On the eve of one major Star Wars film launch, fans learned that the Disney and Lucasfilm empire have yet another iconic-character project in the works: a Boba Fett film.

The Hollywood Reporter and Variety, each citing their own "sources," reported the film's ongoing development on Thursday, and they were able to attach two big names to the project: director and co-writer James Mangold, who previously helmed Logan and 3:10 to Yuma, and co-writer/producer Simon Kinberg, a producer with major credits on The Martian and recent X-Men films. (The duo previously teamed up on Logan.)

This hard confirmation was put into context by the Hollywood press. Both outlets also mentioned in the same breath that a standalone Obi-Wan Kenobi film, which they reported being in development back in August, still doesn't have a writer attached.

The character of Boba Fett has long enjoyed a Star Wars cult following due to his silent-and-violent existence as a bounty hunter in the series' original trilogy. Up until this point, however, Fett's ability to speak and carry a story has remained largely the territory of Star Wars novels. And there have been a lot of them, including a '90s trilogy of Bounty Hunter Wars novels by K.W. Jeter and a six-part young-adult series that took place between Episodes II and III of the prequel trilogy.

As we learned in 2014, Disney and Lucasfilm largely ignore that book-driven canon , so there's no telling whether any of those books' details will carry over to whatever Mangold puts together... or whether Mangold will make it to the end of production

All other possible details, including production timelines, plot hints, and casting decisions, are still unknown at this time. Mangold is currently in a pre-production process for a racing-history film about Ford's and Ferrari's '60s showdowns at Le Mans, starring Matt Damon and Christian Bale.

The number of potential Star Wars films projects is now quite staggering, as we already officially know about a Rian Johnson trilogy, a trilogy from Game of Thrones' showrunners, and a live-action TV series written and produced by Jon Favreau. Need to keep up with Quentin Tarantino's preferred space franchise, we suppose.

Listing image by Sam Machkovech