Cast this: Star Wars – It is only a matter of time before the first official casting announcements start rolling in.

Pictured right: Chronicle and The Place Beyond the Pines star Dane DeHaan.

With production whispered to begin in January, it is only a matter of time before the first official casting announcements for the hotly anticipated Star Wars sequel, due in theaters in 2015, start rolling in. Of course that hasn’t stopped the rumor mill from churning at warp speed with wild theories about the casting and plot of the epic franchise that creator George Lucas has handed over to Disney, screenwriter Michael Arndt and director J.J. Abrams.

Original cast members Harrison Ford (Han Solo), Carrie Fisher (Princess Leia), Mark Hamill (Luke Skywalker) and Anthony Daniels (voice of C-3PO) are basically locked in for smaller, supporting roles in the as-yet-untitled Episode 7, but who will serve as the younger heroes and main characters for what amounts to a fresh start, the first in a trilogy of new space adventures under the blockbuster Star Wars banner?

Last week Saoirse Ronan (Atonement, The Lovely Bones), the talented actress who spent a couple months in Baton Rouge last year filming Stephenie Meyer’s The Host, let slip that not only had she auditioned for a Star Wars role, but that the scene she read involved her handling a lightsaber. Ronan is regarded as one of the best young actors in Hollywood, but she’s remained oddly under the radar due to her chameleon like performances and that fact that a string of the films in which she has shined were, ultimately, box office duds.

Pictured left: The Host star Saoirse Ronan has already auditioned for a role in Star Wars: Episode 7.

With the success of the Twilight and Hunger Games films, it is easy to see Disney wanting a young, galvanizing female character at the very center of its new film, and Ronan, as a talent who is not yet a household name, would perfectly fit the bill. Of course, a rumor that won’t ever die is the notion that some of the younger characters in Episode 7 will be the offspring of the original trilogy’s heroes.

Personally, I think of Luke Skywalker as a monk, devoted to the Jedi and the Jedi alone. So I don’t want to see him hooking up and having any children in Episode 7, but if Disney goes that route, they would be fools not to cast Dane DeHaan (Chronicle, The Place Beyond the Pines). Not only is he a dead ringer for a young Mark Hamill, he is also a real talent, who apparently steals Kill Your Darlings from co-star Daniel Radcliffe.

It’s much more likely that we’ll see the daughter or son, or both, of Han Solo and Princess Leia. With the film largely taking place 30 years after the events of Return of the Jedi, any actors cast as young Solos would most likely be between the ages of 20 and 30. Though she is nearing 40, Keri Russell looks almost a decade younger, and she of course is connected to Abrams by starring for four years in a series created called Felicity. More recently, Russell has proven she can play a lethal spy on The Americans, and I could easily see her as the daughter of Leia and Han. On the younger end of the spectrum, Ksenia Solo (brownie points for her last name) would be an interesting choice. She played Star Wars vet Natalie Portman’s evil-eyed competitor in Black Swan and now stars in Sy Fy’s Lost Girl. But if Disney wants a real action hero, they might split the age difference with Jaimie Alexander, who’s been noteworthy in a tiny, but action-packed role in the Thor franchise as well as a recurring role on Nurse Jackie.

Pictured left: Thor co-star Jaimie Alexander.

For a Solo son, Richard Madden (Game of Thrones), a.k.a. Robb Stark, first comes to mind, and after his demise on that acclaimed fantasy series, he has some time in his schedule. Spartacus star Liam McIntyre could pass for Harrison Ford’s son. He plays the action hero well on TV. A younger and more left field choice would be Nicholas Hoult, known best covered in blue fur as Beast in the most recent X-Men series, but a young talent who showed real chops opposite Colin Firth in A Single Man.