Adam Driver says “The Hunt for Ben Solo” is finished, ending a year of fan campaigning to revive the Star Wars sequel Disney rejected. “It’s over,” Driver told “The Rich Eisen Show” on Wednesday. “No more ‘Star Wars.’ We tried.” He was on the show to promote “Paper Tiger,” which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival earlier this year, when host Rich Eisen asked about a return to the franchise.
Driver said Disney’s response to the pitch was that Ben Solo, the character he played as Kylo Ren, died at the end of “The Rise of Skywalker.” Eisen argued that Star Wars has revived the supposedly dead before. Driver agreed that someone at Disney or Lucasfilm could restart the project if they chose, but he believes it is too late.
Driver and director Steven Soderbergh spent two years on the film. He called the script, written with Scott Z. Burns and Jules Asner, who used the pseudonym Rebecca Blunt, very good. Lucasfilm backed it and took it to Disney, where CEO Bob Iger and entertainment co-chairman Alan Bergman passed. Driver revealed the project in an Associated Press interview in October 2025. Soderbergh later said Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy told him no finished Lucasfilm screenplay had ever been rejected by Disney at that stage. He called the decision frustrating and insane and said he put in two and a half years of unpaid work.
Fans mounted one of the most visible campaigns of the year. They flew a plane over Disney’s Burbank lot with a “Save The Hunt for Ben Solo” banner, hired a Times Square billboard, circulated petitions and held rallies in New York and Los Angeles. A second plane later carried a banner reading “Shareholders want The Hunt for Ben Solo.” Disney never publicly responded. Driver called the reaction pretty incredible and said he had not expected billboards and planes.
The franchise has moved on. “Star Wars: Starfighter,” directed by Shawn Levy from a script by Jonathan Tropper and starring Ryan Gosling, reaches theaters May 28, 2027.
