Those aren't the generic film franchises you're looking for
October 30, 2012 1:06 PM   Subscribe

Disney has purchased LucasFilm, including the Star Wars movies, for a shade over four billion dollars in cash and stock. Also in the Sydney Morning Herald.
posted by Wordshore (727 comments total) 26 users marked this as a favorite
 
Oh, no! What will we do if Disney ruins the "Star Wars" franchise?
posted by infinitywaltz at 1:08 PM on October 30, 2012 [181 favorites]


Pixar presents: Grim Fandango.
posted by hellojed at 1:08 PM on October 30, 2012 [137 favorites]


Big money! Very cool. Huge business deal. Who cares, really?
posted by ReeMonster at 1:09 PM on October 30, 2012 [7 favorites]


Star Wars VII?

Weren't there always only three Star Wars movies?
posted by Curious Artificer at 1:09 PM on October 30, 2012 [7 favorites]


I would like to go on the record as saying that even with the addition of Leia to the mix, Loki will forever be best Disney Princess.
posted by radwolf76 at 1:09 PM on October 30, 2012 [36 favorites]


Who cares, really?

"Star Wars Episode 7 is targeted for release in 2015, with more feature films expected to continue the Star Wars saga."

This may occasion some commentary.
posted by Egg Shen at 1:09 PM on October 30, 2012 [31 favorites]


Star Wars Episode 7 is targeted for release in 2015

Huh? Really? I will only support this is Brad Bird and John Lassiter take over!
posted by TwoWordReview at 1:10 PM on October 30, 2012 [9 favorites]


Here's the press release from Disney.
posted by Atreides at 1:10 PM on October 30, 2012


Han shot first.
posted by wuwei at 1:10 PM on October 30, 2012 [13 favorites]



And with that, the conversion to the Dark Side is complete.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 1:11 PM on October 30, 2012 [32 favorites]


Clearly Lucas is just ensuring he doesn't have to rely on a state pension for his retirement.
posted by modernnomad at 1:11 PM on October 30, 2012 [10 favorites]


Uhm so now Disney own Marvel AND the entire Star Wars Universe?

:S This is something that geekdom ain't gonna like ...
posted by Faintdreams at 1:11 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


Star Wars Theme Park

That's worth $4 Billion right there.
posted by 2bucksplus at 1:12 PM on October 30, 2012 [21 favorites]


Star Wars Episode 7, directed by Brad Bird, written by Joss Whedon.
posted by thecjm at 1:12 PM on October 30, 2012 [77 favorites]


"Star Wars Episode 7 is targeted for release in 2015, with more feature films expected to continue the Star Wars saga."

"It probably won't be very good," accurately predicted EVERYONE.
posted by infinitywaltz at 1:12 PM on October 30, 2012 [17 favorites]


I actually.....feel kinda good about this. Yeah, as in, turning off the targeting computer kinda good.

Disney has shown it can be somewhat competent with franchises...better than Lucas, anyhow.
posted by Atreides at 1:13 PM on October 30, 2012 [16 favorites]


Sucks to be Dark Horse Comics right now.
posted by 1970s Antihero at 1:13 PM on October 30, 2012 [16 favorites]


WAIT. star wars 7 wasn't a joke?
posted by hellojed at 1:13 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


If this was 1995, I'd be worried sick. But I can't see Disney doing anything worse to the SW franchise than what Lucas has done in the past 15 years.
posted by thecjm at 1:13 PM on October 30, 2012 [50 favorites]


Wow. My 11-year-old daughter is firmly entrenched in the Disney mythos, and I've noticed a couple of overtures over the years to entice more boys into the fold (Phineas and Ferb probably being the most successful one). I guess they figured it was easier just to buy their love instead of earn it.

hellojed: Pixar presents: Grim Fandango.

I would literally do just about anything within my power to help this happen.
posted by Rock Steady at 1:13 PM on October 30, 2012 [10 favorites]


This is something that geekdom ain't gonna like ...

Worst business sellout ever!
posted by Wordshore at 1:13 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]



Heh.

I wonder what this means for Lucassoft ? As much as I disliked the pre-quels, the Dark Knight and Xwing/Tie-fighter games were pretty kick ass.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 1:14 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


The content of the link:
Disney says it is buying `Star Wars' maker Lucasfilm for $4.05 billion from George Lucas.

In a statement announcing the deal Tuesday, Lucas says, "It's now time for me to pass `Star Wars' on to a new generation of filmmakers."
It's like, how much more weak could this sauce be? And the answer is none. None more weak.
posted by Wolfdog at 1:14 PM on October 30, 2012 [14 favorites]


The prospect of a new "official" Star Wars movie is exciting as heck, I don't care how terrible it ends up being--I am hopefully optimistic that it will completely destroy.
posted by resurrexit at 1:14 PM on October 30, 2012


Also, you know you LOL'd at the post title.
posted by resurrexit at 1:15 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Kathleen Kennedy, current Co-Chairman of Lucasfilm, will become President of Lucasfilm, reporting to Walt Disney Studios Chairman Alan Horn. Additionally she will serve as the brand manager for Star Wars, working directly with Disney's global lines of business to build, further integrate, and maximize the value of this global franchise. Ms. Kennedy will serve as executive producer on new Star Wars feature films, with George Lucas serving as creative consultant. Star Wars Episode 7 is targeted for release in 2015, with more feature films expected to continue the Star Wars saga and grow the franchise well into the future. - From the news release.


Also, I guess this makes Leia a Disney Princess? You know, a Disney Princess with a blaster?
posted by Atreides at 1:15 PM on October 30, 2012 [19 favorites]


If they don't give Star Wars Episode VII to Chris Nolan, someone doesn't like making obscene amounts of money
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 1:15 PM on October 30, 2012 [18 favorites]


Content is underrated. $4 billion is only 4 Instagrams, or 1/2 a Skype
posted by 2bucksplus at 1:16 PM on October 30, 2012 [15 favorites]


Let's hope this means the end of the Empire / Burger King Alliance
posted by lampshade at 1:16 PM on October 30, 2012


I guess we're supposed to be upset because Disney and Ewoks and blah-blah-blah, but really, regardless of the buyer, taking it out of Lucas's hands is the best possible thing that could happen to the Star Wars legacy.

If nothing else, given Disney's penchant for re-releasing classics, I bet they put the original three movies out in their unadulterated forms.
posted by drjimmy11 at 1:16 PM on October 30, 2012 [33 favorites]


At what point does Disney just own everything (except, apparently, the Ninja Turtles)? At this point we could legally get Muppet Star Wars Guest-Starring Wolverine.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 1:16 PM on October 30, 2012 [51 favorites]


"It's now time for me to pass `Star Wars' on to a new generation of filmmakers."

What he meant was, "It's now time for me to pass Star Wars on to a new generation of marketers."
posted by perhapses at 1:17 PM on October 30, 2012 [10 favorites]


He's still going to be a Creative Consultant though.
posted by TwoWordReview at 1:17 PM on October 30, 2012


TwoWordReview: "Huh? Really? I will only support this is Brad Bird and John Lassiter take over!"

Yeah. I want to like STAR WARS. I like space battles and goofy adventure. So Lucas handing that shit off to someone else is a fucking phenomenal idea, and Brad Bird was the first person I thought of.
posted by brundlefly at 1:17 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Worst case scenario: Star Wars Episode 7 in 3D, written and directed by Tim Burton (who will spend entire press junkets bragging about having never seen Star Wars), starting Miley Cyrus as space-pop singer Lucky Skydancer, with Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter in goth makeup playing every other character.

Oh wait. That's still not as bad as Jar-Jar Binks.
posted by thecjm at 1:17 PM on October 30, 2012 [52 favorites]


"You know, my whole life I been getting this shit. 'You shot first.' 'You didn't shoot first.' Everybody with an asshole has an opinion about it—and that's most known galactic species, and the Vonnugazers from the Klurt system have three apiece so that makes up for the no-shows, I figure.

And the fact is, I don't even know anymore. I don't give a shit. I shot Greedo, Greedo's dead, I've moved on with my life and married a princess and watched my friends die and seen my hair go grey, and Greedo's still dead. It doesn't matter to me.

But you want to ask anyway. You walk into this bar and you see me and I don't know you from Adam and you walk over here and you fuckin' ask me that question? And I'll tell you what, it doesn't matter. Doesn't matter if I shot first. All that matters, as far as I'm concerned, is that..."

[BLAM]

"I shot last."

WALT DISNEY PICTURES PRESENTS

A QUENTIN TARANTINO FILM

STAR WARS EPISODE VII:
EISLEY TANGO

posted by cortex at 1:18 PM on October 30, 2012 [232 favorites]


At this point we could legally get Muppet Star Wars Guest-Starring Wolverine.

I would literally do just about anything within my power to help this happen.
posted by Egg Shen at 1:18 PM on October 30, 2012 [25 favorites]


Interesting. Maybe we'll finally get a quality DVD release of the original trilogy in its original, un-CGI'd form. ("But get it quick before it goes back in the Disney Vault™!")
posted by usonian at 1:18 PM on October 30, 2012 [10 favorites]


Disney Investor conference call ...starts in 15 minutes. Webcast here.
posted by ericb at 1:18 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Pixar presents: Grim Fandango.

Please please please tell me that (a) LucasArts goes in the deal and (b) Disney is willing to just throw some money at Telltale for a new round of Tales of Monkey Island. I will take fifteen new Star Wars cash-ins for that.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 1:18 PM on October 30, 2012 [9 favorites]


Who cares about Star Wars? Every single part of that shitty franchise was an ass shitting into another ass shitting into another ass in an endless loop of ass shitting.

What's really unsettling is that now Disney owns Indiana Jones and Willow.
posted by cmonkey at 1:18 PM on October 30, 2012 [7 favorites]


East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94: "If they don't give Star Wars Episode VII to Chris Nolan, someone doesn't like making obscene amounts of money"

Gloomy and self-serious is always a great way to go with this sort of material.
posted by brundlefly at 1:18 PM on October 30, 2012 [7 favorites]


This is something that geekdom ain't gonna like ...

Any attack made by the geeks against this media conglomerate would be a useless gesture, no matter what press releases they have obtained. Disney is now the ultimate power in the mediaverse!
posted by burnmp3s at 1:19 PM on October 30, 2012 [11 favorites]


Star Wars Theme Park

There's already a sizable chunk of Disney's Hollywood Studios given over to Star Wars and Indiana Jones. I suspect that may be expanded rather than Disney building a dedicated Star Wars theme park. It costs Disney about a billion dollars to build a park (Animal Kingdom was about a billion, California Adventure was about $1.5 billion). That's a pretty big investment in what currently seems like a waning franchise.
posted by jedicus at 1:19 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


high pitch voice

Okay, everybody! Let's show them the full power of this battle station, Haha! That'll be swell!
posted by eriko at 1:19 PM on October 30, 2012 [34 favorites]


Also, you KNOW somebody at Square is frantically writing Luke Skywalker into the next Kingdom Hearts.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 1:20 PM on October 30, 2012 [34 favorites]


Does this mean that Disney now owns THX-1138, too? Can't wait to see the kidz bop version!
posted by Catblack at 1:20 PM on October 30, 2012 [7 favorites]


You know what needs to happen? They need to bury this franchise for the next twenty to thirty years. Same with Star Trek. Same with most other entertainment franchises. Let them marinate and fester out of the public mind for a couple of decades, and see what emerges...because right now, it seems like their getting picked clean, and whatever good ideas and stories might be left don't have a chance.
posted by never used baby shoes at 1:20 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


Finding Solo.
posted by the painkiller at 1:20 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


Gloomy and self-serious is always a great way to go with this sort of material.

It worked for Empire
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 1:21 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


I'm a little surprised the sale price wasn't higher, to be honest.
posted by Auden at 1:21 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


what the holy what now??

At a loss for words, I am.
posted by Elly Vortex at 1:21 PM on October 30, 2012


I don't know about that 2015 release date. Are they sure they want to go up against Ant-Man?
posted by Egg Shen at 1:22 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Hey, Han, I know what we're gonna do today!

Hey, where's Chewie?
posted by eriko at 1:23 PM on October 30, 2012 [9 favorites]


East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94: "It worked for Empire"

Touché.
posted by brundlefly at 1:23 PM on October 30, 2012


I want Mike Stoklasa to direct the next film.
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 1:23 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


Betcha Lucas still gets paid for merch.
posted by mobunited at 1:24 PM on October 30, 2012


Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish: "At this point we could legally get Muppet Star Wars Guest-Starring Wolverine."

Yaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyy!!! * waves arms *
posted by boo_radley at 1:24 PM on October 30, 2012 [14 favorites]


Star Wars VII?!?

WTF?!
posted by George Lucas at 1:24 PM on October 30, 2012 [20 favorites]


So now the existence of Star Tours makes a hair more sense?
posted by shakespeherian at 1:25 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


I hope this doesn't damage the integrity of Angry Birds Star Wars .
posted by Gary at 1:25 PM on October 30, 2012 [10 favorites]


brundlefly: “Gloomy and self-serious is always a great way to go with this sort of material.”

EMRJKC94: “It worked for Empire”

And I think we're all aware from experience that what worked for the Empire seems to work pretty damned well for the Disney Corporation.
posted by koeselitz at 1:26 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


An actual benefit of this is that it clears up any rights complications surrounding the Mark Hamill/Star Wars episode of "The Muppet Show," which might have been delaying the DVD release.
posted by Faint of Butt at 1:26 PM on October 30, 2012 [13 favorites]


Gary: "I hope this doesn't damage the integrity of Angry Birds Star Wars ."

it'll be... well, not fine, obviously, but ... uh... "unchanged" I suppose is the word.
posted by boo_radley at 1:26 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


Star Wars VII: Luke Skywalker and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 1:26 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


Due to outstanding contracts, it's going to take a while to fully synergize. Marvel still isn't putting out Disney comics. I wouldn't worry about Dark Horse, or about seeing Amidala in a Disney Princess line-up just again.

And again, to everyone who seems to be worried about this: Have you been in coma since 1987? Disney has a pretty good track record with franchises lately and it would take a lot of work to do worse than the past 20-some years of George Lucas.
posted by thecjm at 1:26 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


BBC News reporting that Lion King III: Simba rides with Jar Jar is slated for a 2016 release.
posted by Wordshore at 1:27 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


So, does this mean the Christmas Special will get a Blu-Ray release?
posted by Mad_Carew at 1:27 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


From the press release: "our long term plan is to release a new Star Wars feature film every two to three years." Wow. I don't know how to feel about that.

In other news, that Star Wars continuity guy's job just got a lot more interesting.
posted by yasaman at 1:27 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


"It's now time for me to pass `Star Wars' on to a new generation of filmmakers."

It's worth noting that this line means: George Lucas will not be directing the new Star Wars movie.

And there was much rejoicing.
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 1:28 PM on October 30, 2012 [43 favorites]


Betcha Lucas still gets paid for merch.

Lucas' part of the deal is a classic protection racket. He gets to stand around cracking his knuckles and saying "hey, that's a nice creative revitalizaiton of a beloved but tarnished franchise you got there, it'd be a shame if some creative consultation happened to it..." until they give him another wheelbarrow full of cash.
posted by cortex at 1:28 PM on October 30, 2012 [46 favorites]


This is something that geekdom ain't gonna like ...

I'm sorry, name one terrible Hollywood adaptation of a geek-beloved property that geeks have failed to reliably get in line to watch on opening night, watch again on the weekend, buy on VHS, buy again on DVD, buy the video game for, buy in toy form in every expression that injection-molding can dream of, buy again in lego form, and generally continue to be soaked by the marketing suits who are laughing all the way to the bank. Name one single property that has suffered because of pissing off geekdom.

Geeks are worse than anybody outside of fringe politics when it comes to showering time, attention, and cash on anybody who pays them the faintest lip service. The idea that a company that owns Marvel and Pixar is at all worried about the geeks getting mad is ludicrous.
posted by gauche at 1:28 PM on October 30, 2012 [40 favorites]


Marvel still isn't putting out Disney comics, but that didn't stop them from pulling the rights from Boom! Studios (who were doing fantastic work, might I add). If I were a Star Wars comic reader, I would worry about Dark Horse's line being unceremoniously terminated in the near future.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 1:29 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


George looks delighted in this picture.
posted by 2bucksplus at 1:29 PM on October 30, 2012 [18 favorites]


The plunder of our childhoods is now complete.
posted by never used baby shoes at 1:29 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


> ...we're planning to release Star Wars Episode 7 – the first feature film under the "Disney-Lucasfilm" brand. That will be followed by Episodes 8 and 9 – and our long term plan is to release a new Star Wars feature film every two to three years.

By that do they mean Episode 7 in 2015, then 8 & 9 in 2017 and 2019, then done? Or are they planning on milking that Jedi money forever by continually releasing new films?

I'd be OK with a remake of the sequels, actually.
posted by Panjandrum at 1:30 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


One bad thing: Lucas was pretty chill about fan material. I can't imagine Disney allowing something like this to stick around.
posted by dirigibleman at 1:30 PM on October 30, 2012 [8 favorites]


Or, y'know, the crowdsourced versions of entire feature films.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 1:31 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


HERE COMES THE CONFERENCE CALL.
posted by boo_radley at 1:31 PM on October 30, 2012


To borrow from another science fiction franchise:

There are three Star Wars films, three.
posted by tommasz at 1:31 PM on October 30, 2012


Now this image from 2010 makes a lot more sense: George-Lucas-Disney.jpg

I don't know why, but that photo gives me a certain sense of abject horror and creepiness. It's not like seeing actors in (black|yellow)-face, but something just doesn't seem right.

Fingers crossed that Disney will treat Star Wars as a separate entity and not try to blend things too much.
posted by CancerMan at 1:32 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


And it's probably best to not even jokingly speculate about the Star Wars Holiday Special Reimagined...
posted by Wordshore at 1:32 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


George looks delighted in this picture.

