Mandalorian and Grogu’s Modest Budget Could Be Its Saving Grace
The less it costs to make, the softer the landing if it fails.
Pocket watching is one of the most tedious practices to befall the film industry, but fans aren’t getting any less curious about movie budgets and studio spending habits. In an era of blockbuster bloat filled with films that don’t look nearly as expensive as they actually are, that fascination makes a lot of sense. Apart from the blurring of lines between fandom and punditry, fans do want to see quality reflected on-screen. A big-budget failure could mean the end of a juggernaut as everyone knows it, as Lucasfilm’s Star Wars saga has spent the last seven years proving.
Star Wars’ modern era kicked off with spectacle and scale, but that also precluded ever-expanding budgets. When the films were successful and effortlessly recouping their costs, all was right with the world. But things changed with Solo: A Star Wars Story. Filmed on a budget of $275 million, it would have had to make around $600 million to recoup its cost. Though it technically broke even, grossing over $390 million, it’s regarded now as a box office flop. And even if the Star Wars saga bounced back with The Rise of Skywalker in 2019 — which cost as much as Solo but grossed $1 billion — Lucasfilm hasn’t taken any chances since.
That will finally change with The Mandalorian and Grogu, the first Star Wars film of the new, TV-focused era. That it’s basically a spinoff of Lucasfilm’s first live-action series — and kinda looks like one, too — might be a key to its success. But there’s also the concern of its budget, which might be the most modest in franchise history.
Mando & Grogu could be the cheapest Star Wars movie ever made — and that’s a good thing.
As of March 2025, Mando and Grogu’s budget is approximately $166.4 million. That’s the lowest budget of a post-2015 Star Wars movie by a larger margin. Yes, the 1977 Star Wars had a budget of $11 million, and in 2005, Revenge of the Sith had a budget of $113 million. But, after the Disney relaunch of the franchise with The Force Awakens, the budgets have gotten much, much bigger. That first film had a net budget between $500 and 600 million. Rogue One was relatively lower at $200 million, which is closer to Mando and Grogu’s budget this time around.
To be fair, the overall budget has likely risen since due to post-production and promotional costs (Super Bowl ads ain’t cheap, after all), it may still come in as the cheapest of the franchise. Given the sparse nature of the ads we’ve seen thus far, that makes sense: Mando and Grogu looks a lot more like an extended TV special than a blockbuster comeback. Of course, Lucasfilm could be playing its cards close to its chest. Footage unveiled at last year’s Star Wars Celebration teased a major visual upgrade. Either way, a smaller budget, at least by modern Star Wars standards, can be a good thing for the franchise, given its skittishness of late.
Is the future of Star Wars contingent on Mando & Grogu’s box office numbers? Rumors are swirling about new Lucasfilm president Dave Filoni’s upcoming film, claiming that the latter won’t get off the ground without the former. There’s some truth to that, especially if something like Solo could cool Lucasfilm leadership off of blockbuster fare so easily.
If Mando and Grogu does well, we can expect the franchise to return to big-budget events. But even if it underperforms, it won’t have to make nearly as much as its predecessors to recoup the cost of making it. Lucasfilm is still playing things frustratingly safe, but if the franchise is ever going to return to the old ways, it might as well start small.
