After months of rumors, Kathleen Kennedy is officially stepping down as the President of Lucasfilm after 14 years and will be replaced by Dave Filoni and Lynwen Brennan, Walt Disney Studios announced Thursday. Filoni will be the creative lead as Lucasfilm’s President and Chief Creative Officer, Lucasfilm, while Brennan will be Co-President, Lucasfilm. Both execs are longtime Lucasfilm veterans. Lucasfilm’s new leadership split seems reminiscent of how DC Studios is co-led by James Gunn overseeing creative decisions and Peter Safran in charge of the studio’s business side.

“When George Lucas asked me to take over Lucasfilm upon his retirement, I couldn’t have imagined what lay ahead,” said Kennedy in a statement. “It has been a true privilege to spend more than a decade working alongside the extraordinary talent at Lucasfilm. Their creativity and dedication have been an inspiration, and I’m deeply proud of what we’ve accomplished together. I’m excited to continue developing films and television with both longtime collaborators and fresh voices who represent the future of storytelling.”

“My love of storytelling was shaped by the films of Kathleen Kennedy and George Lucas,” said Filoni. “I never dreamed I would be privileged to learn the craft of filmmaking from both of them. From Rey to Grogu, Kathy has overseen the greatest expansion in Star Wars storytelling onscreen that we have ever seen. I am incredibly grateful to Kathy, George, Bob Iger, and Alan Bergman for their trust and the opportunity to lead Lucasfilm in this new role, doing a job I truly love. May the Force be with you.”

“Lucasfilm has played such a meaningful part in my life,” said Brennan. “It’s a community of inspiring storytellers with a rebel spirit like no other, and I am honored to join Dave Filoni in leading us forward. I have been so fortunate to learn from George Lucas, Kathy Kennedy, and Alan Bergman and have unwavering faith in Dave’s creative vision for the next chapter in this storied studio’s legacy.”

Kennedy will transition back into producing. She’s currently producing the movies The Mandalorian and Grogu and Star Wars: Starfighter. She co-founded Amblin Entertainment with Steven Spielberg and Frank Marshall.

In a statement, Walt Disney Company CEO Bob Iger praised Kennedy for her “leadership, her vision, and her stewardship of such an iconic studio and brand.”

“When we acquired Lucasfilm more than a decade ago, we knew we were bringing into the Disney family not only one of the most beloved and enduring storytelling universes ever created, but also a team of extraordinary talent led by a visionary filmmaker – someone who had been handpicked by George Lucas himself, no less,” said Iger. “We’re deeply grateful for Kathleen Kennedy’s leadership, her vision, and her stewardship of such an iconic studio and brand.”

“Kathleen Kennedy has been a tremendous force in the industry for 50 years, and it’s been our privilege to have her here at Disney leading Lucasfilm for nearly 14 of them,” said Disney Entertainment Co-Chairman Alan Bergman. “She has steered Star Wars to incredible box office heights and brought a new generation of fans into the fold. We appreciate having her on board to produce our next couple of films, and the studio remains in extraordinarily capable hands with Dave Filoni, who’s a brilliant storyteller, and Lynwen Brennan, an avid innovator and business leader. They are deeply passionate and experienced executives who will continue to drive the studio and Star Wars forward in exciting new directions.”

This May’s The Mandalorian and Grogu will be Lucasfilm’s first theatrical film release since 2019’s Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, with the studio spending those intervening years developing streaming series of varying quality for Disney+.

Kennedy’s tenure as head of Lucasfilm has not been without its fair share of behind-the-scenes drama – all those director drop-outs, including Phil Lord and Chris Miller getting fired from Solo – and vocal displeasure from segments of fandom, particularly over the handling of the Star Wars sequel trilogy and some of the franchise’s Disney+ series.

In the past, Kennedy criticized fan scrutiny of Star Wars projects in development as “troubling and frustrating” and said that women in front of and behind the camera in Star Wars projects struggle with toxicity due to a “male dominated fanbase.”

Most recently, fan campaigns have been launched to resurrect The Hunt for Ben Solo, Steven Soderbergh’s shelved project with Adam Driver.