I think the other guy has a taser pointed at Lucas' nuts
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 1:32 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


My son will be 5 or 6 when the new movie comes out.

Super psyched.
posted by robocop is bleeding at 1:32 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Oh hey and Community's back.

You nerds love this shit
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 1:32 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


Oh sh%t. This means the Ewoks are coming back, doesn't it?
posted by Blue_Villain at 1:32 PM on October 30, 2012


Death Stars.
posted by Joey Michaels at 1:33 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


I'm just going to leave this Disney Dance Off with the Star Wars Stars video here...

...and yeah, they were already doing this every year...
posted by Muddler at 1:33 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


Wait. This means StarTours gets bumped to the top tier of canon in the Holocron Database, doesn't it? Except it won't be G-Level any more, will it? Leland Chee will have to start calling it D-Level?

On Preview, what shakespeherian and yasaman said.
posted by radwolf76 at 1:33 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


This means the Ewoks are coming back, doesn't it?

Yub nub!
posted by Gary at 1:33 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


LFL actually wrestled itself into a place where they have coherent management of the Star Wars universe after a lot of trial and error. It doesn't make Art but it allows for a large body of work to coexist and takes contradictions and revisions into account. I think that's probably dead, which I have mixed feelings about.
posted by mobunited at 1:33 PM on October 30, 2012


The prospect of a new "official" Star Wars movie is exciting as heck, I don't care how terrible it ends up being--I am hopefully optimistic that it will completely destroy.

An argument could be made that you're everything wrong with the world today. Wouldn't take much convincing for me to agree with it.
posted by dobbs at 1:34 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Pretty sure Disney only bought LFL to find out how to get Walt out of carbon freezing.
posted by Legomancer at 1:34 PM on October 30, 2012 [10 favorites]


"Thank you for joining this conference call. We wanted to have this conference call because of Disney's purchase of LucasArts earlier this morning. We moved quickly on this deal because George was high as a kite on oxycontin."

Wow, these calls are amazing.
posted by boo_radley at 1:34 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


With the animated Star Wars the Clone Wars, I already though Disney owned the franchise, in spirit at least.

This is really only an exchange of money and a realignment of profits and royalties.
posted by thetoken at 1:35 PM on October 30, 2012


Mace Windu didn't die, he just got a job at SHIELD.
posted by FJT at 1:35 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


One bad thing: Lucas was pretty chill about fan material. I can't imagine Disney allowing something like this to stick around.

Of course not.

Prepare yourself for RvD2: Ryan vs. Dorkman starring Kurt Russel.
posted by mazola at 1:36 PM on October 30, 2012


Disney Vault producer in charge of remastering and producing "Diamond Edition" releases of the new franchise looks at the recent and ongoing George Lucas "improvements", narrows her eyes, cracks her neck... "Not on MY watch, sonny-jim. It's the Extras Disk for YOU."
posted by Slap*Happy at 1:36 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


One bad thing: Lucas was pretty chill about fan material.

There goes my "Indiana Jones and the Air Pirates" fan film.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 1:36 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


MetaFilter: Really only an exchange of money and a realignment of profits and royalties.
posted by modernnomad at 1:36 PM on October 30, 2012


Kingdom Hearts: A New Hope.
posted by robocop is bleeding at 1:36 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


Anyone who still has affection for Lucasfilm after the past 10 years obviously already has the stomach for the kind of punishment that this news portends.

What I'm saying is, the time to cut your losses on the StarWars franchise was May 1998. You stuck around after that, that shit's on you. The way to make sure no more Star Wars shit gets made is to stop buying Star Wars shit, people.
posted by gauche at 1:36 PM on October 30, 2012 [10 favorites]


boo_radley: "Wow, these calls are amazing."

Jeez, honestly though it's like listening to a vampire's thoughts while he's eating your blood.
posted by boo_radley at 1:36 PM on October 30, 2012 [7 favorites]


I'm actually excited about this because I think it finally killed whatever was left of my nostalgic longing for the person I used to be, the person who was really into "Star Wars" stuff.

I...can move on now.

I'm free.

Free.
posted by infinitywaltz at 1:37 PM on October 30, 2012 [17 favorites]


OH GOD NOW I CAN'T STOP THINKING ABOUT BRAD BIRD GRIM FANDANGO FUCK FUCK FUCK

And this is bad for...some reason, I assume.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 1:37 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


infinitywaltz: "I...can move on now.

I'm free.

Free.
"

Soon you will shed your neckbeard and have the urge to do squats. Do not supress this urge.
posted by boo_radley at 1:37 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


So now we know the price for your fondest childhood memories.
posted by Old'n'Busted at 1:38 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


I'm readying my pitch for American Graffiti II: Golden Years Orlando right now
posted by Capt. Renault at 1:38 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


My dreams of a ensemble flick staring Donald Duck, Yoda, Kermit, Winne-the-Pooh, Tinkerbell and special guest Nick Fury are closer than ever.
posted by samhyland at 1:39 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


I've got a bad feeling about this.
posted by cupcake1337 at 1:40 PM on October 30, 2012


Capt. Renault: "I'm readying my pitch for American Graffiti II: Golden Years Orlando right now"

THX 1139: Neverending Summer
posted by boo_radley at 1:40 PM on October 30, 2012 [7 favorites]


Oh, no! What will we do if Disney ruins the "Star Wars" franchise?

Ho ho. But Clone Wars is very good, and as noted above probably either going to end or at least move to Disney XD.
posted by Artw at 1:40 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


From what I hear Mark Hamill is still under contract. He better get his ass to the gym.
posted by mobunited at 1:40 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


OH GOD NOW I CAN'T STOP THINKING ABOUT BRAD BIRD GRIM FANDANGO FUCK FUCK FUCK

Let me fix that for you: They could give the movie to Andrew Stanton.

Grim Fandango, A Fighting Man of Mars to open in 2018.
posted by robocop is bleeding at 1:40 PM on October 30, 2012


Yes I am quite sure that is what they plan to do after paying four billion dollars for it

I was saying that was what it needs, not what it will get. Obviously, they will keep it dancing until it falls to pieces.
posted by never used baby shoes at 1:41 PM on October 30, 2012


Given what's happened with Marvel, in film and on TV at least, I'm actually kind of hopeful about this.
posted by Artw at 1:41 PM on October 30, 2012 [9 favorites]


This is one of the few cases where a film maker selling out makes me feel better about the franchise. Please let the Pixar people run Star Wars. (Note, George Lucas started Pixar)
posted by empath at 1:42 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


I'm still somewhat fuzzy on US politics (being English), but isn't this the kind of thing you stop using your Supreme Court of president-appointed judges?
posted by Wordshore at 1:42 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


Star Wars Episode VII: The Return on the Trade Federation's Economic Embargo
posted by Joey Michaels at 1:42 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


From what I hear Mark Hamill is still under contract. He better get his ass to the gym.

The long term contract I had signed
Says I'll be making these movies til the end of time
With my Yoda. Yo-yo-yo-Yoda.
posted by radwolf76 at 1:42 PM on October 30, 2012 [21 favorites]


Grim Fandango, A Fighting Man of Mars to open in 2018.

It's been retitled "Grim", or "Fan", or "2018".
posted by Artw at 1:42 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


BREAKING: CHRISTOPHER NOLAN TO HELM HOWARD THE DUCK REBOOT?
posted by The Card Cheat at 1:42 PM on October 30, 2012 [7 favorites]


Greg Nog: OH GOD NOW I CAN'T STOP THINKING ABOUT BRAD BIRD GRIM FANDANGO FUCK FUCK FUCK

Some MeFite must have his email address right? Can we ask him if he'd consider it? I won't be able to sleep until I hear he's at least thinking about it.
posted by Rock Steady at 1:43 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


... buy on VHS, buy again on DVD, buy the video game for, buy in toy form in every expression that injection-molding can dream of, buy again in lego form...

You left out the Lego video game!
posted by ijoyner at 1:43 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


Guy on the conference call just said that Darth Vader will be chained to a basketball court in Tokyo Disneyland next to some stairs so visitors can dunk on him forever
posted by theodolite at 1:43 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


Given what's happened with Marvel, in film and on TV at least, I'm actually kind of hopeful about this.

If Joss Whedon ends up running Star Wars those T-shirts Scott Kurtz put out are going to turn unbearably ironic.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 1:43 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


I'm still somewhat fuzzy on US politics (being English), but isn't this the kind of thing you stop using your Supreme Court of president-appointed judges?

Yeah, the Supreme Court doesn't really care if you have a monopoly on bad children's character's though. I mean, they never went after Hanna Barbera in the 70s...
posted by FJT at 1:44 PM on October 30, 2012


BREAKING: CHRISTOPHER NOLAN TO HELM HOWARD THE DUCK REBOOT?

See, that I'd watch.
posted by infinitywaltz at 1:44 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Oh hey and Community's back.

You nerds love this shit


Metafilter is where I get all my entertainment news. No joke.
posted by mrgrimm at 1:45 PM on October 30, 2012


Worst case scenario: Wall-E II, directed by George Lucas
posted by Joey Michaels at 1:45 PM on October 30, 2012 [9 favorites]


You guys think George Lucas isn't human, is immune to all the deafening nerd-hate he's gotten? You think that shit hasn't caused him pain for the past few years? It's not even about the money. He's more than willing to just jettison the whole franchise because he's exhausted from the pitchfork-and-torches brigade.
posted by naju at 1:45 PM on October 30, 2012 [9 favorites]


That Disney is purchasing LucasFilm is neither shocking nor particularly newsworthy (though I'm somewhat surprised that Lucas is selling). That they intend to make a seventh Star Wars movie is fairly big news, though. It's also very likely bad news.
posted by asnider at 1:46 PM on October 30, 2012


Things my 6yr old daughter is really, really into:
The Avengers
Spiderman
Tinkerbell
Pixar movies
Disney movies
Star Wars

Outside of Batman and Dracula its like a lock...

Hmmm...Maybe we should by stock or something?
posted by Artw at 1:46 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


Cmon like they would have anyone other than Tim Burton do Grim Fandango
posted by theodolite at 1:46 PM on October 30, 2012


"Starring Shia LaBeouf and Hannah Montana as Jacen and Jaina Solo!"

(oh who am I kidding, I'd still watch it.)
posted by Catseye at 1:46 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


With Pixar at the helm, expect to see a lot more of Rebel Force Major Derlin.
posted by Gary at 1:46 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


I'm looking forward to taking my kids to a new Star Wars movie.

As for the quality, it can't be worse than episode I, and could be much, much better. Disney sometimes does good work and the Pixar people are great.
posted by Area Man at 1:46 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Atreides: Also, I guess this makes Leia a Disney Princess? You know, a Disney Princess with a blaster?

I'm dying to hear Carrie Fisher's comment on the Disney Princess thing. It might even top her Pez dispenser riff.

East Manitoba: It's worth noting that this line means: George Lucas will not be directing the new Star Wars movie.

And that's a good thing because Lucas did not do final scriptwriting or direction of the two best films in the series (and possibly didn't create the final cut of the first). Kasdan, Kershner, and Marquand deserve a lot more credit for Empire and Jedi than they tend to get.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 1:46 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


Metafilter: Those were "FUCK"s of joy!
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 1:46 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Unnamed Joss Whedon Star Wars Bounty Hunter Project.
posted by Artw at 1:47 PM on October 30, 2012 [10 favorites]


The idea of the Star Wars film universe being like the James Bond franchise, just kicking out a movie every couple of years whether people want them or not... I'm sorry, but that doesn't really sound like the worst thing in the world to me. It's always been better without the bullshit of expectations, so why the f not?
posted by MCMikeNamara at 1:47 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


So the Henson Company, Pixar, Marvel, LucasFilm. The middleweight mythopoeic champs of the American century. Who's next? Who's left?
posted by Iridic at 1:48 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


High School Musical VII: Prom Knight
posted by argonauta at 1:49 PM on October 30, 2012


Who's next? Who's left?

Prediction: Time Warner buys Star Trek franchise as a counter move, touches off Multi-verse War of '13.
posted by FJT at 1:49 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


Unnamed Josh Whedon Star Wars Bounty Hunter Project.

I know the edit window will disappear Artw's typo, but for one brief moment I imagined an entire career for Joss's heretofore unknown twin brother, Josh, who walked away from a lucrative pool cleaning career to direct movies produced by inattentive studio execs.
posted by robocop is bleeding at 1:50 PM on October 30, 2012 [13 favorites]


Dammit! Bob Iger just said they also bought the treatment from Lucas for films 7-9.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!
posted by thecjm at 1:50 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


My dreams of a ensemble flick staring Donald Duck, Yoda, Kermit, Winne-the-Pooh, Tinkerbell and special guest Nick Fury are closer than ever.

Someone up above already made the Kingdom Hearts joke.
posted by JHarris at 1:51 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Does Disney get Guybrush Threepwood too?

The press release says they got LucasArts, so yes. Yes they do.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 1:51 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


George Lucas will not be directing the new Star Wars movie.


The Emperor does not share your optimistic appraisal of the situation.
posted by Darth George Lucas at 1:51 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


It looks like LucasArts is included in the sale, yes.
posted by kmz at 1:51 PM on October 30, 2012


I wonder if Disney will have any interest in pursuing the mythical "the scripts are all written!" "dark" hour long Star Wars tv show. Given that they wish to proceed on a SHIELD show, this doesn't sound too remote an idea. Granted, they ditch the scripts and start from scratch.
posted by Atreides at 1:52 PM on October 30, 2012


thecjm: Dammit! Bob Iger just said they also bought the treatment from Lucas for films 7-9.

Yes, just like Indiana Jones made sure the Ark of the Covenant was well taken care of.
posted by Rock Steady at 1:52 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


Who's left?


Almost all the companies producing the next generation of myths: Valve, Bungie, Square, Bethesda, etc, etc.
posted by empath at 1:52 PM on October 30, 2012 [10 favorites]


So the Henson Company, Pixar, Marvel, LucasFilm. The middleweight mythopoeic champs of the American century. Who's next? Who's left?

The Henson company is still independent and owned by the Henson family, along with most of Jim's post-Muppet work.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 1:53 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


Who's next? Who's left?

Howdy partner
posted by Joey Michaels at 1:53 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


Another step to the end of cultural America. Comes 2016, America's first Trillionaire President Mittens Romney will be stumping for re-election, wearing a t-shirt of his recently acquired DisneyLucasAppleDreamWorks mega-entertainment corporation while shouting "Death Stars are people too, my friend."
posted by Wordshore at 1:53 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


I'm looking forward to the Sarlacc Ride at EuroDisney!
posted by The Card Cheat at 1:53 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


Atreides: "I wonder if Disney will have any interest in pursuing the mythical "the scripts are all written!" "dark" hour long Star Wars tv show. Given that they wish to proceed on a SHIELD show, this doesn't sound too remote an idea. Granted, they ditch the scripts and start from scratch."

This sounds like a possibility from the call, but they're focused on films.
posted by boo_radley at 1:53 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


So instead of the 20th Century Fox intro we'll get the Disney castle logo? I have confused feels about that.
posted by Esteemed Offendi at 1:54 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


The Emperor does not share your optimistic appraisal of the situation.

I find your lack of faith disturbing
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 1:54 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


$4 billion seems kind of cheap.
posted by MegoSteve at 1:57 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


So I plan on withholding my ultimate judgment on whether or not this is a good thing until I figure out if I'll live long enough for them to create an actual-sized Death Star to float in orbit over the Magic Kingdom.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 1:57 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


The Henson company is still independent and owned by the Henson family, along with most of Jim's post-Muppet work.

Yes, but Disney owns all Muppet-related trademarks, including the word “Muppet”.
posted by Thorzdad at 1:57 PM on October 30, 2012


I find his lack of faith entirely reasonable
posted by saturday_morning at 1:57 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Han Solo Meets The Punisher
posted by Yakuman at 1:58 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Deadpool Kills the Star Wars Universe
posted by robocop is bleeding at 2:00 PM on October 30, 2012 [8 favorites]


The universe will fold in on itself after Disney commercializes the franchise further by making a line of toys of other Star Wars toys.
posted by starman at 2:00 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


I think Lucas is a better creative consultant that directory. This may produce good movies.
posted by zzazazz at 2:02 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


I hope Boba Fett gets plenty of screen time.

Also, I'm realizing that I'll be in my thirties when the Episode IX comes out, ugh.
posted by A Bad Catholic at 2:02 PM on October 30, 2012


I'm just gonna throw this out there:
Extreme Makeover: Epcot Center/Deathstar Edition
posted by Atom Eyes at 2:02 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


One thing I'd like to point out: Disney bought LucasFilm/Arts/ILM/etc. for a shade over $4 billion. The Company Star Wars Built was (and will be, until the deal goes through) wholly owned by George Lucas. All four billion dollars go to him.

Daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaang.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 2:02 PM on October 30, 2012 [8 favorites]


Star Wars has always been weird. Are the stars warring? How can they, they're stars.

Plus - Stah Wahs? Store Wores?

Weird.
posted by Sebmojo at 2:02 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


From the conference call - encumbrances from Fox and Paramount to Disney re-release of Star Wars and Indiana Jones movies on home video, respectively. So no Disney-vaulting just yet.

This is also the first I'm hearing that they got Indy too.
posted by thecjm at 2:03 PM on October 30, 2012


First thought: Disney is worried they might not get that next copyright extension and are trying to diversify.

