Immediately following last weekend’s $93 million debut, Legendary Pictures and Warner Brothers let it be known that a Godzilla sequel was already in the works. Director Gareth Edwards and screenwriter Max Borenstein had both previously stated that they had ideas about where the next film might go, but they weren’t ready to give specifics. Now, however, it looks as though Edwards will be tackling an even bigger project before he gets to the Godzilla sequel. It was announced today that he will also be helming one of the top secret Star Wars spin-offs. Hit the jump to find out what we know.

According to THR, Gareth Edwards is attached to direct an as of yet unspecified Star Wars standalone film for Disney and Lucasfilm. Gary Whitta (The Book of Eli, After Earth) will write the script and the project has a release date of Dec. 16, 2016, approximately one year after J.J. Abrams’ Star Wars: Episode VII. The question is, what character will the spin-off be about?

Earlier this year, Disney CEO Bob Iger revealed that they plan to release a saga film every other year with the spin-offs likely to fill in the gaps. He also said that they have at least three spin-offs that are currently ready to head into production, and rumour has it those films will focus on Boba Fett, Yoda and Han Solo. That being said, I think the safe bet is that Edwards will be directing an origin story for the Rancor Monster. What do you think, is this exciting news? What other Star Wars characters would you like to see get their own films?