney Platform Distribution
Original network : Disney+
Original release September 22, 2021 - Present

(source : press release)