Second thought: my first thought was a naive attempt to invent an interesting narrative.
posted by Lorc at 2:03 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


Space princess acquired! Yet another sign of the increasing power and ambition of Disney's Department of Princess Diversity.
posted by oulipian at 2:03 PM on October 30, 2012 [7 favorites]


I guess Star Trek is pretty dead at the moment, except for the movie which seems to sit in isolation.
posted by Artw at 2:03 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


I wonder if this means we might actually someday see the planned live-action series.
posted by kagredon at 2:04 PM on October 30, 2012


Star Wars Episode VII: Toy Story 4
posted by oulipian at 2:05 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


Maybe after they make 7-9, we can retcon 1-3 and do a full remake.
posted by amuseDetachment at 2:06 PM on October 30, 2012


Verge reports that ILM and Skywalker Sound are also part of the deal. That is huge! Disney has gained a huge foothold in the industry by snatching up these post facilities.
posted by raihan_ at 2:07 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


It sounds like Disney are going to remaster with more contemporary music.
posted by Wordshore at 2:07 PM on October 30, 2012


I know it's too soon to be speculating, since the ink isn't even dry yet, but I have my fingers crossed that they're going to adapt the Thrawn trilogy into screenplays for episodes 7-9.
posted by radwolf76 at 2:07 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


Kind of interested to see what's possible with ILM and Pixar under one roof, though (actually, I wondered if maybe getting ILM was the whole point.)
posted by kagredon at 2:07 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


> Maybe after they make 7-9, we can retcon 1-3 and do a full remake.

GET OUT OF MY HEAD
posted by Panjandrum at 2:08 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Oh jeeez, just what we need more consolidation. I guess this means no more wall-to-wall star wars on spike-tv now too.
posted by NiteMayr at 2:08 PM on October 30, 2012


Iger said that they want ILM and Skywalker Sound to continue working as normal.

Also just said that they didn't even try to put a value on the Indiana Jones property due to how tied it is to Paramount.
posted by thecjm at 2:08 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Maybe after they make 7-9, we can retcon 1-3 and do a full remake.

I'm on board for that.

I guess Star Trek is pretty dead at the moment, except for the movie which seems to sit in isolation.

They won't kick out a new Trek series until they feel it won't detract from the millions the rebooted franchise brings in. We get Trek 2 next year, May 2013 (shaping up to be a pretty cool month). I'd wager there might be another movie after that before series discussion gets hot.
posted by Atreides at 2:08 PM on October 30, 2012


Star Wars has always been weird. Are the stars warring? How can they, they're stars.

I'm just so tired of all these star wars.
posted by infinitywaltz at 2:09 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


I guess Disney had to buy Lucas/Star Wars after both Tron Legacy and John Carter didn't do so well...
posted by FJT at 2:09 PM on October 30, 2012


Apple, Google or Mixrosift buys it all and platform locks it.
posted by Artw at 2:10 PM on October 30, 2012


This is also the first I'm hearing that they got Indy too.

Interestingly enough, the deal does not seem to include Chuck the Plant which Lucas has retained ownership of for as yet unrevealed purposes.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 2:10 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


From what I hear Mark Hamill is still under contract. He better get his ass to the gym.

The long-term contract I had to sign, says I'll be making these movies 'till the end of time, oh my Yoda...
posted by Melismata at 2:11 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


John Carter left me feeling like I'd watch Star Wars for the first time again. Sweet movie.
posted by Atreides at 2:11 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


Re: the "low" valuation for Lucasfilm. Disney doesn't get the video rights for SW 1-6; it's tied up by Fox. Doesn't get Indiana Jones movies; it's tied up by Paramount. The gaming division is a mess. And who knows how tied up the merchandising rights are. Basically, they spent $4 billion for the right to make new Star Wars movies, a nice post-production sound editing studio, and a top special effects studio.
posted by thecjm at 2:13 PM on October 30, 2012 [13 favorites]



You guys think George Lucas isn't human, is immune to all the deafening nerd-hate he's gotten? You think that shit hasn't caused him pain for the past few years? It's not even about the money. He's more than willing to just jettison the whole franchise because he's exhausted from the pitchfork-and-torches brigade.

That is entirely possible, and I have said before on mefi that at some level after growing up a nerd he must be aware he went from beloved nerd hero to reviled hack by those same people. I am sure he has a lot of yes-men around him but he cannot be entirely insulated from the world.

So yes, if it were me, a decade and change of vilification might cause me to cash in my chips and go home, too. Cashing them in for four billion might take some of the sting out of it.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 2:13 PM on October 30, 2012


$4 billion seems kind of cheap.

Well, look at the almost pure hate for everything Lucas has been involved with, since the first three Star Wars movies. I think, considering how despised his work has become, $4 billion might be too much money, not too little.

It also shows that his first wife was probably the person who made the original films work -- as soon as she was gone, everything he did started to suck.

I mean -- think about it a minute. Disney bought Lucasfilm. Disney. Scumbag central. Nasty, nasty outfit. And the Mefi reaction? Cautious optimism.

Disney overpaid.
posted by Malor at 2:13 PM on October 30, 2012 [8 favorites]


Begun this rebranding has.
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 2:15 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


Looking at Lucas' wikipedia page, I hadn't heard about this:

"In June 2012, it was announced that producer Kathleen Kennedy, a long-term collaborator with Steven Spielberg and a producer of the Indiana Jones films, had been appointed as co-chair of Lucasfilm Ltd. It was reported that Kennedy would work alongside Lucas, who would remain chief executive and serve as co-chairman for at least one year, after which she would succeed him as the company's sole leader."

Or...not, apparently. Ouch. (Yes she's still "President of Lucasfilm," but she reports to Disney.)
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 2:16 PM on October 30, 2012


One thing I'd like to point out: Disney bought LucasFilm/Arts/ILM/etc. for a shade over $4 billion. The Company Star Wars Built was (and will be, until the deal goes through) wholly owned by George Lucas. All four billion dollars go to him.

Doesn't he have an ex or two? IIRC, he made "Howard the Duck" because he had to make alimony payments.
posted by Melismata at 2:16 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


I don't know, "pure hate" and all aside, "Star Wars" still sells a lot of merchandise. People who vote with their wallets buy a lot of Darth Vader paraphernalia, regardless of what people say about Jar-Jar Binks.
posted by infinitywaltz at 2:17 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


Plenty of Star Wars stuff in the toy aisles of Wal-Mart, for example.
posted by Atreides at 2:18 PM on October 30, 2012


So, how much of Frank Oz's work does Disney now own?
posted by ckape at 2:19 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


Plenty of Star Wars stuff in the toy aisles of Wal-Mart

One aisle over, IT'S A TARP!
posted by zippy at 2:20 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


Apple, Google or Mixrosift buys it all and platform locks it.

It'd get Google out of having to pay licensing fees for the Droid trademark.
posted by radwolf76 at 2:21 PM on October 30, 2012


BREAKING: FIRST DRAFT OF DISNEY'S STAR WARS: EPISODE 7 LEAKED.

Hmm. Seems it's just 2 hours of thinly veiled anti-semitism. Watto & the Toydarians features heavily.
posted by Effigy2000 at 2:22 PM on October 30, 2012


Friend has observed:

"Disney own Marvel. They own the Muppets. They own Star Wars. Get ready for Spider-Man Meets Darth Kermit!"
posted by Wordshore at 2:22 PM on October 30, 2012


the deal does not seem to include Chuck the Plant which Lucas has retained ownership of for as yet unrevealed purposes.

Lucas probably wants to branch out.
posted by zippy at 2:23 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


Here is why I am optimistic about this: yes, Disney wants money and to market and maximize earnings and all that. But one way in which Disney's greed parts ways from other major studios is this: Disney doesnt want to make a quick $200 at the summer box office on a hyped-up crappy flick where the dust settles and no one cares anymore.
Disney wants to make that $200 million sure, but they also want to milk the thing for decades after. And you can't really do that with a crappy product no one cares about.
Disney may be money-driven, but they pay for quality and have a very long track record of providing well-written, well-directed, well-told stories to get there.
posted by Senor Cardgage at 2:24 PM on October 30, 2012 [8 favorites]


If anything can bring Walt Disney's cryogenically frozen head back to life, it is the Force.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 2:24 PM on October 30, 2012


FFFUUUUUU
posted by New England Cultist at 2:26 PM on October 30, 2012


Disney/Star Wars recovered memory:

Back in the day, when Star Wars was first released, my parents wanted to take the family to it.

I had a temper tantrum because I wanted to see Disney's The Boatniks instead, which had been re-released.

I lost the argument that day. I never did wind up seeing The Boatniks, though I've seen Star Wars a billion times since then.

This has been another repressed memory brought to you by mazola.
posted by mazola at 2:26 PM on October 30, 2012 [9 favorites]


If anything can bring Walt Disney's cryogenically frozen head back to life, it is the Force.

Only if Disney had a high enough midichlorian count.
posted by Atreides at 2:26 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Only if Disney had a high enough midichlorian count.

A what now?
posted by entropicamericana at 2:27 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


Rubber tree!
posted by faustdick at 2:28 PM on October 30, 2012


Lucas probably wants to branch out.

I just hope he now has enough money now to fix that out of order staircase in the library and buy some gasoline for his chainsaw.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 2:28 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


Disney may be money-driven, but they pay for quality and have a very long track record of providing well-written, well-directed, well-told stories to get there.

Disney pays for quality IP. Once they have a good property, they will run it into the ground shamelessly. Cars 2, DTV sequels and spin-offs of everything under the sun, etc. etc.

Star Wars already prints money. That skips the "create something awesome" step in the Disney model.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 2:29 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]



Thought cascade...

3. They bought it for the guano mining rights
2. Final proof, after the iPad mini with Maps, that Steve Jobs really is dead
1. Someone just gave George $4bn. I have a bad feeling about this...
posted by Devonian at 2:29 PM on October 30, 2012


Senor Cardgage: " And you can't really do that with a crappy product no one cares about."

Counterpoint.

Also did you know? Angelica Huston is in those dreadful tinkerbell direct to dvd movies.
posted by boo_radley at 2:30 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


"Says right here on the spine: THE COMPLETE SAGA!" Fans at TheForce.net's Jedi Council dealing with the news.
posted by muckster at 2:30 PM on October 30, 2012


Someone just gave George $4bn. I have a bad feeling about this...

President Lucas.
posted by robocop is bleeding at 2:31 PM on October 30, 2012


Disney pays for quality IP. Once they have a good property, they will run it into the ground shamelessly. Cars 2, DTV sequels and spin-offs of everything under the sun, etc. etc.


Cars is what it is and we already have the DTV and spinoffs. Might as well have the quality feature films too.
posted by Senor Cardgage at 2:31 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Disney may be money-driven, but they pay for quality and have a very long track record of providing well-written, well-directed, well-told stories to get there.

Eh hem, Cars 2. Pixar is a merch-selling company now, the films are just the vehicle to market them.


Also, does anyone know what it means now that ILM belongs to Disney?
posted by Vysharra at 2:31 PM on October 30, 2012


It's not like the first Cars was some kind of artistic masterpiece.
posted by 2bucksplus at 2:32 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


It just hit me - oh god, if they make Yoda break out in song one time...

"When Upon The Force You Wish..."
posted by Greg_Ace at 2:32 PM on October 30, 2012 [8 favorites]


Eh hem, Cars 2. Pixar is a merch-selling company now, the films are just the vehicle to market them.

As evidenced by those soulless marketing juggernauts Brave and Ratatouille.
And if I see one more little kid in a Wall•E costume this Halloween I swear I am gonna lose it!

Or wait...maybe typing words doesnt make them true, necessarily.
posted by Senor Cardgage at 2:33 PM on October 30, 2012 [10 favorites]


Also, does anyone know what it means now that ILM belongs to Disney?

It means Disney owns ILM.
posted by rocketman at 2:34 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


Fool me once, shame on you.

Fool me I, II, III, VI, and VII...
posted by mazola at 2:35 PM on October 30, 2012


Might as well have the quality feature films too.

We already have those. You assume Disney is going to make a sequel or spin-off that is worth a damn, and the only precedent there would be Toy Story 2 and 3, versus a long, long line of cheap-and-easy cash-ins.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 2:36 PM on October 30, 2012


Ok, here's what I don't understand. Why can't we just invent some new stories or characters?! Let's milk for all they're worth and reboot Star Trek. Spider Man. Superman. James Bond. Let's put reruns of For Better or For Worse on the comics pages. I feel so sorry for young people who have brilliant, creative ideas, because there's no room for them.
posted by Melismata at 2:36 PM on October 30, 2012 [9 favorites]


Might mean cheaper FX work due to being in-house?
posted by Atreides at 2:36 PM on October 30, 2012


(Ok, yeah, I do understand, it's money, but still...)
posted by Melismata at 2:37 PM on October 30, 2012


We already have those. You assume Disney is going to make a sequel or spin-off that is worth a damn, and the only precedent there would be Toy Story 2 and 3, versus a long, long line of cheap-and-easy cash-ins.

We also have the Marvel franchise to work off of.
posted by Atreides at 2:37 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Over 200 comments, and no Adm. Ackbar reference? Really, people.
posted by gimonca at 2:38 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


.
posted by Aquaman at 2:39 PM on October 30, 2012


I feel like, after the prequel trilogy, there's literally no way this could result in WORSE Star Wars movies.
posted by DoctorFedora at 2:40 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


I wonder if this changes any of the license deals with LEGO. Disney now owns 3 of franchises that LEGO has (Marvel, Star Wars, and PIXAR).
posted by FJT at 2:40 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Over 200 comments, and no Adm. Ackbar reference? Really, people.
*Ahem.*
posted by radwolf76 at 2:40 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


Worst-case scenario: Lucas uses the proceeds to buy AMC and assume personal control of original programming.
posted by COBRA! at 2:40 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


BTW, even Cars (lackluster as it is) isnt as bad as most major blockbusters.
If Cars selling a billion dollars worth of toys helps the mouse fund something as sublime as Ratatouille, then I dont mind ignoring Cars and its place in the world.
posted by Senor Cardgage at 2:43 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


THIS MEANS MORE MUPPETS YOU GUYS
posted by Sys Rq at 2:43 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


If I were Obama I would take full credit for this October surprise.
posted by Che boludo! at 2:45 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


This is going to be one big 3d crapfest. Nooooooooooo

I loved the original because it was so innovative with the special effects. I better see boom mikes and wires in 2015!
posted by stormpooper at 2:45 PM on October 30, 2012


Over 200 comments, and no Adm. Ackbar reference?

It's a Parent Trap!!
posted by Atom Eyes at 2:46 PM on October 30, 2012 [30 favorites]


hellojed:
Pixar presents: Grim Fandango.
You guys think it's a joke but Pixar announced an Untitled Día de los Muertos film directed by Lee Unkrich a few months ago.
posted by whittaker at 2:46 PM on October 30, 2012 [8 favorites]


For everyone talking about a Pixar Grim Fandango movie... Pixar announced some time back that they were doing a movie based on Dia de los Muertos with Lee Unkrich at the helm. If LucasArts is part of this deal, the chance of it happening is, I would guess, astronomical. In fact, I wonder if this has been in the cards for a while, and Pixar/Disney put that in the chute as something along the lines of "Untitled DDLM Project" to be rebranded as Grim Fandango once all the paperwork was finished. You heard it here first, folks.
posted by phong3d at 2:47 PM on October 30, 2012 [7 favorites]


It will be interesting to see if episode VII uses any of the (many, many, many) existing Expanded Universe post-ROTJ plots/characters, or completely disregards (and de-canons(?)) them and comes up with something new. Or even if it will be live-action or Clone Wars-style CGI (three years seems like cutting it fine for a full live-action film with the level of effects and production required for a Star Wars sequel).
posted by EndsOfInvention at 2:50 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


Hey doesnt 2015 seem like a pretty rushed target date?
posted by Che boludo! at 2:52 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


As evidenced by those soulless marketing juggernauts Brave and Ratatouille.

Ratatouille was released in 2007, probably finished before the acquisition. If you account for the 3 years it takes to finish a Pixar film, then Wall-E and Up were written and in production before the acquisition.

What are the next films, the ones solely under Disney control? Toy Story 3, Cars 2 and Brave. A lot of people enjoyed Brave, but it was just a well-made, blandly-likable Disney movie. I will always wonder what made Brenda Chapman finally leave and I imagine it had something to do with that. The fact that it did not offend us doesn't make it a good movie. Brave and Tangled are miles ahead of Sleeping Beauty, but they are definitely princess movies with lots and lots of merchandise.

Monster's University is next, which I'm sure will be entertaining and just chock full of fun new lovable characters (collect them all!).

Pixar, Marvel and LucasFilm are just profitable properties for Disney to exploit.
posted by Vysharra at 2:52 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


This seems like good news. They have a good backbone for a story. Eventually one of their reboots will strike gold.
posted by psycho-alchemy at 2:53 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Hey doesnt 2015 seem like a pretty rushed target date?

Maybe not so rushed if they're taking existing EU novel plots as a starting point?
posted by radwolf76 at 2:53 PM on October 30, 2012


These aren't the droids you're looking for. Sadly, I don't know where they are either. So long, George. Enjoy the cash while you can.
posted by Lynsey at 2:54 PM on October 30, 2012


Yes, if there's a pure story untainted by merchandising out there, it is certainly Star Wars.
posted by entropicamericana at 2:55 PM on October 30, 2012 [7 favorites]


Well, you have Monster U, and then the untitled Dinosaur movie and the Untitled Movie That Takes Place Entirely Inside a Girl's Head, not to mention the Untitled movie talked about above.

I think 2 years is enough time to put together a good film. Whedon took over Avengers (rewrote the thing basically) in 2010, production began in 2011, and it was released last May. I think some people enjoyed that movie.
posted by Atreides at 2:56 PM on October 30, 2012


Hey doesnt 2015 seem like a pretty rushed target date?

It does to me.

May 2015 is 31 months away. Even if they did a straight adaptation of an EU novel, that is not a lot of time to put together an extremely effects-heavy tentpole movie.
posted by Egg Shen at 3:00 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Toy Story movies arent allowed to be excellent films because they are based on pre-existing characters that they themselves created.

Gotcha.

