Kathleen Kennedy explains why Colin Trevorrow left The Rise of Skywalker

One of the main criticisms of the STAR WARS sequel trilogy has been the lack of a consistent through-line between all three films. Say what you will of the prequels, at least George Lucas' trilogy felt connected. Unfortunately, Disney decided to treat THE FORCE AWAKENS, THE LAST JEDI, and THE RISE OF SKYWALKER like a track meet, with each director handing off to the next one.

While J.J. Abrams passed the baton to Rian Johnson, he wasn't expected to receive the cinematic stick back from Johnson. Rather, Johnson was supposed to hand off to JURASSIC WORLD director Colin Trevorrow. However, due to that ubiquitous term "creative differences" between himself and producer Kathleen Kennedy, Trevorrow left the project. While, Trevorrow is returning to the world of CGI dinosaurs with the upcoming JURASSIC WORLD 3, he does retain a writing credit on THE RISE OF SKYWALKER.

Various explanations have been provided as to the specifics behind Trevorrow's departure, however in a recent interview Kennedy herself gave a reason that points back to the aforementioned consistency criticism:

Well, I wouldn’t say it didn’t work. Colin was at a huge disadvantage not having been a part of Force Awakens and in part of those early conversations because we had a general sense of where the story was going. Like any development process, it was only in the development that we’re looking at a first draft and realizing that it was perhaps heading in a direction that many of us didn’t feel was really quite where we wanted it to go. And we were on a schedule, as we often are with these movies, and had to make a tough decision as to whether or not we thought we could get there in the time or not. And as I said, Colin was at a disadvantage because he hadn’t been immersed in everything that we all had starting out with Episode VII.

Now listen, I've looked into the multi-verse and I've yet to find a planet where I'm a Hollywood producer or executive. What I mean by that bloated metaphor is that I in no way claim to be an expert on the ins and out of the Hollywood scene. However, from a logic standpoint it seems to me that if you're mapping out a trilogy of films based on the most iconic franchise in the history of cinema, you might want to have all your directors collaborate from day one. If Trevorrow had "been immersed in everything" beginning with THE FORCE AWAKENS, maybe he would have been retained as director.

What say you guys? Do you buy this reason from Kennedy? Would you liked to have seen Colin Trevorrow's vision? Sound off in the comments below!