By Oliver Gettell

Los Angeles Times

(MCT)

“Star Wars: Episode VII” has completed principal photography and gained an official title, Disney and Lucasfilm announced Thursday.

The highly anticipated film shall henceforth be known as “Star Wars: The Force Awakens.”

Scheduled to hit theaters Dec. 18, 2015, “The Force Awakens” is the first installment of a planned trilogy set 30 years after 1983’s “Return of the Jedi.”

J.J. Abrams is directing the space opera from a screenplay by him and Lawrence Kasdan. The cast features a combination of familiar faces, including Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher and Mark Hamill, and “Star Wars” newcomers, such as John Boyega, Daisy Ridley, Adam Driver and Oscar Isaac.

“Looper” filmmaker Rian Johnson will pick up the franchise baton from Abrams to write and direct “Episode VIII” and pen a treatment for “Episode IX.”

In addition to the central “Star Wars” saga, Disney and Lucasfilm are planning multiple spinoff movies, including one directed by Gareth Edwards (“Godzilla”) and one directed by Josh Trank (“Chronicle”).

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