It feels like only yesterday that Haunted Mansion director Justin Simien remained fairly confident that not only would tortured Disney Plus series Lando emerge from the throes of development hell eventually, but he’d be the one to drag it out of there.
That’s probably because it was quite literally less than 24 hours ago that the filmmaker stated his belief that he was still attached to the episodic spin-off to Solo: A Star Wars Story, only for news to break several hours later that not only was he mistaken, but the decision was reportedly made a while back prior to actors and writers going on strike.
As much as you’d think hearing on the grapevine that the project you’d been working on for almost three years was moving forward without you, Simien somehow managed to put on a brave face, even in spite of the fact that nobody from Disney or Lucasfilm even had the good graces to tell him to his face.
Taking to his Instagram Stories to react to the news, Simien revealed that “this is me finding out rn” that Donald Glover and brother Stephen were the new creative architects behind Lando, but there don’t appear to be any sour grapes after he offered his congratulations and endorsement.
“Donald is a national treasure. Glad he and Stephen get to carry the character forward their way. Can’t wait to see. Rooting for everybody Black.”
You’ve got to applaud Simien for handling the situation with such class and dignity, even if it doesn’t reflect to well on Disney, who lest we forget have him out there promoting Haunted Mansion all on his lonesome due to contractual obligations.