Finally, afters months – scratch that, years – of anticipation, we will finally be able to witness "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" tonight. 

But bah, "The Force Awakens" is old news now. Let's start getting excited about "Rogue One"!

Questing to wring every single dollar possible from their LucasFilm purchase, Disney – in addition to cranking out this new trilogy – has set into motion several one-off cinematic adventures in the "Star Wars" universe. So far, there has been talk of a Boba Fett spin-off, and casting has already gone into effect for a Han Solo spin-off – with Phil Lord and Chris Miller, the geniuses behind "The LEGO Movie" and "21 Jump Street," directing. 

The first "Star Wars Anthology" film down the pike, however, will be "Rogue One," coming out next December. The spin-off will take place between "Revenge of the Sith" and "A New Hope," following the rebels as they attempt to steal the plans for the Death Star. A bit of teaser footage premiered back at Star Wars Celebration in April – before it had even begun filming – and leaked out to the public. I assumed Disney's all-seeing, all-knowing militia of lawyers had seen to destroying any trace of the footage, but as it turns it, it's still out there – in really, really grainy, low-quality form, but there nonetheless!

Holy wow. That is, in fact, no moon.

In case Disney pulls the trailer off YouTube, the teaser travels over a jungle planet, while old Obi-Wan discusses in voiceover "the dark times" and the rise of the empire. The camera then pans up to reveal the Death Star on the horizon ... and it's friggin' huge, more Death Planet than Death Star. Cue a cut to black, the title, some garbled combat audio and a whole lot of excitement. 

To get the bad news out of the way first, the movie comes directed by Gareth Edwards, whose "Godzilla" movie last summer was a bit of a disappointment. However, it was the kind of disappointment where you could see the potential and you felt interested to see where the director went next (similar to Denis Villeneuve, who followed up the OK "Prisoners" with this year's hauntingly great "Sicario"). And as the teaser footage shows, few directors are as good with capturing massive scale like Edwards. 

There's just too much other awesome sounding stuff surrounding "Rogue One" too to get too worried about Edwards at the helm. The premise sounds very intriguing and the buzz only more so, with Edwards talking about putting the war back into "Star Wars." This doesn't sound or look, judging by the grey, gritty cast photo released, like a "Star Wars" movie we've seen before.

And how about the cast? The photo's got the very good Felicity Jones ("The Theory of Everything") in the lead, as well martial arts star Donnie Yen, but that's just the half of it. The rest of the cast includes the tremendous Mads Mikkelson ("Hannibal," the blood-crying villain from "Casino Royale"), Oscar-winner Forest Whitaker, the colorful cult favorite Alan Tudyk, "Nightcrawler" breakout Riz Ahmed and the great Ben Mendelsohn ("The Place Beyond the Pines," "The Dark Knight Rises"), probably playing a sleaze because that's why you get Ben Mendelsohn. 

So yes, be excited tonight for "The Force Awakens" (snarky intro aside, I most certainly am). But we've got another "Star Wars" movie coming next year too, and it sounds even better.