At long last, Light & Magic Season 2 has landed on Disney+, and it couldn’t be more timely. As Industrial Light & Magic celebrates its 50th anniversary this year, this new season picks up right where the last left off, chronicling a wild, wonderful era of visual effects innovation and paying tribute to the rogues and rebels who reshaped filmmaking forever.
Announced on StarWars.com with a trailer and poster drop during Star Wars Celebration Japan, Season 2 dives into ILM’s digital renaissance of the 1990s and early 2000s — the Jurassic Park boom, the Star Wars prequels, and a relentless push to redefine what was possible on screen. Hosted by voice actor Sam Witwer, the live panel featured a rare gathering of ILM and Lucasfilm creatives: Ahmed Best, Janet Lewin, John Knoll, Rob Coleman, Doug Chiang, and Lynwen Brennan, all sharing memories, laughter, and hard truths about building magic from scratch.
Director Joe Johnston — an ILM original — returns to tell this next chapter. In a video message, he called the season "an exploration of an incredible chapter of change," hinting at the growing pains of the digital revolution and the grit behind the glamour. Executive producer Ron Howard added that the stories "make the iconic movies even more fascinating," and he’s not wrong. These aren’t just VFX demos or nostalgia trips, this is the human story of an industry transforming.
And yes, it gets personal.
Doug Chiang, who helped define the look of the prequel trilogy, admitted he never thought he’d fulfill his dream of working at ILM — until he did. Rob Coleman and Ahmed Best, reunited for the first time in twenty years, shared a heartfelt reflection on their collaboration bringing Jar Jar and digital Yoda to life. "We are Jar Jar," Best declared. "It’s not just me — it’s all of us."
What makes this season of Light & Magic so compelling to me is how it unpacks the myth of the "visual effects button." As Brennan said, it’s not a black box — it’s thousands of artists, engineers, designers, and dreamers. Rebels with a cause. People who dared to break the rules because they believed in taking risks, and in George Lucas’s famously impossible ideas.
There's a beautiful full-circle feeling in watching ILM veterans revisit their journey, not with dry retrospection, but with real reverence. It's a love letter to those who made the impossible possible, again and again.
And somehow, you get the sense that they're just getting started.
Watch Light & Magic Season 2 now on Disney+.