The Sound of Boba Fett: Star Wars Leitmotifs in Streaming Television

John Williams’s score for the 1977 space opera Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope is often celebrated for its neo-romantic style and distinctive character leitmotifs—subsequently developed by Williams across eight additional films. Almost fifty years later, new Star Wars content is introduced primarily through streaming television on Disney+ and the sound of the franchise is changing as numerous composers are contributing to these Star Wars scores. This article provides a leitmotivic analysis of Ludwig Göransson and Joseph Shirley’s score for the Disney+ streaming miniseries The Book of Boba Fett. The analysis considers the direct quotation and evolution of Williams’s leitmotifs in the Star Wars television scores of Göransson and Shirley, the creative mutation of leitmotifs—specifically the melodic sequencing of thematic fragments—to parallel character development, and the use of multiple leitmotifs for a single character to highlight the non-linear narrative structure of the show.