BTW Wiki lists upcoming Pixar films and besides Monsters University (which OMGz they arent brand new characters thus it cant possibly be a quality film) they have The Good Dinosaur, The Untitled Pixar Movie that Takes You Inside the Mind, and The Untitled Pixar Movie About Día de los Muertos.

Disney must be salivating over all those unipolar neuron toys they are going to sell!
posted by Senor Cardgage at 3:00 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


As a wee teenager I sat through episode 1 in the cinema, cringed at the horrible attempts at banter between Neeson and McGregor, and thought "Christ, they shoulda let Whedon write this."

Please please please let me get what I want.
posted by ominous_paws at 3:00 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


"The last Star Wars movie release was 2005's Revenge of the Sith – and we believe there's substantial pent up demand. In 2015, we're planning to release Star Wars Episode 7 – the first feature film under the "Disney-Lucasfilm" brand. That will be followed by Episodes 8 and 9 – and our long term plan is to release a new Star Wars feature film every two to three years."

So, is it going to be like Bond? They'll just keep going past episode 9?
posted by Area Man at 3:01 PM on October 30, 2012


A lot of people enjoyed Brave, but it was just a well-made, blandly-likable Disney movie. I will always wonder what made Brenda Chapman finally leave and I imagine it had something to do with that.

Zing!

And look where she ended up working next. Fancy that.
posted by panboi at 3:02 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


So, is it going to be like Bond? They'll just keep going past episode 9?


I could see it becoming like one of those Japanese film series you'd always read about in Guinness books when you were a kid. The ones that had like 40 sequels over several decades.
posted by Senor Cardgage at 3:02 PM on October 30, 2012


Pixar
Marvel
Lucasfilm
Nintendo

It is inevitable.
posted by oulipian at 3:03 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


Color me intrigued for the potential there. I personally find the Star Wars universe to be more... coherent than the Marvel one, and arguably better suited for film. In the right hands, SW 7-9 could turn out great.
posted by fatehunter at 3:05 PM on October 30, 2012


Pixar
Marvel
Lucasfilm
Nintendo

It is inevitable.


Nah, my money's on Hasbro.
posted by radwolf76 at 3:07 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


I look forward to Leia showing up in Storybrooke. Luke can maybe help Henry with his father/knight-wannabe issues.
posted by maryr at 3:09 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


(OMG, "Henry, I am your father." Writes itself.)
posted by maryr at 3:10 PM on October 30, 2012


Disney pays for quality IP. Once they have a good property, they will run it into the ground shamelessly. Cars 2

I hate to break it to you, but the first Cars movie was... bad.
posted by KokuRyu at 3:11 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


Rats! I was hoping the name of this thread was going to be "Something something as if millions of voices dreams suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced."
posted by sneebler at 3:11 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Please please please let me get what I want.

I don't want to get snarky, but there really has to be more (and lesser known) talent out there than Joss Whedon. I like my geek stuff, but having one guy branded as THE geek director is the quickest way to make it stale.

What about District 9 guy or that guy that directed The Raid or the people that worked on Chronicle?
posted by FJT at 3:12 PM on October 30, 2012 [9 favorites]


I cried like Astro Zombie's girlfriend when I read that press release. At work.
posted by steef at 3:12 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


When you wish upon a death star
Makes no difference who's son you are...
posted by maryr at 3:13 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


Rats! I was hoping the name of this thread was going to be "Something something as if millions of voices dreams suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced."

You'll have to wait until Episode 7 before seeing that.
posted by CancerMan at 3:13 PM on October 30, 2012


Over 200 comments, and no Adm. Ackbar reference?

It's a crap!
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 3:14 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


...py movie.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 3:15 PM on October 30, 2012


sneebler: "Rats! I was hoping the name of this thread was going to be "Something something as if millions of voices dreams suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced.""


"Something something as if millions of dollars suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced."
posted by boo_radley at 3:16 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


Soooo... Indiana Jones/Talespin crossover?
posted by ckape at 3:17 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


A lot of people enjoyed Brave, but it was just a well-made, blandly-likable Disney movie

I see no way in which it is more like a Disney movie than, say, Finding Nemo.
posted by Artw at 3:20 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


Disney called Star Wars an "evergreen" media property today. But the prospect of keeping the Star Wars series going ad infinitum, and expanding it to regions and age groups in which it isn't already well known or loved, is far from a sure bet with consumers. It essentially amounts to wagering that die-hards will continue to flock to anything with the Star Wars name on it, while also betting that new movies will draw a younger generation that didn't grow up on Millenium Falcon references.

Disney can't rely on old intellectual property — it needs Lucasfilm to keep throwing off cash to justify its $4 billion price tag. But with aging cultural cachet (the first Star Wars came out 35 years ago) and a consumer base that has lots of other popular franchises clamoring for its attention, it's hard to think that the marketing machine of a decade ago can keep chugging along at pace. As this chart from Box Office Mojo points out, recent Star Wars movies have underperformed older ones by a significant margin. Why would newer ones, released by Disney, fare any better? ...

If Disney can't keep a parade of Star Wars sequels from suffering diminishing returns, its "evergreen" acquisition may be more like a wilting flower. And if Disney knows it overpaid, or even senses it might have, then burying the news makes all the sense in the world.
posted by Egg Shen at 3:23 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


Disney can't rely on old intellectual property

Except, you know, that string of movies recycled from centuries old fairy tales that pretty much defines their entire core brand.
posted by radwolf76 at 3:28 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


Sam and Max corrupt Tink
posted by edgeways at 3:29 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


It essentially amounts to wagering that die-hards will continue to flock to anything with the Star Wars name on it, while also betting that new movies will draw a younger generation that didn't grow up on Millenium Falcon references.

Yeah...um...I don't even have kids, and I can tell you that kids today really like "Star Wars," as much or possibly even more than we did when we were their age.
posted by infinitywaltz at 3:29 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


that string of movies recycled from centuries old fairy tales

They didn't pay $4 billion for those.
posted by Egg Shen at 3:29 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Snow White and the Seven Jawas
Seethreeppio, the Little Metal Boy
Salacious Crumbo
Wookiee and the Tramp
...
posted by Atom Eyes at 3:31 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Ms. Kennedy will serve as executive producer on new Star Wars feature films

This alone will ensure a new generation of people to hate these movies.
posted by Ideefixe at 3:31 PM on October 30, 2012


Why can't we just invent some new stories or characters?!

Harry Potter? Hunger Games? Twilight? Glee? The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo? Game of Thrones? I mean, sure, none are original like Ulysses or Frankenstein, but neither was Star Wars.
posted by alasdair at 3:31 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


They didn't pay $4 billion for those.

No, but they're old, and Disney relies on them.
posted by radwolf76 at 3:32 PM on October 30, 2012


In a world where buyouts accidentally create movie plots driven by a bankrupted creative culture, Disney is somehow proud to bring you a tale that will make everything you've ever loved puke blood and die of sadness...
posted by tripping daisy at 3:33 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Why is 6 afraid of 7?

Because George Lucas can't leave well enough alone.
posted by robocop is bleeding at 3:35 PM on October 30, 2012 [20 favorites]


This alone will ensure a new generation of people to hate these movies.

What's wrong with Kathleen Kennedy? Thank your maker it's not Rick McCallum.
posted by entropicamericana at 3:35 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


I see this a a bid by Disney to become the first entertainment company to become "To Big To Fail."

John Carter? Bailout!@!
posted by Trochanter at 3:36 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Star Wars VII: The Young Jar Jar Binks Chronicles
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 3:37 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


"Anakin's Freaky Friday"
"Anakin's Deep Impact"
"Anakin's Galaxy Quest"
"Anakin's the Prince of Egypt"
"Anakin's Road Trip"
"Anakin's Almost Famous"
"Anakin's Time Machine"
"Anakin's Road to Perdition"
"Anakin's Biker Boyz"
"Anakin's House of Sand and Fog"
"Anakin's Collateral"
"Anakin's Series of Unfortunate Events"
"Anakin's the Prize Winner of Defiance, OH"
"Anakin's Dreamgirls"
"Anakin's Norbit"
"Anakin's the Heartbreak Kid"
"Anakin's Sweeney Todd: the Demon Barber of Fleet Street"
"Anakin's Tropic Thunder"
"Anakin's Hotel for Dogs"
"Anakin's Paranormal Activity"
"Anakin's Cowboys & Aliens"
"Anakin's Robopocalypse"
posted by Nomyte at 3:40 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Star Wars LXXXVI: The Heat Death of the Universe
posted by never used baby shoes at 3:41 PM on October 30, 2012 [9 favorites]


Shut up before Disney makes a Ulysses cartoon, man.

In space! With a cute robot!
posted by Artw at 3:46 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


Lucas was perfectly willing to sign at the bottom of the page for STAR WARS CARS back when it was an independent company. I foresee no marketing bullshit he wouldn't already do in a heartbeat in addition to the possibility of decent filmmaking.
posted by whittaker at 3:48 PM on October 30, 2012


"Who's the leader of the club that's made for you and me?
J-A-R (Are you taking about me?)
J-A-R (Are people gonna die?)
B-I-N-K-S
Jar Jar Binks! (Boba Fett!)
Jar Jar Binks! (Boba Fett!)"

Etc. etc.
posted by Joey Michaels at 3:50 PM on October 30, 2012 [9 favorites]


Heh, when I saw this headline earlier I just assumed it was a joke.

On the bright side, more Plinkett reviews.
posted by homunculus at 3:50 PM on October 30, 2012


No, but they're old, and Disney relies on them.

They're legendary - which is not the same thing. Luke Skywalker is not a Hercules or Aladdin.

I don't think the writer meant "Disney can't make it without new characters". I think he meant "The revenue deriving from affection for the first two movies is a finite resource."
posted by Egg Shen at 3:52 PM on October 30, 2012


I don't know why I didn't think to check metafilter for news of this sooner.

I was a latecomer to the Star Wars franchise (despite the fact that my username was my family childhood nickname). I never saw the first movie until the Special Editions were released in the theater when I was twelve. And even though there was crappiness that I can recognize in retrospect (Greedo shooting first), I thought it was such a wonderful, hopeful series. Now, as an adult, I can recognize why: the soothing, formulaic, monomyth plotting. The iconic, even stock characters. At twelve, I bought a toy lightsaber and had a battle with my best friend in the Toys R Us parking lot and ate up expanded universe novels.

Even then, it was clear to me that Luke was meant to some day take Obi-wan Kenobi's role in a sequel series. It makes sense, in the over-arcing story, in the predictable, yet satisfying plotting. Even at 12 I was very, very worried it wouldn't happen while Mark Hamill was still alive. Lucas had already started to distance himself from the sequels, claiming he had never planned on making them.

Then the prequels came out and they captured none of the magic of the original films. You know where I've gone for that magic? To stuff like John Carter and old Flash Gordon serials on netflix. It's clear to me that Lucas just doesn't understand that what made Star Wars great wasn't their specificity but their generic, heartwarming, optimistic space magic. It's a story that's kind of in our blood and our veins, unlike the prequels, which are overly convoluted, messy. They don't hit the proper narrative beats and the characters aren't memorable in the way mythic heroes need to be.

Disney's not perfect, but you know what? It's a company that understands iconic, optimistic, even formulaic storytelling. This is the best chance that the movies that I've been waiting to see since I was twelve will ever get made and made halfway to well.

I'm hopeful.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 3:55 PM on October 30, 2012 [27 favorites]


So basically George is now going to fund building a time machine so he travel back and erase the original 'Wars out of the timelines
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 3:58 PM on October 30, 2012


eponysthoughtful
posted by 2bucksplus at 3:58 PM on October 30, 2012


At this point we could legally get Muppet Star Wars Guest-Starring Wolverine.

Fox owns Wolverine. Would you settle for Iron Man?
posted by bgrebs at 4:01 PM on October 30, 2012


THIS CAN'T BE REAL!

OMG

o_O
posted by Kevin Street at 4:03 PM on October 30, 2012


I could see it becoming like one of those Japanese film series you'd always read about in Guinness books when you were a kid. The ones that had like 40 sequels over several decades.

Boba Fett IS Zatoichi!
posted by stebulus at 4:04 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


My pet theory is that Lucas is either very ill or has been diagnosed with something terminal. He has sold his business and has agreed to be involved in an event in Modesto next year after decades of pretending it doesn't exist. That seems like putting affairs in order to me (but has no real basis).
posted by arruns at 4:04 PM on October 30, 2012


I think Lucas is a better creative consultant that directory. This may produce good movies.

That's my take on how the first trilogy got made. Lucas had the grand ideas, but delegated large chunks of the final production to brilliant people who made those ideas work as cinema. Marcia Lucas, Ben Burtt, and John Williams may very well have saved A New Hope in post-production. Kirshner brought on a radically different approach to direction that gave Ford and Fisher more room to develop their performances. Lucas apparently was more involved in Jedi, but delegated much more than he did for Star Wars.

(Williams provided exactly what was needed for a movie that swings from Samurai in Space to Flying Leathernecks in Space.)

In fact, I wonder if this has been in the cards for a while, and Pixar/Disney put that in the chute as something along the lines of "Untitled DDLM Project" to be rebranded as Grim Fandango once all the paperwork was finished.

I'm highly skeptical. Pixar right now doesn't need any IP from Lucas* or Disney beyond intertextual references to use as a quick gag. Why use something from a sister company when their original designs get millions of fans hours after they email out a press packet? Anything they do with DDLM will eclipse prior art and define the holiday (and possibly Halloween) for the next generation.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 4:08 PM on October 30, 2012


Ain't It Cool News reports Episodes VII, VIII, and IX are a trilogy with an early stage development treatment completed - all of which will be shot in 3D.

So not only will there be Ewoks (or their equivalent), they will literally be in your face.
posted by Egg Shen at 4:11 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


My pet theory is that Lucas is either very ill or has been diagnosed with something terminal. He has sold his business and has agreed to be involved in an event in Modesto next year after decades of pretending it doesn't exist. That seems like putting affairs in order to me (but has no real basis).

Honestly, this deal meshes with what he's said previously about the sequels:
A further comment Lucas made at that 1999 press conference noted the "nine year commitment" required to make a Star Wars trilogy. The theme of the commitment required, and his age, were the subject of his remarks in following years about why his position had changed about the sequel trilogy. In 2002, he described his past answers about the sequels in this way: "Basically what I said as a joke was, 'Maybe when Harrison and Carrie are in their 70s, we'll come back and do another version.' The thing I didn't realize then, and that I do realize now very clearly, is that not only would they be in their 70s, but I would be in my 70s too."
What I suspect is that he originally planned for nine movies, started making the prequels then realized he would be old by the time the sequels would be made, so then back-tracked.

Wikipedia on the sequel trilogy is pretty informative.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 4:12 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


PhoBWanKenobi: "Wikipedia on the sequel series is pretty informative."

"with Luke's sister (who was not Leia)"

haha, nice.
posted by boo_radley at 4:14 PM on October 30, 2012


This news has turned me into a nine year old, apparently. And my jaw has just been on the floor reading this comments.

The Star Wars universe is wide open now. Anything could be done with it, good or bad. The only thing we can count on is that it'll still be around for years to come.
posted by Kevin Street at 4:17 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


The only thing we can count on is that it'll still be around for years to come.

I think we can also count on there being merchandise.
posted by Egg Shen at 4:19 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


Good point! Disney says they're going to make Star Wars an international brand. They'll fill the world with merchandise.
posted by Kevin Street at 4:21 PM on October 30, 2012


The whole story has six episodes.... If I ever went beyond that, it would be something that was made up.

As opposed to...?
posted by ShutterBun at 4:22 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


As opposed to...?

Stuff that really happened, like Han shooting first.
posted by Egg Shen at 4:24 PM on October 30, 2012 [8 favorites]


I think MeFites should write Episode VII.
posted by zardoz at 4:25 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Avengers 2 soon to be reworked, with the core team now Iron Man, The Hulk, Luke Skywalker, Mr. Incredible, John Carter, and Miss Piggy.
posted by A dead Quaker at 4:25 PM on October 30, 2012


Wait! COMMUNITY IS COMING BACK IN FEBRUARY 2013?! YIPPPPIE!
posted by Faintdreams at 4:25 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


The idea of the Star Wars film universe being like the James Bond franchise, just kicking out a movie every couple of years whether people want them or not... I'm sorry, but that doesn't really sound like the worst thing in the world to me.

I agree. Take the religion out of the monomyth and just turn it into space opera adventures. J.J. Abrams and company are taking far too long in getting out their rendition of Wrath of Khan, dammit.

So the Henson Company, Pixar, Marvel, LucasFilm. The middleweight mythopoeic champs of the American century. Who's next? Who's left?

Apple.
posted by Apocryphon at 4:27 PM on October 30, 2012


With a 95-year copyright on corporate-owned works, we aren't scheduled to have a discussion about what the public might do with Luke Skywalker—and about the rich world of unauthorized spinoffs, sequels, and remakes that could be created—until 2072. Now that Star Wars is owned by a company so determined to stave off the public domain, we can't really count on it happening then, either.
posted by Egg Shen at 4:27 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


R2-D2 and C-3PO would be the only characters who might continue through all nine films...

Episode IX: Waiting for Jedi will be just the two droids on screen talking about their friend Luke who never shows up.
posted by albrecht at 4:27 PM on October 30, 2012 [18 favorites]


My pet theory is that Lucas is either very ill or has been diagnosed with something terminal.


Good call. He probably doesn't want to die in the public eye like his friend Steve Jobs and wants to totally divest himself and live a quiet private life for the rest of his days.
posted by Renoroc at 4:28 PM on October 30, 2012


"with Luke's sister (who was not Leia)"

haha, nice.


Hee!

Honestly, I think all a sequel trilogy would need for them to not 100% bungle the storytelling is for the robots to be in all 9 films and for Luke to be the supernatural mentor.

