A Future 'Star Wars' Animated Project Will Bring Back Matt Lanter As Anakin Skywalker

Star Wars: The Clone Wars may be over, but that doesn't mean we've seen the last of the animated version of Anakin Skywalker, even if he's already transformed into Darth Vader.Matt Lanter, who voiced Obi-Wan Kenobi's Jedi apprentice turned Sith Lord throughout the Star Wars animated series, has just teased a surprising return as Anakin Skywalker in some kind of upcoming Lucasfilm Animation project that's currently in the works.

Speaking with Entertainment Weekly, Matt Lanter dropped the bomb about returning as the animated Anakin Skywalker sometime in the future. The voice actor teased:

"There's some new Lucasfilm Animation going on. I've been a part of some things I can't talk about yet. You'll see Anakin again. I never quite put Anakin down, whether I'm doing a video game or something new for Lucasfilm Animation."

It's good that Lanter makes the differentiation between voicing Anakin Skywalker in something like a video game and doing something for Lucasfilm Animation. That means there's an upcoming Star Wars animated series that will bring back Anakin in some capacity. So what could it be?

As of now, the best bet is that there might be flashbacks in the upcoming animated series The Bad Batch, coming to Disney+ on May 4. During the time in which The Bad Batch is set, Anakin has already become Darth Vader. But in the seventh season of The Clone Wars, the unique Clone Trooper squad did spend some time fighting alongside Anakin, so there's an opportunity to fill in some of the Bad Batch's character history with flashbacks to The Clone Wars.

There's also the chance that Lucasfilm Animation is working on something entirely new. Though The Clone Wars series filled in a large period of time in the prequel era, there are still pockets throughout that trilogy that have been left unexplored. What might be interesting is a series featuring an animated Obi-Wan Kenobi and Luke Skywalker on their own Jedi adventures, the kind referenced throughout Attack of the Clones, before The Clone Wars even began.

Lucasfilm certainly doesn't seem ready to let young Anakin Skywalker fall by the wayside just yet. Hayden Christensen is returning as Darth Vader for the upcoming Obi-Wan Kenobi series, and with Matt Lanter revealing this surprising return of Anakin Skywalker on the animated side, it would appear there are still plenty more prequel-era stories to tell.