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Michael Happe, Winnebago CEO, told CNBC on Friday that he expected the coronavirus pandemic-inspired surge in recreational vehicle sales to continue into next year.

The comments came after the Forest City, Iowa-based company reported strong quarterly results that exceeded Wall Street’s expectations. Investors enjoyed the quarter on Friday as Winnebago shares rose more than 5%.

Winnebago reported adjusted earnings per share of $ 1.69, beating estimates of $ 1.01, according to FactSet. This corresponds to an increase of 131.5% compared to the same quarter of the previous year. Revenue for the quarter ended November 28th was $ 793.1 million, up 34.8% year over year and beating analysts’ guidance of $ 753 million.

“We were obviously very pleased with the way consumers flocked to the outdoors in 2020 as they tried to manage the impact of the pandemic on their lives and we believe you will see a similar behavioral trend in 2021,” said Happen on “close bell.”

“We believe that consumers who might have been interested in the space and category earlier this year and may not have pulled the trigger but are still very excited to find a way are in great demand for RVing and boating in the Year 2021, “added the executive.

Winnebago Industries RVs on display at Winnebago Motor Homes in Rockford, Illinois.

Daniel Acker | Bloomberg | Getty Images

As the coronavirus pandemic required social distancing, many outdoor recreational activities such as boating, biking, and RV travel have grown in popularity. Happe is not alone in his optimism that America’s newfound interest in nature will carry over into the next year.

David Foulkes, CEO of Brunswick, told CNBC earlier this month: “We have incredible momentum in the [boating] Industry now. We have attracted a new population. … I think that gives us great momentum, not only in the next year but also in the years to come. “

Winnebago, which sells RVs and boats, has seen a similar shift in buyers, according to Happe. “Our consumers are getting younger. They are becoming more diverse in background and profile, and they are using the products in many different ways,” he said. “The trend to work from anywhere is pretty strong right now, and many of our new consumers see these products as an opportunity to work from the street or from a nice campsite here in America.”

Winnebago’s shares are up 18% so far this year and more than 260% since the March 19 low.

According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, rocket sales have become the second largest arms export in the US. And a handful of US companies dominate production.

As with aircraft, missile sales are based on international alliances and treaties. And those sales can become hot button issues, like a recent proposal to sell Boeing’s Harpoon missiles to Taiwan or a failed offer to sell the Raytheon-made Patriot missile system to Turkey.

As defense technology advances, cheaper alternatives such as smaller guided missiles and loitering ammunition could change the dynamics of the battlefield.

“We have entered a kind of new rocket age,” said Tom Karako, Senior Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Check out the video above to find out how the US missile business works, how much money it makes for American defense companies, and what happens to the future of the industry.

England’s top medical officer announced Saturday that the UK had identified a new variant of the coronavirus that “can spread faster” than previous strains of the virus, prompting Prime Minister Boris Johnson to impose new restrictions on parts of the nation to control its spread.

“We learn from this over time, but we already know enough, more than enough, to be sure that we need to act now,” Johnson said during a press conference on Saturday setting new restrictions on London and other parts of England before the Christmas holidays.

“If the virus changes its method of attack, we’ll have to change our method of defense,” said Johnson.

The UK government announced the new strain of coronavirus on Monday after cases increased in the south and east of England. According to a statement from Public Health England, just over 1,100 Covid-19 cases had been identified with the new variant by Sunday.

Now it is believed the new strain could be up to 70% more communicable than the original strain of the disease, Johnson said on Saturday, adding that it appears to be fueling the rapid spread of infections. Johnson urged residents not to travel and “stay on-site” to keep the new strain from moving around the country and abroad.

The UK reports around 24,061 new Covid-19 cases daily based on a weekly average, an increase of more than 40% from the previous week, according to a CNBC analysis of data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

“This is early data that needs to be verified, but it is the best we have right now and we need to respond to information as we have it because it is now spreading very quickly,” said Johnson.

Professor Chris Whitty, England’s chief medical officer, said at the press conference that “viruses are constantly mutating”. Seasonal influenza mutates every year, and other new variants of the coronavirus have already been identified in countries like Spain, according to Public Health England.

