When John Williams announced that he would come out of semi-retirement to score Star Wars: The Force Awakens, fans rejoiced. The man behind many of the most iconic themes in cinematic history was back in the conductor’s chair to revisit the galaxy that he had helped bring to life. Questions did arise, though. At age 83, how much of an investment was he willing to make? With word that LucasFilm/Disney wanted to release not only a new trilogy but various spin-offs and standalone pictures, would Williams score all of them? It makes sense that he’d handle the primary Episodes, but would he do the off-shoots? 

We now have an answer:

No.

IndieWire is reporting that Alexandre Desplat will be handling Star Wars: Rogue One. 

Desplat is no stranger to working with Rogue One‘s director, Gareth Edwards. After all, he’s the man who provided the score for the director’s Godzilla last year. The Oscar, Golden Globe, and BAFTA-winning composer has also handled such films as The Imitation Game, The Grand Budapest Hotel, Zero Dark Thirty, and both parts of Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows. Considering that Williams laid the groundwork for the Harry Potter franchise, Desplat is probably quite comfortable with building on the prolific composer’s ideas and motifs- which should help with their being cohesion between Rogue One and The Force Awakens. 

Williams is known for this, of course. Aside from Star Wars, where he scored all of the first six Episodes, Williams has shown that he’s fine bowing out and letting other composers build on his iconic themes. He did that with the aforementioned Harry Potter series, Superman, Jurassic Park, and Jaws. 

SOURCE: IndieWire