The Ninth Jedi Puts Star Wars Visions Anime Back in the Spotlight

Verdict: A Needed Jolt of Imagination for Tired Star Wars Fans

Star Wars: Visions Presents – The Ninth Jedi is an eight-episode, non-canon anime streaming series on Disney+ that continues the acclaimed Visions short and uses long-form storytelling to explore a distant future where Jedi, Sith, and lightsabers have faded into legend, pushing Star Wars into more experimental territory while still feeling recognizably part of the franchise. At its core, this is a thoughtful, mid-budget experiment that earns its place in the Disney+ Star Wars lineup by asking harder questions about the Force and the Jedi than most recent live-action projects. It starts as a pseudo-remake of the original trilogy, but settles into a confident, character-driven tale once it trusts its own ideas. For fans worn out by familiar beats, The Ninth Jedi lands as a welcome reset rather than another reheated nostalgia play, even if some of its most exciting concepts feel only half-explored by the finale.

Story and Characters: Familiar Skeleton, Fresh Moral Nerve

Set roughly 1,000 years after The Rise of Skywalker, The Ninth Jedi follows young Jedi apprentice Lah Kara as she trains under Margrave Juro, attempts to restore the defunct Jedi Order, and fights to rescue her father, lightsaber smith Lah Zhima, from warlord Nawaam. The broad strokes echo classic Disney+ Star Wars and the Skywalker Saga: paternal drama, masked villain, ragtag rebels vs an authoritarian conqueror, and even a new planet-destroying kyber cannon that recalls the Death Star and Starkiller Base. That overfamiliarity makes the early run feel safer than it should, a "pseudo-remake" that cleaves a bit too close to expected Star Wars beats. Yet once the series digs into Nawaam’s unexpectedly blue lightsaber and the questions around Zhima’s past and loyalty, the moral ground shifts in engaging ways. Intrigue around Zhima’s origins and his uneasy relationship with Nawaam becomes the dramatic spine, and the answers the finale offers are largely satisfying, even if they stop short of fully mining the character’s complexity.

Anime Format: Production I.G Reshapes the Galaxy Far, Far Away

The Ninth Jedi is built on the foundation of the original Star Wars Visions anime short, now expanded into a dedicated series animated by Production I.G, the studio behind Ghost in the Shell and Kill Bill’s anime sequence. While the sound design and shot language often echo the feature films, the show’s best moments feel like a fusion between George Lucas’ space opera and the sweeping, quest-driven energy of The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. The anime style gives lightsaber duels sharper motion and lets the color-changing blades read as emotional beats, not just visual flourishes. In this non-canon future, Jedi and Sith are mostly myth, lightsabers are rare, and the craft of making them has almost vanished, which the animators use to frame each saber as an event rather than a prop. On Disney+, that exclusive positioning quietly reframes anime as premium long-form storytelling for the franchise instead of a side experiment.

Mythology Twists: Color-Changing Sabers and a Less Binary Force

The Ninth Jedi’s most striking idea remains the concept that a lightsaber’s color reflects its wielder’s alignment with the Force, shifting as their inner state changes. Kenji Kamiyama uses this device to undercut simple good/evil assumptions: Nawaam’s blue blade forces viewers to question his moral position, while flashbacks introduce a key figure wielding a silver lightsaber that evokes fan memories of “gray Jedi” without spelling out the label. According to one review, “The Ninth Jedi is interested in leveraging these familiar hallmarks of Star Wars to ask some new questions of it, particularly around the dichotomy of the Jedi and Sith.” This non-canon status lets the series toy with Force conventions more freely, from rare sabers to forgotten orders, and that freedom is where it feels most alive. Yet the show only lightly sketches rules around silver and shifting colors, leaving tantalizing lore on the table when the season ends.

Pacing, Music, and the Case for More Seasons

Across eight episodes, The Ninth Jedi moves from cautious homage to more confident originality, with the latter half markedly stronger than the first. Early reliance on familiar threats and a conventional orchestral score that often feels like a forgettable imitation of John Williams hold it back from greatness. But when the series keeps its recollections of the films to a brief echo and spins away into new territory, it captures the fresh perspective that made Star Wars Visions anime compelling in the first place. The season’s closing stretch deepens the ensemble around Kara, Juro, and Zhima, then ends on a cliffhanger that invites a second season to continue their arcs. All episodes are now streaming exclusively on Disney+, and as a Disney+ Star Wars experiment, the show does enough to justify more time in this corner of the galaxy, provided future installments push harder into the stranger, less comfortable edges of its own ideas.

Buy if / Skip if

• Buy the Star Wars: Visions Presents – The Ninth Jedi if you want Disney+ Star Wars that questions Jedi/Sith morality instead of repeating safe canon beats.
• Skip the Star Wars: Visions Presents – The Ninth Jedi if you’re tired of any story that revisits empires, rebels, and planet-killing superweapons, even in anime form.
• Buy the Star Wars: Visions Presents – The Ninth Jedi if you enjoyed the original Star Wars Visions anime short and wanted its universe expanded over multiple episodes.
• Skip the Star Wars: Visions Presents – The Ninth Jedi if you expect fully fleshed-out lore explanations for every new concept, especially the silver lightsaber and color-shifting blades.
• Buy the Star Wars: Visions Presents – The Ninth Jedi if you’re open to non-canon experiments and appreciate Production I.G’s anime style as a fresh lens on Star Wars.