What needs to be answered is whether the new strain will transmit more easily, make people sick, and whether it will change the way a person’s immune system responds to the virus if they are already infected or vaccinated, Whitty said.

So far, a body of evidence from genetic studies, frequency studies, and laboratory studies suggests that the new strain “has a significant, substantial increase in transmissibility,” Whitty said. So far, however, there is no evidence that the new strain causes a higher mortality rate.

Health officials believe the new variant first appeared in London or Kent in mid-September, and by mid-November it is believed to have caused about 28% of cases in London and other parts of south-east England, Whitty said.

Now those numbers are much higher, he said. In London last week, data suggests the new variant accounts for more than 60% of new cases, Whitty said.

“So that tells us that this new variant is not only moving fast, it also transmits better, it also becomes the dominant variant. It beats everyone else in terms of transmission,” he said.

However, there is “no evidence” that it causes more severe illness, more hospitalizations, or “more problems than the other virus,” Whitty said. While there are reasons to suspect the new variant might alter a person’s immune response to the disease, nothing suggests that it has so far, he said.

“We are currently assuming by all scientists that the vaccine response for this virus should be appropriate,” he said. “Obviously this has to be checked in the future, and we have to remain vigilant in this regard.”

The UK has alerted the World Health Organization and will continue to analyze data on the new strain.

The Child, popularly known as “Baby Yoda,” is a character in the new Disney+ series, “The Mandalorian”

Episodic Photos, Disney

*This post contains spoilers for “The Mandalorian” season two.* 

When the final credits rolled on “Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker,” fans who had eagerly awaited the final chapter in the Skywalker saga quickly split into two camps.

There were those that rallied behind J.J. Abrams’ decision to largely undo the narrative events of “The Last Jedi” and bring back the presumed dead Emperor Palpatine as the main villain. And then there were those who wondered how Disney could have let things go so wrong.

“The Mandalorian,” a show that launched with the Disney+ platform several weeks before “The Rise of Skywalker” entered theaters, had instantly captivated audiences with its back-to-basics Star Wars style in late 2019. The space western, which took inspiration from the days of John Wayne and Clint Eastwood and the films of Akira Kurosawa, captured the hearts of Star Wars fans and casual pop culture consumers.

After two seasons, the show has reignited faith in the Star Wars franchise. Its success has given Disney the confidence to invest in producing more content. Over the next few years, the streaming service will be home to nearly a dozen Star Wars shows, both live action and animated.

Much of the credit goes to the careful direction of showrunners Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni. Under their care, “The Mandalorian” takes the time to craft a cohesive story and uses restraint when it comes to delivering moments of fan service. The result: The future of the more than 40-year-old franchise is brighter than ever.

A few parsecs short

Star Wars is a beloved franchise. Its fans are its biggest supporters, but also its biggest critics. So, when it became clear that the studio had not mapped out a story arc for its newest film trilogy, many fans were disappointed.

“It isn’t just a series of movies, it’s a lifestyle,” said Robert Thompson, a professor at Syracuse and a pop culture expert.

Many griped that the most recent trilogy of films had spent too much time rebranding George Lucas’ original trilogy. The Empire morphed into the First Order, the New Republic was destroyed by an even bigger Death Star in the form of Star Killer Base and the Emperor has (surprise!) been pulling the strings the whole time.

“The first six movies are the story of Anakin Skywalker, it’s not Luke,” said Doug Creutz, managing director and senior research analyst at Cowen. “So if you are going to have a new trilogy, and this is the conclusion to the Skywalker saga, you’ve got to have Anakin Skywalker. Instead you bring back Palpatine. You’ve made it the Palpatine saga.”

Daisy Ridley, who portrayed Rey in those films, admitted in September that while filming “The Rise of Skywalker” she wasn’t sure what her character’s heritage was.

Daisy Ridley as Rey in “Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.”

Disney | Lucasfilm

According to Ridley, Rey was initially supposed to be connected to Obi-Wan Kenobi, but in “The Last Jedi” writer and director Rian Johnson decided that she would not be connected to a major character.

However, when Abrams returned to write and direct the last film, he decided, in the end, that she would be related to Palpatine. In theory, this could have been a very dynamic reveal, but it failed in execution because there was no set-up for it. In fact, it generated more questions about the logic and plausibility of such a thing, infuriating many fans.