No mention of midichlorians would be cool, too (even if they made sense in the prequels--and I'm not saying they did, but if they did, in light of the more technologically advanced Jedi society--they wouldn't later, after that society's rebirth), but I'm not pushing it.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 4:28 PM on October 30, 2012


Pretty soon Kingdom Hearts is going to include all of fiction.

I wonder whether Telltale will get to keep the Monkey Island and Sam and Max licenses?
posted by painquale at 4:29 PM on October 30, 2012


Does this mean there wil be a retcon wherein Bambi's mom shoots first?
posted by Twain Device at 4:32 PM on October 30, 2012 [8 favorites]


I feel so sorry for young people who have brilliant, creative ideas, because there's no room for them.

We've still got Looper, and Inception.
posted by Apocryphon at 4:33 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


My understanding is that Lucas (of the 1970s) had originally envisioned Star Wars to be "the continuing adventures of." Conflicting sources report plans for up to nine or more movies. However, Lucas (of the 1980s) caught "trilogy-itis" and episodes 4-6 became a self-contained unit. Lucas (of the 1990s) later added episodes 1-3, but that story had a natural endpoint (thankfully). And then Lucas (of the 2000s) sorta gave up and left things fallow. For better or worse, looks like this Disney deal means that we get the 1970s Lucas again . . .
posted by Quaversalis at 4:34 PM on October 30, 2012


This should have happened 20 years ago.
posted by computech_apolloniajames at 4:36 PM on October 30, 2012


The movies might be AMAZING or HORRIBLE and I am NOT OPTIMISTIC THAT THEY WILL BE SATISFYING, though the less Lucas is involved the better. I am FAR MORE CONCERNED that Disney is trying to TAKE OVER THE WORLD.

seriously antitrust laws where are they?
posted by Leucistic Cuttlefish at 4:36 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


My understanding is that Lucas (of the 1970s) had originally envisioned Star Wars to be "the continuing adventures of." Conflicting sources report plans for up to nine or more movies. However, Lucas (of the 1980s) caught "trilogy-itis" and episodes 4-6 became a self-contained unit. Lucas (of the 1990s) later added episodes 1-3, but that story had a natural endpoint (thankfully). And then Lucas (of the 2000s) sorta gave up and left things fallow. For better or worse, looks like this Disney deal means that we get the 1970s Lucas again . . .

Way back when, Lucas was often interviewed as saying there were supposed to be 9 movies.
posted by KokuRyu at 4:41 PM on October 30, 2012


Lucas said all kinds of crap.
posted by mazola at 4:42 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


Serious, sudden, thought. The ideal writer and director for Star Wars 7. Shane Carruth.
posted by Wordshore at 4:42 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


All they would have to do is have a ten second trailer with the star wars music and the face of a blue man with red eyes in a white uniform.

The Internet would explode.
posted by BeeDo at 4:43 PM on October 30, 2012 [11 favorites]


Mirror, mirror, on the wall,
Who has the highest midichlorian count of all?
posted by zippy at 4:45 PM on October 30, 2012


I feel so sorry for young people who have brilliant, creative ideas, because there's no room for them.

Almost every play of Shakespeare's was adapted from another source. Execution counts for a lot.
posted by empath at 4:46 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


You're a mean one, Mr. Sith.
posted by mrbill at 4:46 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


"seriously antitrust laws where are they?"

They went out with shoulder pads and the Cosby Show, I'm afraid. We're entering the age of megacorporations predicted in all those cyberpunk novels. Exxon will own everything that burns, Monsanto will own everything that grows, Walmart will sell it all to us, and Disney will own our imaginations.

Time Warner and Viacom better watch out, because Disney is coming...
posted by Kevin Street at 4:49 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


Lucas said all kinds of crap.

Yeah. This. It is clear to me that Lucas originally wrote a silly space opera script, which became Star Wars, and then subsequently decided that it was actually part of a larger Cambpellian epic myth cycle that he had completely planned from beginning to end. But Empire and Jedi were clearly made up more or less seat-of-the-pants style with multiple script re-writes, and not according to some amazing grand vision.
posted by chrchr at 4:52 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


I always knew Maleficent was a Sith Lord.
posted by Apoch at 4:56 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


I think MeFites should write Episode VII.

On it.

The question is, how far after VI does it take place? 15 years? Or 30? It comes down to how set we are with certain actors playing certain parts. Could moviegoers accept a non-Ford Solo? Would Ford even take the part?

I'd move it forward father, set it beyond the surviving Star Wars cast. Maybe we could get Mark Hamil doing voicework for a wizened Luke, but outside of that none of the mains outside of R2/Threepio should be showing up in the ensemble.

Do we stick with the Skywalker family? I say no. Harry Potter has filled our needed for Kid Of Destiny, Descended From The Blah-de-Blah. We instead focus on the haughty daughter of a Thrawn-like figure. She gets a sense of what her dad's influence in the waning Empire and what it means to cling to that power and rejects it.

Basically, we iterate Star Wars from Leia's perspective. We give her a posse (okay, a Skywalker Jedi buddy because those are required) and set her loose on the universe, righting wrongs and toppling jerks, almost accidentally setting up a true unified society.
posted by robocop is bleeding at 5:00 PM on October 30, 2012 [7 favorites]


I wanted to live in a Star Trek future, but instead, I got Neuromancer future.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 5:01 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


What I suspect is that he originally planned for nine movies, started making the prequels then realized he would be old by the time the sequels would be made, so then back-tracked.

My guess is that Lucas just got tired of it all. Interviews with him post-prequels reveal that he is very, very weary of people telling him what he did wrong with the prequels. He seems to almost regret having ever made them, and appears to believe that he couldn't have done anything that would have satisfied the fans. A whole documentary was made about how much the fans hate him now, a whole cottage industry of "what I would have done with the prequels" blog posts and Youtube videos has sprung up, and that's gotta grind him down.

So my guess is he just said, you know what, I'm done with it. Let it belong to other people, so it can live on without me getting slapped around with every release. Plus I get FOUR BILLION DOLLARS, so that's okay.
posted by middleclasstool at 5:02 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


I think MeFites should write Episode VII.

The last remnants of the Empire intend a final push by building an even bigger Death Star...
posted by mazola at 5:02 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


I wanted to live in a Star Trek future, but instead, I got Neuromancer future

And with no Sprawl trilogy films to ease our pain.
posted by Ber at 5:08 PM on October 30, 2012


Episode VIII -- The ghost of Darth Vader reveals that he was Biggs' godparent.

Episode IX -- With the Empire all but vanquished, the Rebels are surprised to learn of the existance of a 'Doomsday Machine' -- the biggest Death Star yet programmed to automatically destroy both sides in an interstellar war.
posted by mazola at 5:09 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


The last remnants of the Empire intend a final push by building an even bigger Death Star...

What if, like, we're all inside of a huge death star?
posted by maxwelton at 5:09 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


Star Wars Episode 7, directed by Brad Bird, written by Joss Whedon.

And "Red Letter Media" would still produce a longwinded screed about why you must hate it.
posted by mgrichmond at 5:11 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


So the Henson Company, Pixar, Marvel, LucasFilm. The middleweight mythopoeic champs of the American century. Who's next? Who's left?

Apple.
posted by Apocryphon at 6:27 PM on October 30 [+] [!]


That acquisition would go the other way around -- Apple's market cap is over SIX TIMES that of Disney. Apple could pay cash for Disney and still have $10 billion left over for drinks.
posted by nathan_teske at 5:12 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


And "Red Letter Media" would still produce a longwinded screed about why you must hate it.

And they would still be right.
posted by Ryvar at 5:12 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


Also, the jobs family is already the single largest Disney shareholder.
posted by empath at 5:14 PM on October 30, 2012


The question is, how far after VI does it take place? 15 years? Or 30? It comes down to how set we are with certain actors playing certain parts. Could moviegoers accept a non-Ford Solo? Would Ford even take the part?

I'd move it forward father, set it beyond the surviving Star Wars cast. Maybe we could get Mark Hamil doing voicework for a wizened Luke, but outside of that none of the mains outside of R2/Threepio should be showing up in the ensemble.

Do we stick with the Skywalker family? I say no. Harry Potter has filled our needed for Kid Of Destiny, Descended From The Blah-de-Blah. We instead focus on the haughty daughter of a Thrawn-like figure. She gets a sense of what her dad's influence in the waning Empire and what it means to cling to that power and rejects it.

Basically, we iterate Star Wars from Leia's perspective. We give her a posse (okay, a Skywalker Jedi buddy because those are required) and set her loose on the universe, righting wrongs and toppling jerks, almost accidentally setting up a true unified society.


I agree with only using the Hamill, as well as the droids. And moving beyond the skywalkers. But I think the main character still needs to be a burgeoning jedi. Is there any reason that couldn't be a girl, and even possibly a princess? Perhaps on the outskirts of the empire. I like the idea of making her father villainous, but she has incipient powers, too, and so the rejection of her father is paired with kind of an iconic coming-of-age story--in the same way that Luke's was (yearning for a world beyond from your drab home town, becoming independently powerful--but here it would be rejecting one's parents and becoming independently powerful).

I like narrative echoes, so I'd probably make her mother a mysterious figure, but she needs not to be a virgin birth or any of that crap. I don't know what the reveal would be.

Maybe she needs to inadvertently destroy her father with her powers in the first act of the first film and sneak off with a bounty hunter or something. She finds the Hamill, he helps her, then he dies. How does she come to terms with her own inner darkness--the death of her father--and still learn to be a hero?

(Man, I would so write books with mefites)
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 5:14 PM on October 30, 2012 [7 favorites]


"... almost accidentally setting up a true unified society."

Yeah, this... this could be the nub of it. The Republic didn't fall just because of the Emperor. It fell because the people of the galaxy forgot what their ideals were. Giant Trade Federations and banking clans tried to simplify society (wink, wink), which made it possible for an Empire to rise. People stopped questioning the powerful and became frightened sheep that the regional governors could control. Those problems didn't go away with the Battle of Endor and Ewok Holocaust. And the New Republic won't be secure while there's still so many would-be Emperors out there waiting to take their piece of the galaxy.
posted by Kevin Street at 5:17 PM on October 30, 2012


It would be nice if the conclusion to the series was one of a synthesis of the black and white dichotomy between sith and jedi. The Jedi in the prequels really are kind of evil--there's little ethical good in a society that asks members to give up love. Prequel ends with a sith victory, main trilogy with a Jedi victory. True balance restored to the force at the end of it all would be nice, if you ask me.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 5:22 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


But I think the main character still needs to be a burgeoning jedi. Is there any reason that couldn't be a girl, and even possibly a princess?

Sure, no reason for Thrawn-spawn not to be a Jedi herself. That could be what leads her to question her Dad's wisdom. Hell, he need not even be her biological father, so could be all blue skinned, red eyed Thrawn as well.

As for her princessness, I wonder if there is space for a line something like "You don't need to be a princess to do great things" or so on. But then again, I'm not a girl and don't understand the hardwired princess thing.
posted by robocop is bleeding at 5:23 PM on October 30, 2012


She could be a farmgirl. Who saves a prince. That'd be neat.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 5:25 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


But with aging cultural cachet (the first Star Wars came out 35 years ago) and a consumer base that has lots of other popular franchises clamoring for its attention

Are there really other worldwide franchises of such popularity? Bond is remarkably enduring but its demographics is smaller (no preteens, no toys). US superhero franchises became international hits only recently, mostly in movie form (the comic book form remains as purely American as baseball and almost as difficult to export) with some hits and many misses. Hey I passed by this geek's paradise in Paris the other day and most of the stuff on sale was Star Wars related. One Buffy, a few men in colorful leotards, some Aliens, and truckloads of Star Wars figurines. I'd wager that outside the US, Star Wars remains the only international movie franchise that really matters. And while there's no shortage of people claiming that the SW prequels were the WORST.THING.EVER, the fact is that they have not damaged the brand as far as the general movie-going public is concerned (unlike the Batman brand before the Nolan reboot, for instance). Kids and teens everywhere keep buying SW merchandise and know the characters even when they haven't seen the movies. The SW universe has now become as universal as the most famous Disney properties, with the same kind of staying power.
posted by elgilito at 5:26 PM on October 30, 2012


That acquisition would go the other way around -- Apple's market cap is over SIX TIMES that of Disney. Apple could pay cash for Disney and still have $10 billion left over for drinks.

This reminds me of the time AOL bought Time Warner.
posted by Fuzzy Monster at 5:27 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Episode IX: Waiting for Jedi will be just the two droids on screen talking about their friend Luke who never shows up.

I imagine them sitting in a sunken futuristic vehicle in front of a statue of a blue fairy. R2D2 non-functional, C3PO mouthing a silent wish over and over again.

Then they are discovered by Stephen Speilberg and he makes them play out a schlocky, sentimental scene with a cloned version of Anikan as a boy over and over again.
posted by Joey Michaels at 5:30 PM on October 30, 2012


I'd rather see them pursue their own collective muse but would anyone else be totally jazzed if Lana and Andy Wachowski got their hands on the keys to this car?
posted by sendai sleep master at 5:30 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


if Lana and Andy Wachowski got their hands on the keys to this car?

VADER: Luke, I am your father.

LUKE: WHOA!

Or, alternately, "WHOOAAAAAAAAAAA"
posted by Joey Michaels at 5:33 PM on October 30, 2012


George looks delighted in this picture.

I was hoping the other guy in the picture would be Vito Corleone.

Alas...
posted by Pudhoho at 5:33 PM on October 30, 2012


I'm curious to see how they work in the existing weird-as-shit framework of the post-Empire Star Wars Universe. Google "Yuuzhan Vong" and you'll see why.
posted by JauntyFedora at 5:33 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


The question is, how far after VI does it take place? 15 years? Or 30? It comes down to how set we are with certain actors playing certain parts. Could moviegoers accept a non-Ford Solo? Would Ford even take the part?

The Sydney Herald link above mentions that the next series of films are supposed to be sequels to Jedi, but that doesn't make any sense, since Solo will be like 75 and Mark Hamill has, shall we say, retained none of his youthful good looks.

I imagine Han Solo and Princess Leia have twins or something, and the next series will revolve around them.
posted by KokuRyu at 5:34 PM on October 30, 2012


Apple's market cap is over SIX TIMES that of Disney. Apple could pay cash for Disney and still have $10 billion left over for drinks.

I've been saying for years that the next step for Apple is to start making the content they sell. The step after that is controlling the pipes that bring the content to your devices, but that requires buying a telco, and I'm not sure they would want to open that can of regulatory worms
posted by Rock Steady at 5:34 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


She could be a farmgirl. Who saves a prince. That'd be neat.

It could start in media res with Our Hero part of some group going across the Universe to locate people with Force powers. Her group consists of her, her mentor figure (and it could be unclear whether or not they are Sith or Jedi at the start), R2, and maybe a bounty hunter type (Greedo IV!). They come across a prince (who has this golden yellow protocol droid) who scores highly, but when they reveal by accident that he's Force sensitive, the native population flips out and he gets pretty much disowned and needs to be rescued.
posted by robocop is bleeding at 5:37 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


"I'm curious to see how they work in the existing weird-as-shit framework of the post-Empire Star Wars Universe."

Don't know much about the post-Jedi continuity, but I hope the new films go their own way. We've already had three movies where the pieces had to fit with existing stories. These should be totally new.
posted by Kevin Street at 5:38 PM on October 30, 2012


These should be totally new.

The question becomes: How new could it get and still be in any meaningful sense a Star Wars film? [As opposed to just a space movie with the brand name slapped on it?]

If you take out Lucas and the Skywalker storyline, the Jedi seem to be the only distinguishing thing left.
posted by Egg Shen at 5:43 PM on October 30, 2012


I'd love to see Han and Leia and Luke sitting around at the galactic retirement home all gray and wrinkly and fat, reminiscing about their glory days and bitching about the food. I would pay to see that. Weekly. Harrison, don't pretend you have anything better to do.
posted by Biblio at 5:44 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


When used well, continuity adds depth and richness and isn't a flaw. The problem with the prequels wasn't the continuity but that the story sucked.

Funny thing, I watched the unedited original Star Wars the other day, and the scene where Obi-Wan describes Luke's father as this amazing star pilot? Would have totally watched that movie. At its core, the ideas it created were richer than the stuff that Lucas gave us, which actually fit the continuity really poorly.

But then, you all know that.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 5:44 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


(If you mean the EU continuity, well then, honestly, I kinda think that should be thrown out so the filmmakers can just tell the story they need to. And that's speaking as someone who totes plans to cosplay Tenel Ka someday.)
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 5:46 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


So my daughter and I were just talking about what episode 7 would be like and I said it should have Mara Jade's children. She replied why would it have Marriage aids in it that makes no sense... Up until now I had never thought it sounded like that also...

.
posted by mrgroweler at 5:46 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


"The question becomes: How new could it get and still be in any meaningful sense a Star Wars film? [As opposed to just a space movie with the brand name slapped on it?]

If you take out Lucas and the Skywalker storyline, the Jedi seem to be the only distinguishing thing left
."

The new movies will still be set in the same universe, though. That's what'll make them Star Wars. (Although it would be cool to see a cameo or two from the original cast, and there should definitely be mentions of the Skywalkers and others.)
posted by Kevin Street at 5:47 PM on October 30, 2012


It should be a total breakdown of order in the galaxy with a running subtext of doubt that maybe the Empire should not have been toppled and all that. Warlords with Imperial tech on an Imperial scale, etc.
posted by Senor Cardgage at 5:49 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


So my daughter and I were just talking about what episode 7 would be like and I said it should have Mara Jade's children. She replied why would it have Marriage aids in it that makes no sense...

Depends what kind of movie we're talking about here.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 5:53 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Kitt Fisto is: the Marriage Aid
posted by ShutterBun at 6:03 PM on October 30, 2012 [8 favorites]


One bad thing: Lucas was pretty chill about fan material. I can't imagine Disney allowing something like this yt to stick around.

