Disney chief Bob Iger officially announced the title for the first Star Wars spinoff film as Rogue One during a shareholders meeting in San Francisco on Thursday.

According to an official statement released by the company, the spinoff films will explore new characters apart from those that we've seen in the original and prequels of the Star Wars saga.

With Edwards directing, Oscar nominee Chris Weitz (Cinderella, About a Boy, Antz) will serve as the writer.

Rogue One will be produced by Kathleen Kennedy and Tony To (Band of Brothers, The Pacific), co-produced by John Swartz (Star Wars: The Force Awakens) and executively produced by Simon Emanuel (The Dark Knight Rises, Fast and Furious 6) and Jason McGatlin (Tintin, War of the Worlds).

The first cast member has also been announced. Felicity Jones, who received critical acclaim for her performance as Jane Hawking in last year's The Theory of Everything, will be starring in Rogue One. Whether or not she will be the main character for the film has yet to be determined.

A lot of fans and critics are speculating that Rogue One will be about the leader of the Rogue Squadron, the fighter pilot team that belongs to the Alliance.

Iger also announced on Thursday that Rian John will write and direct Star Wars: Episode VIII. The film is set to release on May 26 2017. According to Starwars, this release date falls forty years and a day after the release of the first film in the franchise, Star Wars: A New Hope.

However, with the new movie comes a new person in charge of the score. This time around, Alexandre Desplat will score the movie, instead of John Williams who traditionally scores Star Wars films.

Rogue One will start shooting in London this summer and is scheduled for a December 16, 2016 release date.