“One of the standout complaints regarding the recent movie trilogy was a lack of consistent vision for where the story and characters were going,” said Shawn Robbins, chief analyst at Boxoffice.com. “While many fans can enjoy the films individually and some of the character arcs prove quite emotional, not all of them do to some fans.”

A celebration of Star Wars

“The Mandalorian,” on the other hand, had a clear narrative arc from the start. Favreau and Filoni mapped out the direction of the series, leaving breadcrumbs for eagle-eyed viewers of what was to come.

It’s no surprise that this strategy has been incredibly effective in creating a cohesive story. It’s bolstered by Filoni, who has worked with Lucasfilm for years and was the man behind the “Clone Wars” and “Rebels” cartoon series. He is responsible for much of the canonical events and characters in the Star Wars universe over the last decade.

Under Filoni and Favreau, “The Mandalorian” takes the universe of Star Wars and dives in deeper and deeper. The new details imbue it with meaning. For example, “The Mandalorian” explores the Sand People, who, we discover, have their own sign-based language, and the nomadic scrap-collecting Jawas on Tatooine. These are familiar creatures who are made more complex through their inclusion in the narrative. They enrich the world around our masked hero Din Djarin and Grogu, the child formerly known as Baby Yoda.

And the series doesn’t just rely on the material that has made it to the big screen. With Filoni on board, “The Mandalorian” has expertly brought characters and elements from Star Wars animation into live action. From the reveal of the Dark Saber in season one and the emergence of Bo-Katan Kryze early in season two, to the jaw-dropping entrance of Ahsoka Tano and the reveal that she is hunting Grand Admiral Thrawn, Favreau and Filoni are doing fan service the right way.

Ahsoka fans were delighted by Rosario Dawson’s portrayal. Her vocal cadence matched that of Ashley Eckstein, the voice actor who took the character from snippy apprentice to a master with dual lightsabers, and her acrobatic fighting style was expertly captured in live action.

“[They have] shown that he can handle it with the respect they deserve,” Cowen’s Creutz said. “It doesn’t read like fan fiction.”

Rosario Dawson as Ahsoka Tano in “The Mandalorian” on Disney+.

Disney

Favreau and Filoni also managed to take Boba Fett, a bounty hunter introduced in “The Empire Strikes Back” and considered one of the most skilled combatants in the universe, and actually deliver on that promise. Previously, Fett had limited screen time, in which he stood stoically in the background, or was easily defeated by Han Solo.

The pair even tackled Luke Skywalker. The hero of the original trilogy makes a brief, but impactful, appearance in the season two finale, arriving aboard Moff Gideon’s light cruiser in his iconic X-Wing fighter. He easily dispatches of a squad of robotic dark troopers, a black glove over his robotic hand and a hood over his eyes.

When he finally meets our heroes and takes Grogu away to be trained as a Jedi, he is stoic and a man of few words — he is the Luke Skywalker that we saw in “Return of the Jedi” — just five years older and with the burden of restarting the Jedi Order resting heavily on his shoulders.

“It’s figured out how to both acknowledge the franchise and the history,” Thompson said. “‘The Mandalorian’ has found a nice little calculus of starting a new set of stories with new characters, but not rejecting or being contradictory to the old [stories].”

There’s even a nod to a recent Star Wars video game and comic book during the penultimate episode of the second season when Migs Mayfeld, a former sharpshooter from the Galactic Empire, turned friend of the Mandalorian and his crew, mentions Operation Cinder.

“That’s what Favreau and Filoni have been allowed to provide so far,” Robbins said, [“they have] built upon the foundation of their passion and deep investment in the mythos of Star Wars.”

Star Wars is for everyone

“The Mandalorian” doesn’t shy away from its source material, regardless of its form. It also has benefited by including diverse voices behind and in front of the camera.

For the first season, Filoni and Favreau enlisted Taika Waititi, Bryce Dallas Howard, Rick Famuyiwa and Deborah Chow to direct episodes, but also act as consultants on the episodes they did not direct. They worked as a team to bring the episodes to life, but also brought different perspectives to the series.

