When Disney said that they would be producing “spin-off” movies alongside the VII, VIII, IX trilogy of films, I don’t think anyone expected them to bring their biggest guns off the shelf to make a movie.

No, Johnny Depp isn’t making a Disney produced Star Wars film. (Well, not yet and hopefully not ever.) Reports indicate that they’ve called in Pixar to make an animated Star Wars spin-off movie.

Details are fairly scarce on the planned Pixar Star Wars movie. An animated Star Wars movie wouldn’t be without precedent. The Clone Wars TV show launched with a movie pilot. Even if the movie was poor, the show turned out okay. Lucasfilm Animation is also working on a new animated series, Rebels, for this fall. And Boba Fett was introduced in an animated portion of the Star Wars Holiday Special.

As for Pixar, a return to Star Wars would be a return to its roots. The company was originally founded as Lucasfilm’s computer animation division and even produced the Death Star trench run schematic used in the Rebels’ battle briefing in Episode IV. In 1986, it was spun off and bought by Steve Jobs before being sold to Disney in 2006.

While Pixar isn’t completely infallible (see the recent Planes as an example), I’m actually legitimately excited for a Pixar Star Wars movie. If they don’t make a quick merchandising cash-in and was up to the best of Pixar quality, they could produce an award-winning Star Wars movie.

Am I being excessively optimistic or does anyone else see this as great news?

Sources: Electric Playground, Latino Review