Yep. Whatever you might want to see in a Star Wars movie, you're going to have to wait for Disney to make it—and make a profit from it.

Disney can't rely on old intellectual property

Oh yeah? Then why do they keep fighting to extend copyrights every time their intellectual property is about to time out? See also.

The Star Wars universe is wide open now. Anything could be done with it, good or bad. The only thing we can count on is that it'll still be around for years to come.

And that no one besides Disney will be able to do anything with it (without paying out the nose, at very least).

As my husband (the one with the Star Wars figures lining his office windowsills) put it when I told him about this: "WHAT?! Fuck George Lucas."
posted by limeonaire at 6:03 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


Yeah, to make it Star Wars, you really only need someone waving a lightsaber around. Everything else (ships, blasters, even the Force) can be found in other scifi stories.
posted by robocop is bleeding at 6:04 PM on October 30, 2012


We don't have George Lucas to kick around anymore...

:(
posted by mazola at 6:12 PM on October 30, 2012




Actually, there are two Disney-employed artists I know of (mostly for their comic book series) who have Tumblr blogs in which they have done a lot of fan art - in fact, they've both been 'special guests' at Disney events drawing commission pieces for the VIPs. Aside from those commissions, they've been kept on a short leash money-making-wise, but they're still free to do some delightful stuff... Amy Mebberson and James Silvani. And, hey, look, they've already done "Star Wars/Disney" mashups that they reposted today!

Then there's mashup-master James "Relentlessly Cheerful" Hance who has published a Winnie the Pooh/Star-Wars mashup book titled "Wookiee the Chew" without trouble from either party (as well as many Muppet mashups - he got a Muppets-as-Firefly-cast picture autographed by the actors AND Joss Whedon).

So I am cautiously optimistic about the future of Fan Art in the Star Wars Universe.
posted by oneswellfoop at 6:24 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


When used well, continuity adds depth and richness and isn't a flaw. The problem with the prequels wasn't the continuity but that the story sucked.

Spot on. There is this continuing misconception that the reason the original trilogy is held in such high esteem (and the prequels less so) is down to some bizarre childhood nostalgia obscuring our vision. The prequels failed because they were poorly constructed stories with poorly constructed characters.

The original films stand up remarkably well considering when they were made which, in this particular genre, is a feat in itself.

There's no reason why a new series of films cannot capture that same imagination and charm with a talented team on board. Also in a period in which we've already seen some outstanding additions to genre TV and film such as Firefly, Lord Of The Rings, Game Of Thrones, Battlestar Galactica etc.
posted by panboi at 6:31 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


If there's one thing that George Lucas really needed, it was two billion dollars in cash. Oh, and 2% of Disney.
posted by Huck500 at 6:37 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


"Yeah, to make it Star Wars, you really only need someone waving a lightsaber around. Everything else (ships, blasters, even the Force) can be found in other scifi stories."

It's a bit more specific than that, though. They've got all those planets like Tatooine and Coruscant, and specific aliens and techologies that are unique to Star Wars. It's a fictional world as detailed as Tolkein's Middle Earth. Then there's the narrative structure that comes from old fashioned adventure serials, and directorial touches like the wipe transitions that Lucas borrowed from Kurosawa. That's why the Clone Wars series feels (imo) like Star Wars.
posted by Kevin Street at 6:38 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


Imagine! LiteSabers(tm) brand hard roll candies!
posted by mwhybark at 6:38 PM on October 30, 2012


It's a fictional world as detailed as Tolkein's Middle Earth.

mmm, no. Languages, genealogies, mythologies all developed by one obsessive expert in these fields vs. scattershot marketing and fictional development of planets, cultures, and technologies may mean there are more discrete and disparate elements in Star Wars, but certainly not as detailed.
posted by mwhybark at 6:39 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


Why not? There've been a lot more people and man hours spent creating it.

And it's cooler.
posted by Kevin Street at 6:41 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


I'm optimistic now that George Lucas is marginalized. I look forward to my Star Wars Princess mini-series.
posted by arcticseal at 6:41 PM on October 30, 2012


Disney has put out some stellar fils in the past couple of decades, and also some pure drivel. So, they could take the SW franchise in either direction; so we might as well be catiously optimistic. And, back to the point many have made before, they really can't do worse than Ep. I, II, III.
posted by Vindaloo at 6:45 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Kevin, my edit crossed your reply. I saw my initial response and saw how it needed development. Please accept my apologies.
posted by mwhybark at 6:45 PM on October 30, 2012


Disney hasn't been cracking down on Marvel superhero cosplayers or fan films or video game mods, have they? I suspect that they'll treat Star Wars fans with the same sort of kid gloves.
posted by Apocryphon at 6:45 PM on October 30, 2012


I'm not a huge fan of the star wars IP so I think I can keep a level head about this. I think they need to split the franchise, cartoons and direct to DVD/ streaming featuring ewoks and Jar Jar for the kids and a bold gritty reboot for the nerds.

I'd like to see a huge budget HBO series, by huge budget I mean Rome big. I don't trust SyFy, only HBO can do this. It will focus on the day to day operations of a rebel cell.These front line troops are light years away from any Jedis or trade embargoes. Luke Skywalker is nothing more than a rumor. I'd like to see them abandon the hackneyed black/white characterization invented in the 70s and the grand overarching themes that are about as dramatic as watching paint dry. A small scale drama about the lives of rebel soldiers told minute by minute. Their lives, their sacrifices and most of all, the moral ambiguity of their mission.

Along with the series are 5-7 new movies, each based in a single rebel operation, no fucking grand themes or Jedis. Each will be intricate caper movies. A new mmo, this time it is mainly urban, with some planets strangely desolate and lawless, no fucking magic, just blasters. A new series of eBooks that explore the individual characters.

As for characters:
Captain, a wounded soul. Wife killed by the Empire.
sergeant, long suffering true believer, possibly a woman.
Enforcer, smarter than he looks, combat expert.
Pilot, a bit of comic relief and takes some convincing sometimes.
Doctor, former Empire doctor, for him this is personal.
Chaplain, this man is an enigma.
Mechanic, idiot savant, master of ships and robotics.
Face, man or woman who can open doors closed to a group of scruffy outlaws. In love with the captain.
Surrogate daughter, escaped from experimental research facility. She could be the key to destroying the empire or a ticking time bomb.


I think they could do great things if they simply updated it appeal to more modern sensibilities. Move Jedis and Jedi magic to background color and focus on detail and not grand themes.
posted by Ad hominem at 6:45 PM on October 30, 2012 [16 favorites]


Okay, now I just want NBC Universal or someone to buy the rights to Firefly to bring it back for half a pilot episode only to brutally kill it off so Browncoats can fucking shut up about it already and move on.
posted by Apocryphon at 6:48 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


So I wonder what this is going to do to the long-impending Star Wars live-action TV series.

Seriously, I have no idea what to make of this news. Part of me hopes it will be good. Part of me doesn't want to see my childhood continue to be churned into sausage. Mostly I have a wait-and-see attitude about it.

(And while I don't really like the new Tron universe much for how it's completely left the "inside a computer" world of the original movie behind, I have really REALLY enjoyed Tron: Uprising as an animated series. It's more complex and adult than I would have thought a Disney series would be.)
posted by hippybear at 6:49 PM on October 30, 2012


It might be possible for Disney to make a worse Star Wars movie than George Lucas, but I seriously doubt it.
posted by eriko at 6:49 PM on October 30, 2012


Chaplain, this man is an enigma.

That's no preacher.
posted by flaterik at 6:50 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


I know that Lucas Arts always had final say on anything using the Star Wars license so that anything with "Star Wars" on it was considered official cannon. With this sale, that might not be true anymore. If Lucas was ever going to make episode 7-9, he'd have to follow the existing EU stuff or at least work within that framework. Disney might be able to tell the "official" cannon to fuck off and write something better or they might cherry pick the good stuff from that material but only really worry about continuity with the movies and if they set them a little ways into the future that won't be much of an issue.

Mark Hamill looks like he could pull off an 800 year-old Jedi master for a cameo just fine.
posted by VTX at 6:51 PM on October 30, 2012


So I wonder what this is going to do to the long-impending Star Wars live-action TV series.

I was quite looking forward to the TV series - as it really could have gone in any direction, too, but more likely would have stayed away from existing characters and concepts. Now the film franchise might do the same, but I suspect there will be stronger connections to the earlier films - Luke, Leia and the droids.

I like this more than I would if Lucas was driving it - but whether it's good or not remains to be seen. My concern? 2015 is not that far away. Also, isn't that the year Avengers 2 is due for release? Are Disney trying to dominate that year?
posted by crossoverman at 6:52 PM on October 30, 2012


I'm not a huge fan of the star wars IP so I think I can keep a level head about this. I think they need to split the franchise, cartoons and direct to DVD/ streaming featuring ewoks and Jar Jar for the kids and a bold gritty reboot for the nerds.

Ugh please don't do Star Wars gritty. Nuanced, sure (though even that might be a stretch), but grit is really not in keeping with the spirit of the whole endeavor (Han Solo may be a murderer, but he's not gritty).

Particularly since gritty often just means women in refrigerators and the specter of rape hanging over everything.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 6:52 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


Particularly since gritty often just means women in refrigerators and the specter of rape hanging over everything.

That's a definition of gritty which had never once entered my mind, regardless of context.
posted by hippybear at 6:56 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Particularly since gritty often just means women in refrigerators and the specter of rape hanging over everything.

Yeah, I was thinking maybe they ride horses somethimes and eat gruel.

fucking shut up about it already and move on.

We are in a thread dedicated to 3 kids films made 30 years ago.
posted by Ad hominem at 7:01 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


That's a definition of gritty which had never once entered my mind, regardless of context.

"Captain, a wounded soul. Wife killed by the Empire."? That's pretty fridgerrific right there.

No offense to Ad hominem, and in a way his character break-down is pretty emblematic as to how these things go. But it's also kinda the opposite of the spirit of Star Wars (and Lucas was already trying to do "dark" Star Wars with the prequels and . . . well, we all saw how that went.)
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 7:02 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


But it's also kinda the opposite of the spirit of Star Wars

Right. And this never happened in the very first movie.
posted by hippybear at 7:05 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


I was really just kidding. Those were the characters from firefly.
posted by Ad hominem at 7:06 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


No offense to Ad hominem, and in a way his character break-down is pretty emblematic as to how these things go. But it's also kinda the opposite of the spirit of Star Wars (and Lucas was already trying to do "dark" Star Wars with the prequels and . . . well, we all saw how that went.)

I don't think he was being entirely serious- there's a direct correspondence between his characters and Firefly.
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 7:06 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


I was really just kidding. Those were the characters from firefly.

You know, I stared at your comment for several minutes trying to figure out if it was a hamburger or not.

(This Star Wars is serious business.)
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 7:09 PM on October 30, 2012


So I see. No joking in the SW threads.
posted by Ad hominem at 7:10 PM on October 30, 2012


But it's also kinda the opposite of the spirit of Star Wars

Right. And this never happened in the very first movie.


An inclusion of violence is pretty different from what's meant by "grit" in modern TV and movies. Even the burned bodies in IV--there to up the stakes for Luke and force him to leave home--or Han shooting first--there to establish that he's a bad ass and not to be trifled with--don't do much to destroy the overarching optimism of the narrative. Hell, Leia gets tortured and it has little plot relevance and hardly changes the rah rah sense of adventure.

So I see. No joking in the SW threads.

Nah, I like em gritty!
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 7:13 PM on October 30, 2012


Ad hominem has it right.

What was Star Wars, after all, but a story about a dreamy kid marooned on an out of the way planet dragged, willingly, improbably into a galactic civil war?

All the rest of the dopey big idea baggage came later. Drop it and refocus on the kids in the out of the way places.
posted by notyou at 7:16 PM on October 30, 2012


Here's a quick sketch that I came up with...

Background: It's been 30 years since the Battle of Endor. The Imperial central command has been destroyed, different imperial admirals attempt to assert control, but most of the highest ranking officers become warlords and end up carving out their own territories made up of just a handful of systems. The Republic grows, but about half of the systems in galaxy are still controlled by former imperials (but very disunited). Another quarter of the systems are uncontrolled (think frontier west).

Episode VII: 20yo female protagonist and her father are mechanics that are employed by the local Imperial warlord. She's a genius mechanic and her father is very proud of her. They hate their employers though. Being young, she does something unwise... she helps a childhood friend (who belongs to an anti-imperial organization) sneak some powerful explosives on a batch of TIE Fighters she and her father are working on. When the TIE Fighters are returned to their Star Destoryer, the explosives go off, destroying an entire landing-bays worth of TIE Fighters and Transports. Imperials figure out it had to be the father and daughter mechanics. Father sacrifices his life to allow his daughter to get smuggled off-planet. Of the three smugglers, one is a former Jedi student of Luke Skywalker, who notices that the force is with her. Let's throw in some basic training and sexual tension. He wants to get her to Skywalker to atone for abandoning his training. The rest of the movie is trying to get to Skywalker, who's in an uncontrolled system that some Imperial warlords are trying to exert control over. Hijinks ensue on their way there. The movie ends with the female protagonist and the former student finding Skywalker. She agrees to become one of Skywalker's students. The movie ends when we learn why the former student left Skywalker's training... he was kicked out for dark-side tendencies before he could learn too much. Skywalker realizes he should have kept trying to reach him and wants to train him again, but he tells Skywalker that he has already become the student of another...

Episode VIII: 3 Years have passed. Training montage to set the theme for the rest of the movie. 23yo female protagonist yearns to return home to free her home planet (many of Skywalker's students are motivated by this). She and two other students, against Skywalker's wishes, leave to free their respective homes. The trio start by going to her home first where they hatch a plan to infiltrate the imperial warlord flagship, capture the Admiral and destroy the ship. The former student is on the ship, apparently working for the Admiral. The trio still go through with the plan, but the Admiral ends up dead, the former student murders one of female protagonist's friends and the other two barely escape. Former student takes over the ship in the name of his unnamed master and takes the fleet with him to meet up with his master. Her planet is free for now, but at what cost? The female protagonist and her one still-living comrade return to Skywalker and beg to finish their training. Skywalker takes them back.

Episode IX: I dunno...
posted by Groundhog Week at 7:18 PM on October 30, 2012 [5 favorites]


An inclusion of violence is pretty different from what's meant by "grit" in modern TV and movies.

...the overarching optimism of the narrative.


Yeah, we're working from entirely different definitions of "gritty".

This one from UrbanDictionary comes closest to what I've been using.
1. gritty
harsh, coarse, rough and unrefined, as in film depictions that portray life as it truly is, without false distortions, stylizations, or idealizations. Often, the realism is exaggerated such that the culture or society being portrayed appears more coarse than it really is.
I'm not sure what yours is, but it sounds entirely different from mine based on our minimal exchange.
posted by hippybear at 7:19 PM on October 30, 2012


We are in a thread dedicated to 3 kids films made 30 years ago.

Three kid's films belonging to an intellectual property Empire that is actually going to be continued. Firefly was great and all but really, we can move on to new, existant series now. It was a good pre-BSG way to introduce new gritty human-focused sci-fi to the masses (though it failed, or at least FOX failed it, and the general public ignored it), but it's time to move on. Great ensemble class and all, but honestly how hard is it to come up with an RPG party composition that's any less imaginative than the Serenity crew? Whedon tried to bring that some of imagination to network TV, that is to be applauded, but I hardly think playing with archetypes is some sort of genius that bears repeating for other series.

I am firmly convinced that the magic of Firefly isn't really the fourteen episodes and a movie, but the potential of what it could have been. What is Book's past all about? Who are the Blue Handed men? Will Simon and Kaylee ever get together? When the hell are we going to see some actual Asians in your godforsaken racebended space wasteland, Whedon? In many ways, it is the anti-Star Wars, in that it was the universe that was truncated, that never got a chance to breathe and reveal itself, outside a few lame comic books (including the lame truth about Book's past). But I don't see merit within the show that could be applied elsewhere, sci-fi space westerns is a familiar trope. And Star Wars already had its own gritty Firefly-esque reboot, and it was surprisingly good, actually.
posted by Apocryphon at 7:22 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


Oh. nevermind.
posted by notyou at 7:24 PM on October 30, 2012


Yeah, we're working from entirely different definitions of "gritty".

That sounds fairly close to mine? Many modern gritty works are heavy on the misogyny and machismo, and characters usually display (sometimes exaggerated) psychological side effects to the events of the narrative, and these works are usually pervasively dark and pessimistic. Battlestar and Game of Thrones and Breaking Bad and Boardwalk Empire and The Road. It's Dark Knight vs. older Batman, where older Batman sometimes had violence, and it may have spurred new plot events, but it didn't really matter. It was still campy ol' Batman.

Again, I think this was what Lucas was going for in the prequels--Anakin murders a bunch of people! And is traumatized by it! Kinda! But I don't think that he was a capable enough writer to handle it and also I don't think that was in keeping with the spirit of the franchise over all. Also, mood whiplash, because of Jar-jar and stuff.

(The humor of the originals is a lot more understated and moodwise I think it trended toward optimism and high adventure anyway.)
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 7:29 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


I'm still not buying it. Twin Peaks was full of rapey rape and women wrapped in plastic, but it was completely NOT gritty. NYPD Blue was gritty, and had a bit of rape, but mostly wasn't about that, especially from the main characters.

I think you're allowing some characteristics of what some gritty shows have to define all things gritty. And I don't think that's a quality thing to be working from.

I accept not wanting to have rape and misogyny as feature players in the setting and characters of a series. I don't accept that rape and misogyny are defining characteristics of the overarching approach to setting known as "gritty".

