Star Wars redefined what a movie could look like when it first hit the big screen in 1977, and that was largely due to special effects that were best in class at the time the first movie was released. This was largely due to the work of Industrial Light & Magic, the company behind all the visual effects for Lucasfilm. Disney+ released the first season of in 2022, a documentary showing off their work behind the scenes on more than 300 movies, and Collider is thrilled to partner with Disney, Lucasfilm, and Imagine Documentaries to announce that the second season of with three new episodes, with taking over directorial duties from . You can also find four new exclusive images from the new season below.
Collider’s also spoke with Light & Magic director Joe Johnston about Season 2, where he confirmed that it will pick up but that it would not follow a strict timeline and would instead jump around all over the place. The two also went on to talk about how big of a player the prequel trilogy is in the second season of Light & Magic, highlighting that there were many things wanted to do going in that he would only pursue if he had the proper special effects for, and that he was fortunately able to see his vision through thanks to the work of ILM. Johnston also mentioned that the work ILM did with other movies such as and will be featured heavily in Season 2, along with and .
"Every time ILM is given a challenge, they figure out how to do it and that advances their abilities and techniques for the next film to come along."
ILM may have started out working on Star Wars movies, but the studio now has its hand in everything. Just in the last few months, the studio has worked on TV shows such as , , and even , and it did the visual effects for Oscar nominees such as , , and . ILM also worked with Wētā FX on both of ’s Avatar movies, and their work will be seen later this year in other major projects such as ’s , Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning, and Jurassic World: Rebirth.
Light & Magic Season 2 will premiere on April 18 on Disney+. Check out the new images from the series above and stay tuned to Collider for Zimmerman's full interview with Johnston.