In front of the camera, is an equally diverse group. In addition to putting a number of female characters in the foreground, the series features actors of a variety of races. This was something that critics felt was lacking in the most recent trilogy.

While John Boyega, Kelly Marie Tran and Oscar Isaac, were included in the cast, their roles were often pushed to the side in favor of white characters. Boyega publically discussed his frustration with how Disney handled his character of Finn in a GQ article published in September.

“What I would say to Disney is do not bring out a Black character, market them to be much more important in the franchise than they are and then have them pushed to the side,” he said. “It’s not good. I’ll say it straight up.”

Chewbacca, Finn and Poe Dameron pilot the Millenium Falcon in “Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.”

Disney | Lucasfilm

Finn, a former stormtrooper, was featured prominently in the marketing for “The Force Awakens,” most famously wielding a lightsaber. However, it was later revealed that it was Ridley’s Rey that was the one that was force sensitive. The character of Finn, while still a major character in the franchise, seemed to be nudged further and further into the periphery in the following two films.

Tran and Isaac, too suffered this fate.

It was feared that Ming-Na Wen’s bounty hunter Fennec Shand would, too, be another non-White character to die off quickly and unceremoniously. However, the writers brought back Shand in the second season, with a new robotic torso, but the same attitude that made her a fan favorite.

The show also brought forth a number of strong, complex female characters played by Gina Carano, Katee Sackhoff, Sasha Banks and Dawson. While Dawson only appeared in one episode of the series so far, the other actresses have had recurring parts on the show.

In fact, during the finale, the majority of the named characters on screen that set out to rescue Grogu from the clutches of Moff Gideon are women. And their team-up isn’t treated as a contrived moment of girl power, they are simply the best fighters Din knows and trusts. There is also, notably, no forced romance between any of these characters and Din.

What the series lacks in romantic love can be found in the familial love between Din and his bounty-turned-son Grogu. It is the emotional string that runs through the series and keeps audiences invested in the intricately choreographed and beautifully filmed battle sequences.

Gaining goodwill

“The Mandalorian” has earned Disney a lot of goodwill.

Projects that had been abandoned by the company have now been transformed into limited and regular series for Disney+. Ewan McGregor will reprise his role an a series about Obi-Wan Kenobi, which takes place 10 years after the events of “Revenge of the Sith.”

Kathleen Kennedy, the head of Lucasfilm, teased fans that Hayden Christensen will reprise his role as Darth Vader in “Kenobi,” along with McGregor in the title role. The series is helmed by “Mandalorian” alum Chow.

And it’s not the only project in the works for the streaming service.

“Andor” stars Alan Tudyk as the reprogrammed imperial droid K-2SO and Diego Luna as rebel fighter Cassian Andor in the years before the events of “Rogue One.”

Ewan McGregor as Obi-Wan Kenobi in “Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith.”

Lucasfilm

There will also be a series called “Lando” that follows the smooth-talking Lando Calrissian from the original trilogy of films as well as a series called “The Acolyte,” which takes place during the final days of the High Republic. It has been dubbed a “mystery-thriller.”

Not to mention Filoni and Favreau will be developing two additional series: “The Rangers of the New Republic” and “Ahsoka,” which will star Dawson in the title role.

“Star Wars: Visions” is an animated anthology series that will feature anime-inspired takes on the Star Wars universe. Additionally there will be an animated film called “A Droid Story,” which will introduce a new hero guided by R2-D2 and C-3PO.

And Boba Fett isn’t just a secondary character in “The Mandalorian.” During a post-credit scene in the season two finale, Disney announced that Fett and Shand would appear in a spinoff called “The Book of Boba Fett.” It’s unclear at the moment if that is going to be an arc within “The Mandalorian” or a separate series.

Additionally, the next theatrical Star Wars release will come in 2023 from Patty Jenkins. Waititi is also attached to a future film project as well as Marvel head Kevin Feige.

“I think my big concern was that you’d dilute the franchise,” Thompson said of adding too many films or TV shows to the Star Wars canon. “That it would get complicated. I completely give that up. Look at Marvel. That has not hurt Marvel at all. In fact, it’s been a boon to it. It’s part of the fun of it.”