Anyway, enough of this derail. I still wonder what this will do to the live-action series.
posted by hippybear at 7:36 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


The Star Wars Legacy comics were gritty because they basically showed that history was cyclical and had an evil Sith Empire take over 125 years after and the whole setup of Rebels vs. Empire happened again. Also the protagonist was a descendant of Luke Skywalker who was raised by pirates and became a drug addict. He was certainly annoying and grating at times for embodying a '90s antihero stereotype (though Star Wars is no stranger to annoying heroes, what with whiny Luke), but it was sort of amusing because he is so sick of the destiny of the Force and his family namesake that he became a drug addict. (Fictional space drugs, so less gritty than a cable serial.) They prevented Luke and the other family space ghosts from stop talking to him and telling him to follow the will of the Force and become a hero to save the galaxy. I figured that tossed some mud at ol' Joseph Campbell's eye.
posted by Apocryphon at 7:38 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


We are in a thread dedicated to 3 kids films made 30 years ago.

The original Star Wars, which you are a heathen if you call it Episode 4, was not a kids film. It was a callout to aging geeks who saw their vision of the Golden Age of SF written on a screen so much better than they had ever seen it before that they bathed the halls of the theatres in sperm. The kids were like wow but they thought this must be normal and were not quite so impressed.

SW not-4 was, for its time, an absofuckinglutely amazing film. Nobody had ever seen anything like that. Or that. Or that. OR THAT. It was one thing like that strung together after another to the point where you didn't care that the plot was simple and the characters flat and the acting iffy. It was just WOW WE ARE IN THE FUTURE.

Empire managed not to fuck that up, but I count Lucas' rape of my youth at the introduction of the obvious plush-toy Ewoks in place of Chewbacca's people in Jedi. The rest has just been a downhill toboggan from there.

At this point it is not possible for Disney to fuck this franchise up more than Lucas did in the last four (that's right, not three) movies. If they are smart they will reboot like the recent Star Trek movie.
posted by localroger at 7:38 PM on October 30, 2012


hippybear, the way I hear people use the phrase "gritty" is usually interchangeable with darker and edgier or (pejoratively) "grimdark." And of course gritty works aren't the only ones with rape or women in refrigerators, and gritty works don't have to have those things.

They just very often do.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 7:40 PM on October 30, 2012


It feels stupid to talk about Star Wars and cartoons while 8 million people don't have power. But I gotta get it out.

Disney has protected its properties and culture for more than 50 years (Yes, sometimes a bit overly so) . Lucas has spent 25 shitting on his. I’m ecstatic about this news. Disney let The Muppets get made. Brave came between Pixar sequels. And Wreck-It-Ralph is getting good press. I trust Disney. I'd already checked out of Lucas fandom.
posted by DigDoug at 7:41 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


the way I hear people use the phrase "gritty"

I think that's just what you hear when you hear that word, and may not be what people are meaning when they use it. *shrug*
posted by hippybear at 7:42 PM on October 30, 2012


I don't really know why we're arguing. I actually agree with you on the quoted definition.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 7:44 PM on October 30, 2012


Ad hominem has it right.

What was Star Wars, after all, but a story about a dreamy kid marooned on an out of the way planet dragged, willingly, improbably into a galactic civil war?

All the rest of the dopey big idea baggage came later. Drop it and refocus on the kids in the out of the way places.


Thank you. I may have been mostly joking but I think the premise is sound. I still think people try to put too much stuff into movies now. They were good because it was an adventure movies, not a galactic politics movie.

Maybe I shouldn't say gritty, I don't want it be about psychological trauma and misogyny and rape. I meant more real and less Jedi high council.

The original Star Wars, which you are a heathen if you call it Episode 4, was not a kids film

Ok, I probably just think they are because I was a kid when I saw them and so was everyone else I know. I dont know anyone who saw them first as an adult and liked them. My parents despised them. I accept that just because kids seem to especially like them they are not necessarily kids movies.
posted by Ad hominem at 7:49 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


Here's the problem with "gritty": Before SW, space was portrayed as being physically clean, like our own space missions, where no speck of dirt was allowed. SW portrayed a future where FTL fighter jets would have dirt stains, streak marks, and wear and tear. It might seem silly now but in 1977 that was really a new thing -- hey, space hardware gets worn out too, and these rebels are like guys with 1966 Pontiacs trying to keep the engine going even though it blows oil. Of course the reason we do it the way we do is that we are pushing material science to its limits and dirt like that would kill, but presumably the technology of the Galaxy Far Far Away is advanced enough to allow for wear and continued use.
posted by localroger at 7:49 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


Metafilter: It feels stupid to talk about Star Wars and cartoons while 8 million people don't have power.
posted by Apocryphon at 7:53 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


I think it's useful to ground what PhoB is talking about in terms particularly of comic book publishing over the last thirty years, since I feel like in the lay and critical reading I've done on that subject her notion of how "gritty" is handled is spot on in a way that maybe doesn't translate as directly to other media that have had different arcs on this stuff. Gritty as in dark as in serious character problems and big drama as in, very very often, "your girlfriend/wife/love interest got raped/killed/tortured/all-of-the-above".

It's not the sole domain of the concept of grittiness, by any stretch, but gritty = grimdark = "guess someone you care about got raped" is definitely there as a problematic metatrope in, in particular, comic book storytelling.
posted by cortex at 7:55 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


Was Metafilter talking about cartoons while I didn't have power after Isaac? *checks crackberry* don't sweat it. Talk about cartoons. If we have people drowning in attics, I'll text you to say it's not so good any more.
posted by localroger at 7:56 PM on October 30, 2012


I dont know anyone who saw them first as an adult and liked them.

Photos and press from the 1977 opening of Star Wars at the Coronet in San Francisco.

Not a lot of kids to be seen. Just for a bit of context here.
posted by hippybear at 7:57 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


(also, bonus points for being a slideshow which doesn't reload the entire fucking page for each new photo!)
posted by hippybear at 7:57 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


You know who would make a brilliant Star Wars movie? The dudes at Obsidian Entertainment. Okay, they probably couldn't direct it for crap. Or produce it. Or do the cinematography or marketing or the script or... wait, what was I saying? Oh yeah. They could storyboard the shit out of a great Star Wars movie.

Have the guys who wrote Knights of the Old Republic: The Sith Lords do the storyboard for Episode VII and I bet you'd have something special.
posted by Justinian at 8:02 PM on October 30, 2012


People who think "Empire" was just as gloomy and self-serious as anything Chris Nolan does should be reminded that it may have been the funniest movie in the series.

Speaking of humor, all of the internet Disney-Star Wars crossover jokes are starting to numb my brain (and just wait till the late night shows get their turn!)

And I don't think putting a dent in Gangnam Style parodies is worth it all.
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 8:06 PM on October 30, 2012


It's not the sole domain of the concept of grittiness, by any stretch, but gritty = grimdark = "guess someone you care about got raped" is definitely there as a problematic metatrope in, in particular, comic book storytelling.

Thanks, cortex, for helping me to contextualize. As I washed the dishes I realized that perhaps the difference in my view and hippybear's was that my definition incorporates "psychological realism" (including exaggerated psychological realism), which is where you get characters with dead wives and PTSD and that kind of thing, and often has violence against women as its source. Not always. But often.

There's a large overlapping section on the Venn diagram of media between psychological grit and physical grit in terms of setting, and that's a lot of it too. I suppose you could have one without the other, but the typically go hand-in-hand.

I do think the original SW films were a bit gritty--in terms of setting and trauma--for their time, but in terms of modern franchises they still feel very clean to me. Maybe in part because they were nostalgia pieces for Lucas. So on a sliding scale between shiny and gritty they're sort of dead in the middle between Flash Gordon and Firefly.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 8:09 PM on October 30, 2012


i could see the post VI star wars universe acting as a metaphor for post 2001 afghanistan.
posted by cupcake1337 at 8:11 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


You know who would make a brilliant Star Wars movie?

I thought that Timothy Zahn's Thrawn trilogy was like stepping back into Star Wars movies for the first time since, well, since they stopped making those movies nearly a decade before. Incredibly cinematically written, decent plotting, memorable characters and extensions of ideas that came before.

That they ended up being the opening salvo in the (IMO) horror that is the Expanded Universe is something I tend to overlook. They were better and more in the spirit of any of the Han Solo books written during the film series' run, although I'm not sure if they were better than Splinter Of The Mind's Eye. I haven't read that particular tome since I was 10.

So, yeah. I nominate Zahn to be involved with this on some level.
posted by hippybear at 8:15 PM on October 30, 2012 [10 favorites]


What's the freakout about? A mainstream media and entertainment corporation just bought a mainstream media and entertainment corporation. Triteness doesn't know extinction, only transformation.
posted by MeanwhileBackAtTheRanch at 8:15 PM on October 30, 2012


Star Wars was most definitely a kids film, because it was created to sell toys. Star Wars was the first film I saw in the theatre in 1977 at age 6, and I had most of the toys growing up.
posted by KokuRyu at 8:16 PM on October 30, 2012


Star Wars was most definitely not a kids film. Star Wars was the first film I saw in the theatre in 1977 at age 8, and I wasn't able to get most of the toys until I reached my 40s.
posted by mazola at 8:26 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


All Disney has to do now is buy the Discovery network and we can get:

Star Wars IX: Here Comes Honey Boo-Boo
posted by double block and bleed at 8:27 PM on October 30, 2012


Kids films don't make the kind of money Star Wars did. All that box office didn't come just from kids, and their parents who got dragged along (well, not that I was around at the time to witness this).

Toys based on movies weren't exactly a sure cash-in before Star Wars came along. Hence Fox happily giving up merchandising profits to Lucas beforehand.

And if he'd just been interested in selling to kids, he would've made "Empire" a lot more cheery (I can't defend Ewoks though).
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 8:32 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


mmm, no. Languages, genealogies, mythologies all developed by one obsessive expert in these fields

. . . and his son, and at least one ghost writer -- oh sorry, "editor" -- in the form of Guy Gavriel Kay. Seriously, Christopher Tolkien's modest ambitions may obscure it, but he's made his father the Tupac of fantasy.

vs. scattershot marketing and fictional development of planets, cultures, and technologies may mean there are more discrete and disparate elements in Star Wars, but certainly not as detailed.

Hey folks, I know you would like to believe there's a firm difference between Geekery for Art that you like and Commercial Geekery that you don't, but there isn't. Lots of "serious" novelists do packaged fiction (Warhammer novels kept a significant number of British F&SF writers fed) and while it's not necessarily the stuff they like the most, I bet you dollars to donuts that some of that work is more meaningfully there's than The Children of Hurin is JRRT's.

In any event, the interesting thing about Star Wars is that by the mid 80s, nothing much was happening and before that, you could see that the franchise's management had no idea what to do with their stuff. The big leap forward was the release of the original Star Wars RPG. We think of story worlds as a matter of course now, but back then seeing Star Wars (or most fiction) as a "legendarium" or whatever was the preserve of the tabletop RPG field. That game churned out original material in an artful, integrated way which led to the monster we have now, though I believe it took some time for LFL to actually understand this process themselves, and treat management of that universe seriously.

(If you want a comparison, consider that Paramount did not track Star Trek continuity in any organized fashion. The curator at the Merrill Collection -- and SF media repository in Toronto -- told me that Paramount sent an intern to photocopy everything. The short-lived product of that was the uptick in Enterprise's quality. Otherwise the fans *really did know better* than the creative team.)

I'm not going to say the result is high art or anything, but there's a remarkable coherence worth admiring even when the individual products fail, and occasionally demonstrates sparks of real creative zest.
posted by mobunited at 8:33 PM on October 30, 2012 [6 favorites]


One thing that gives me hope at a larger level: in the past fifteen years we have seen prequels to Star Wars, Star Trek, Alien, X-Men, James Bond (after a fashion) and The Thing and we are about to get The Hobbit. Episode VII is a complete unknown quantity at this point but at last maybe time will start flowing forward in Hollywood again.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 8:33 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


There'll probably be a couple series about space tweens hanging out at the space mall on the Disney Channel.
posted by Trochanter at 8:45 PM on October 30, 2012


Hey guys, remember when The Avengers joined forces with The Mickey Mouse Club to fight aliens?
posted by Brocktoon at 8:48 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


George Lucas and the people who brought us Cars 2? I'll just drop this here.
posted by davejay at 9:34 PM on October 30, 2012


So if one was to commemorate the events of today by watching Star Wars, which should one watch?
  • Crappy Laser Disk Transfer
  • Star Wars Special Edition
  • Star Wars Revisited
  • Star Wars Revisted (Purist Edition)
  • Star Wars Despecialized Edition
  • Star Wars Uncut
posted by mazola at 9:40 PM on October 30, 2012


Did they get the negatives?!?! Was anyone distracting George while the moving van was loaded up? Say what you will about Disney, but their own BluRay restorations are spectacular.
posted by pashdown at 9:46 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Well, at least now we know that all future Lucas films will have twice as many simpering little kid sidekicks to drive cars and poke the bad guys in the bottom.
posted by dunkadunc at 9:46 PM on October 30, 2012


So if one was to commemorate the events of today by watching Star Wars, which should one watch?

I'd probably pick the crappy DVD original cut version which was included as a second disk in some editions of the Episode IV special edition DVD release.

At least, that's the one I watch the most often.
posted by hippybear at 9:57 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Star Wars was most definitely a kids film, because it was created to sell toys.

Not at first. George secured the rights to merch because he was scrambling for any dollars he could eek out of the film. The reason the studio gave it to him was because nobody saw the potential. George got lucky, and the result was '80s TV and Ewoks.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 10:02 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


You realize this means the Millennium Falcon will have a starring role in Cars 3?
posted by casarkos at 10:07 PM on October 30, 2012


I like Ewoks.
posted by Brocktoon at 10:08 PM on October 30, 2012


They're delicious when done in a slow cooker for about 10 hours with root vegetables.
posted by hippybear at 10:15 PM on October 30, 2012


The Jedi of Waverly Place.
posted by prodigalsun at 10:19 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


UP will be retconned so that it is not balloons but Yoda that holds the house aloft.
posted by cortex at 10:27 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


It seems like George really has to swallow his pride here, considering people could only assume how much better the prequels would've been with other writers and directors.

Now, that scenario will basically become reality, and if they succeed, all he'll hear is "See, you should've let someone else do the prequels!" and "Star Wars is better off without you." It'd be like resigning as coach of a last-place team and watching someone else take the same roster to a championship a year later. And, I know, he's getting $4 billion, but it's not like he was hurting before...

I guess it's safe to assume John Williams won't be involved, though I wonder if Ben Burtt will. And if Anthony Daniels will just provide the voice for an all-CGI Threepio. And... Harrison must've been in for a rude awakening today.
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 10:36 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Metafilter: I don't really know why we're arguing. I actually agree with you
posted by maryr at 10:37 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


I guess it's safe to assume John Williams won't be involved

Really? Why's that? Hard to imagine a Star Wars movie without a John Williams score behind it.
posted by TwoWordReview at 10:54 PM on October 30, 2012


. . . and his son, and at least one ghost writer -- oh sorry, "editor" -- in the form of Guy Gavriel Kay. Seriously, Christopher Tolkien's modest ambitions may obscure it, but he's made his father the Tupac of fantasy.

Beside the point. The material was not developed for publication, and I made no mention of it, or of the films. Are you asking us to take into account the Avalon Hill board games and the Rankin Bass movie too?

More stuff on the market to consume does not mean there is more detail. There's less, because there is less internal consistency and coherence. I mean, this is the basic quality issue with the three most recently-released films.

There are differing notions of canon, sure, I get that. The Star Wars canon is more or less gleefully inclusive because it came into being as popcorn and marketing. And retconning all that into a cohesive whole is fun!

Additionally, aren't there varying 'official' levels of canon in Star Wars? The simplest one, which looks outside the authority of the copyright holder or author and is therefore the one I prefer, is the initial, um, texts, in this case the two sets of live-action films, which explicitly would exclude things like Alan Dean Foster's Dagger of the Mind, which iirc was written and published before the second film but which anticipated several scenes from that film.
posted by mwhybark at 10:56 PM on October 30, 2012


never used baby shoes: "Star Wars LXXXVI: The Heat Death of the Universe"

In this episode a cute new alien species know as "The Incubators" will be introduced.
posted by the_artificer at 11:00 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


At least, that's the one I watch the most often.

Ha, me too! Except last time we watched the film I accidentally grabbed the wrong disc and was TAKEN ABACK by the CGI stormtroopers in Mos Eisley because I wasn't expecting them.
posted by mwhybark at 11:02 PM on October 30, 2012


Alan Dean Foster's Dagger of the Mind

You're thinking of Splinter Of The Mind's Eye. Dagger Of The Mind was a Star Trek episode. You've just been ejected from the convention.

Anyway, when it comes to Star Wars canon, the man to talk to is Leland Chee. He's the one in charge of cross-platform continuity.
posted by hippybear at 11:04 PM on October 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


oops, I was just coming in to note that. I had meant to doublecheck the title and got distracted. Stupid internet, so shiny and
posted by mwhybark at 11:10 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Really? Why's that? Hard to imagine a Star Wars movie without a John Williams score behind it.

Well, if Williams is just as close with Lucas as he was before the prequels, he probably wouldn't be interested in devoting time to another trilogy without him. If they're not as close... he probably wouldn't be as interested. Plus, he'll be 83 by the time just the first movie comes out. I guess at the very least he could just compose the music, but I still doubt it.

I wonder if someone could splice together the Disney production logo along with the Lucasfilm logo and the rest of the usual Star Wars openings. That would just be weird to see.
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 11:11 PM on October 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Ha, me too! Except last time we watched the film I accidentally grabbed the wrong disc and was TAKEN ABACK by the CGI stormtroopers in Mos Eisley because I wasn't expecting them.

I think I'd be taken aback too because I don't think they ever made such a change. And it seems like there'd be a few giveaways that occur earlier in the movie, starting with the "Episode IV" in the opening crawl.
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 11:14 PM on October 30, 2012


I'm reminded of this video.

