Stephen Soderbergh has no plans to try to revive The Hunt for Ben Solo — even with fresh leadership at Disney and Lucasfilm. Asked on the press tour for his new film The Christophers whether he was pushing to bring back the shelved Star Wars project, the Oscar-winning director answered bluntly: “nope,” adding, “Look, if it was gonna happen, it would have happened. It’s that simple.”
Adam Driver first revealed the existence of The Hunt for Ben Solo in an October 2025 interview with the Associated Press, saying he and Soderbergh had spent two years developing a movie centered on his Ben Solo/Kylo Ren character before Disney executives pulled the plug. Driver has said Lucasfilm figures including Kathleen Kennedy, Dave Filoni and Cary Beck supported the project initially, but that Walt Disney Company leaders — he named Bob Iger and Alan Bergman — declined to greenlight it. “They didn’t see how Ben Solo was alive. And that was that,” Driver told the AP.
Soderbergh told The Playlist that the whole effort began because Driver believed there was more to explore with the character. “It was strictly Adam saying, ‘I think there’s still somewhere to go with this character.’ That’s how it started,” Soderbergh said, stressing he would not have returned to the Star Wars universe otherwise. He praised the process of developing the script and the creative work that went into it, comparing the discipline to CrossFit and saying the experience will have “a residual effect that will be unexpected at some point.”
The director has been vocal about his disappointment with how the project was shut down. In a February interview with BK Mag he said the movie was cancelled before the studio even asked how much it would cost, calling the decision “insane” and expressing frustration that audiences would never see the version he had imagined. But Soderbergh made clear to The Playlist that once it became obvious the film would not proceed, he moved on: “As soon as it became apparent, ‘OK, not gonna happen,’ I sat down and started writing [something else].”
Recent changes at the top of Disney and Lucasfilm have prompted renewed chatter about whether axed or stalled projects might be resurrected. Kathleen Kennedy stepped down as Lucasfilm president in January after a 14-year tenure; Dave Filoni now serves as co-president and chief creative officer of Lucasfilm. Bob Iger is also out of the CEO role at Disney, with Josh D’Amaro now at the helm. Those leadership shifts — and Driver’s public comments — spurred a vocal segment of Star Wars fans to campaign for the film’s revival.
Fans have tried to keep attention on the project through social efforts on social media and more visible stunts: a group reportedly paid for a plane to tow a banner reading “Save ‘The Hunt for Ben Solo’” over Walt Disney Studios in Burbank, California. Despite the noise, Soderbergh’s position is definitive: he is not lobbying to reopen the file. Between Driver’s endorsement of the script and the fans’ activism, the story has continued to generate headlines, but for now the creators themselves have accepted the studio’s decision and moved on.