I just hope Lucas spends a couple billion on land in the Marin area to preserve publicly accessible open space.
posted by ambient2 at 11:17 PM on October 30, 2012


As far as grittyness and Star Wars goes, it's worth considering what the norm for science fiction movies was in the 70s: Planet of the Apes, A Dog and His Boy, Silent Running, Logan's Run, Soylent Green...

Star wars was unique in that it had a positive, adventuresome attitude toward sci-fi-hell, it was downright optimistic.. That was a total breath of fresh air. 11 year-old me didn't realize I was pining for fun in an SF movie until I saw it.

And let's not forget that the first minute after the title crawl was utterly brilliant cinematography; the way the star destroyer kept coming and coming and was HUGE just blew my mind. It still does
posted by happyroach at 11:23 PM on October 30, 2012 [2 favorites]


I don't think they ever made such a change

I guess that's correct. I seem to have been thinking of the first appearance of the stormtroopers (page search for 'Look, sir! Droids!'), although the scene I really remember was a left-to-right wipe to a Mos Eisley exterior where a stormtrooper is mounted on a two-legged animal and moves left, out of frame, following the wipe. Perhaps it appears in my imaginary Star Wars Trek novel.
posted by mwhybark at 11:26 PM on October 30, 2012


It's a trap.
posted by Cranberry at 11:41 PM on October 30, 2012


And it seems like there'd be a few giveaways that occur earlier in the movie, starting with the "Episode IV" in the opening crawl.

All video releases of Star Wars included the "Episode IV" title. It was only the original theatrical prints that did not. There are some other changes in the opening crawl from the Laserdisc release to the Special Edition (and Blu Ray) but they take a very sharp eye to notice.

The first super obvious giveaway in the Special Edition is the srormtroopers on Dewbacks in the Dune Sea.
posted by ShutterBun at 11:48 PM on October 30, 2012


I wonder if someone could splice together the Disney production logo along with the Lucasfilm logo and the rest of the usual Star Wars openings. That would just be weird to see.

Disney has generally avoided using the Disney name/logo on "not strictly Disney" material. (Touchstone, Miramax, Hollywood Pictures, etc.) A notable exception, of course, would be Pixar.

But ya know what's REALLY gonna be weird? Not hearing the 20th Century Fox/CinemaScope fanfare music to start things off.
posted by ShutterBun at 11:54 PM on October 30, 2012 [4 favorites]


All video releases of Star Wars included the "Episode IV" title. It was only the original theatrical prints that did not.

Actually, I should've said the lack of "Episode IV." Didn't the "limited edition bonus disc" DVD not have it either?

But ya know what's REALLY gonna be weird? Not hearing the 20th Century Fox/CinemaScope fanfare music to start things off.

Well yeah, I kinda had that in mind too. Wouldn't we still see the logo if it's being distributed by Disney proper?

I suddenly wonder what that life-size Millennium Falcon builder will do if Disney ends up making their own authentic replica in a lot less time.
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 12:20 AM on October 31, 2012


I suddenly wonder what that life-size Millennium Falcon builder will do if Disney ends up making their own authentic replica in a lot less time.
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 5:20 PM on October 31


Given the direction that Disney seems to be trying to take of late, my guess is "get hired."
posted by DoctorFedora at 12:33 AM on October 31, 2012 [1 favorite]


Actually, you're right.

I haven't watched the laserdiscs in a while, but I seem to recall they had the Episode IV title all along, which leads me to think it was instead "re-removed" for the GOUT DVD release.
posted by ShutterBun at 12:33 AM on October 31, 2012


"Lucas, take Jar-Jar and Little Ani to the incinerator."
"You said they'd be left at the ranch under my supervision!"
"I am altering the deal. Pray I don't alter it any further."
posted by obiwanwasabi at 12:55 AM on October 31, 2012 [5 favorites]


I wonder how much of the new films will be made intolerable through attempts to recreate a new, cool Han Solo type character, and how pitifully shit that will come out. Depp perhaps?
posted by biffa at 12:57 AM on October 31, 2012 [2 favorites]


I wonder how much of the new films will be made intolerable through attempts to recreate a new, cool Han Solo type character, and how pitifully shit that will come out.

Hey, you know they could maybe find someone cast in that sort of rakish role. Maybe he's played a starship captain before, some sort of dude with a heart of gold but a steely inner resolve... he might have experience playing a guy who is at home on both sides of the law.
His hammer might be his penis.

I don't know where you could find a guy with that charm and wit. I really don't.
posted by Mezentian at 1:16 AM on October 31, 2012 [3 favorites]


Shut up before Disney makes a Ulysses cartoon, man.
In space! With a cute robot!


I'm late, and there are 400+ posts above me, but I want to take the low road and make this explict: I WANT A Ulysses 31 MOVIE. PLEASE.

Disney, call me.
posted by Mezentian at 1:19 AM on October 31, 2012 [1 favorite]


I miss anti-trust laws.
posted by Goofyy at 1:26 AM on October 31, 2012 [1 favorite]


If it involves a Jar Jar snuff-film angle I'm totally there.
posted by bardic at 2:13 AM on October 31, 2012


gritty - to me is little pebbles, sand in the cracks, dust, film grain, rain, haze, that little bit of barely noticable rust. It is slight imperfections in the body, rash decisions, procrastination, and then sheer guts to somehow make it through.
posted by niccolo at 3:14 AM on October 31, 2012 [1 favorite]


A Disney Episode 7 will be vastly superior to whatever tosh Lucas would have eventually decided to make.
posted by memebake at 4:19 AM on October 31, 2012


I'm less worried about new Star Wars chapters than I am worried about Howard the Duck now being related to Donald the Duck.
posted by emelenjr at 4:27 AM on October 31, 2012 [1 favorite]


They've owned Howard the Duck since they bought Marvel anyway.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 4:32 AM on October 31, 2012 [2 favorites]


Could moviegoers accept a non-Ford Solo?

Captain Tightpants now with Corellian Bloodstripe

====================
I'm less worried about new Star Wars chapters than I am worried about Howard the Duck now being related to Donald the Duck.

That already happened back when they bought Marvel Comics.
posted by radwolf76 at 4:32 AM on October 31, 2012


Am I the only one who liked Howard the Duck back in the day?
Of course, I also liked Masters of the Universe.... so, you know.
posted by Mezentian at 4:35 AM on October 31, 2012


[[I guess it's safe to assume John Williams won't be involved]]

Really? Why's that? Hard to imagine a Star Wars movie without a John Williams score behind it


John Williams is 80 years old and has not composed a score for anyone but Steven Spielberg in 7 years.

I'm sure they'll use his main theme over the opening crawl. After that, the new guy will take over. Michael Giacchino, maybe.
posted by Egg Shen at 5:33 AM on October 31, 2012


The pictures around yesterday and today, of George Lucas signing documents and stuff. The man looks ... tired. And older than he is. Perhaps, as others have speculated, not well.

I can't get enraged over movie sequels not turning out how I hoped they would; just disappointed. The bottom line for me; they're movie sequels. Others, many others, obviously feel very passionate - this news item, the big storm, and the election have been the three things creating a comment-blizzard on The MetaFilter alone this past week or so.

For the good, and the not so good, stuff that he made - and it's all subjective - I hope he uses his time wisely and takes a seriously good, long, rest. This may be the time for him to take a year or two out and hopefully work on his definitive, accurate and revealing autobiography.
posted by Wordshore at 5:35 AM on October 31, 2012


I wonder how much of the new films will be made intolerable through attempts to recreate a new, cool Han Solo type character

He's proactive and totally in my face!
posted by Egg Shen at 5:39 AM on October 31, 2012 [5 favorites]


I'm pretty sure all the laserdisc releases of Star Wars include the Episode IV thing. The first version of SW on LD came out in 1982, and by then ESB had already been in theaters and we were about to get ROTJ. As far as I know, it is ONLY the DVD bonus disk version which does not have that.

(The Super 8 release eliminated the opening crawl altogether in favor of a voice-over.)
posted by hippybear at 5:54 AM on October 31, 2012


It is the lack of Han Solo that broke the prequels.

I'm serious. Han's a complex character. You're not actually sure of the decisions he'll make, given various scenarios. He might actually shoot first.

That doesn't exist in the prequels, at all. It's just not there. And it's why, ultimately, they don't work like the original trilogy did.

(To some extent, Anakin is supposed to take the role of Han, as a falling star rather than a rising one. But then Anakin switches from Good Guy to Child Killer in like sixty seconds. Doesn't work, not even a little.)
posted by effugas at 5:54 AM on October 31, 2012 [3 favorites]


Saying a lack of Han Solo ruined the prequals, is like saying Mitt Romney shouldn't be president because his name is a type of glove.
posted by panaceanot at 6:01 AM on October 31, 2012 [1 favorite]


I mean it's certainly true to an extent, but it took Redlettermedia longer than the films ran to attempt to comprehensibly decode why they failed so badly.

Injecting a flawlessly executed Han Solo character into those films would not have saved them.
posted by panaceanot at 6:04 AM on October 31, 2012


And it seems like there'd be a few giveaways that occur earlier in the movie, starting with the "Episode IV" in the opening crawl.

I have found that a startling number of people doggedly insist that was there from 1977.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 6:10 AM on October 31, 2012 [2 favorites]


They've owned Howard the Duck since they bought Marvel anyway.

Now they own the rights to the character AND the movie. It makes me wonder if this was Disney's plan all along.
posted by Dr-Baa at 6:19 AM on October 31, 2012 [2 favorites]


Saying a lack of Han Solo ruined the prequals, is like saying Mitt Romney shouldn't be president because his name is a type of glove.

With less than a week to go and the polls essentially tied, I'll take any reason for why Mittens shouldn't be POTUS.
posted by Wordshore at 6:32 AM on October 31, 2012


Mitt is in a bizarre religious cult!
And also he's an outsourcing brazillionaire!

But if he is President in 2013, isn't a new Star Wars film in 2015 the least legacy the Obama Years could leave you?

Isn't it?

Also Obama: Fewer zombies, less parkour.
posted by Mezentian at 6:39 AM on October 31, 2012


Now all I want is Pepe cast in the new Star Wars movie so he can say, "I am not Darth Vader, I am Grand Admiral Thrawn, okay!"
posted by cottoncandybeard at 7:30 AM on October 31, 2012


gritty - to me is little pebbles, sand in the cracks, dust, film grain, rain, haze, that little bit of barely noticable rust. It is slight imperfections in the body, rash decisions, procrastination, and then sheer guts to somehow make it through.

So, theatrical edition Tatooine, in other words.
posted by mwhybark at 7:37 AM on October 31, 2012


I'm sorry, name one terrible Hollywood adaptation of a geek-beloved property that geeks have failed to reliably get in line to watch on opening night...

Green Lantern. The Fantastic Four. Eragon. The Golden Compass. Van Helsing. Dungeons and Dragons. The Last Airbender. The Punisher (three times!).

You're right that the problem here wasn't "pissing off geeks." The producers didn't care. Honestly, if they had, the movies probably wouldn't have sank without a ripple. But they all serve as evidence that you can make a movie so abjectly terrible that not even geeks will go see it.
posted by valkyryn at 7:39 AM on October 31, 2012 [1 favorite]


Green Lantern. The Fantastic Four. Eragon. The Golden Compass. Van Helsing. Dungeons and Dragons. The Last Airbender. The Punisher (three times!).

Dredd. Which stings hardest of all because it was both a fan pleasing adaptation and actually legitimately good.
posted by Artw at 7:41 AM on October 31, 2012 [2 favorites]


Episode VII is a complete unknown quantity at this point but at last maybe time will start flowing forward in Hollywood again.

Maybe if they make enough sequels they can bridge the gap from "a long time ago" to the present day!
posted by albrecht at 7:46 AM on October 31, 2012


And Punisher War Zone was good.

If Eragon was good I can't say, but a lot of those movies were not works of love (except Dungeons and Dragons... that was, just not a good one).
posted by Mezentian at 7:47 AM on October 31, 2012


Green Lantern and Fantastic Four could practically be called works of contempt.
posted by Artw at 7:51 AM on October 31, 2012


Green Lantern and Fantastic Four could practically be called works of contempt.

Seriously. If you can't have any on-screen chemistry with Jessica Alba, You're Doing It Wrong.
posted by valkyryn at 7:54 AM on October 31, 2012


Today being Halloween, wanna see something really scary?
posted by netbros at 7:54 AM on October 31, 2012 [2 favorites]


Mitt is in a bizarre religious cult!

Hokey religions and magic underwear is no match for a Joe Biden by your side, kid.
posted by entropicamericana at 7:59 AM on October 31, 2012 [5 favorites]


This may be the time for him to take a year or two out and hopefully work on his definitive, accurate and revealing autobiography.

Will he replace Marcia Lucas with a singing CGI alien?
posted by Strange Interlude at 8:01 AM on October 31, 2012 [2 favorites]


I'm hoping that the inevitable end of Clone Wars means those guys will be put into the creative mix for the new movies. The production team on Clone Wars gets Star Wars pretty thoroughly.
posted by immlass at 8:12 AM on October 31, 2012 [4 favorites]


I know! It's so much more Star-Warsy than the prequels.
posted by Artw at 8:16 AM on October 31, 2012


Here were my thoughts upon hearing this announcement.

"I am so upset! I really hate to imagine a beloved multi-billion dollar merchandising engine built off one of the highest grossing sets of movies of all time might end up being *commercialized*! and seriously, a Star Wars sequel with George Lucas reduced to the role of "Creative Consultant"? Can you imagine what kind of shit movie that would result in? I would HATE to see what Disney will do with a beloved canon, having purchased the parent company. Lucas proved what a challenge it is to make an enjoyable sequel to an iconic Sci-Fi property over 20 years later, what hope does Disney have?"
posted by Uther Bentrazor at 8:46 AM on October 31, 2012 [1 favorite]


So you're against it?
posted by mazola at 8:47 AM on October 31, 2012


I'd trust the Clone Wars guys on this (though they say Lucas gave a lot of insight on the creative process, but I'm not sure if it's still at the same level).

On a sort of related note,
I wonder if Disney would be reluctant to let one of their Pixar guys direct, after what Stanton did with John Carter. But I don't know how much they blame him. The only guy I would be totally optimistic with is Bird, but assuming they asked him, I worry he'd decline out of humility.

But surely they have people in mind since they've already said 2015?
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 8:59 AM on October 31, 2012 [1 favorite]


I'd trust the Clone Wars guys on this (though they say Lucas gave a lot of insight on the creative process, but I'm not sure if it's still at the same level).

I was suprised to see from the DVD extras that sometimes he's right there in the room with the writers. TBH I suspect that's mainly for show and mostly he just drops them notes like "why don't you do a Godzilla episode?" and a Zillo Beaat pops out the other side.
posted by Artw at 9:02 AM on October 31, 2012 [2 favorites]


A friendly reminder: any purchase of a Disney product directly contributes to the destruction of the public domain and shared culture.
posted by Gin and Comics at 9:04 AM on October 31, 2012 [5 favorites]


Why yes you're right!

/stocks up on crappy straight to DVD fairy tale animations with free-to-use classical soundtracks.
posted by Artw at 9:08 AM on October 31, 2012 [1 favorite]


A friendly reminder: any purchase of a Disney product directly contributes to the destruction of the public domain and shared culture

On the other hand: Boba Fett action figure with working fibercord whip!
posted by Egg Shen at 9:11 AM on October 31, 2012 [1 favorite]


A friendly reminder: any purchase of a Disney product directly contributes to the destruction of the public domain and shared culture.

Hold on. There are still *non*-Disney products to purchase?
posted by Strange Interlude at 9:15 AM on October 31, 2012


mwhybark: mmm, no. Languages, genealogies, mythologies all developed by one obsessive expert in these fields vs. scattershot marketing and fictional development of planets, cultures, and technologies may mean there are more discrete and disparate elements in Star Wars, but certainly not as detailed.

In my opinion, this both overrates and misunderstands Tolkien. Tolkien's whole thing was centered on "fall, mortality, and machine," and since he was a scholar of medieval language and literature, he wrote dozens of variations on that theme in the style of literary traditions he invented, as filtered through the almost but not entirely reliable scholarship of Frodo and Bilbo, and peppered with incongruities, blatant retcons, and anachronisms.

But if you try to look beyond the detail invested in oral and literary tradition, Middle Earth doesn't make a lick of sense. And that's because Tolkien built his professional reputation on the claim that using stories as a historical or anthropological window is the wrong way to read them. Tolkien was even reluctant to include the appendices for fear that readers would be more engaged in the set-dressing than the drama.

It's probably best to say that they're different. The Star Wars Extended Universe has at least an attempt at a coherent theory of empire, history, human rights, economics, and technology (less coherent when those things interface with the good/evil narratives). Tolkien lacks all of this except perhaps for his reactionary chapters on technology (which are tied directly to his thesis that man turns to machine to avoid the uncomfortable truth of his mortality.)

ChurchHatesTucker: Not at first. George secured the rights to merch because he was scrambling for any dollars he could eek out of the film. The reason the studio gave it to him was because nobody saw the potential. George got lucky, and the result was '80s TV and Ewoks.

Yes. It's my understanding that Lucas had to sell off everything but merchandising and control of the sequels to avoid being shut down during post-production. The studio execs were convinced Star Wars would flop and wanted to cut their losses.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 9:47 AM on October 31, 2012 [4 favorites]


In sort of related news, Lucas' longtime girlfriend Mellody Hobson was just named chairwoman of the DreamWorks Animation board of directors. They must have some very interesting pillowtalk.
posted by fuse theorem at 9:55 AM on October 31, 2012 [3 favorites]


I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of geeks suddenly went: "Eep!"
posted by philipy at 10:03 AM on October 31, 2012


I thought all he wanted was the merchandising and control of sequels. Either way, it's funny that he was so loathsome of studio interference, and now he's sold everything to a studio.

Also that he saw himself more as an artist than a businessman, yet most would agree he's much better as the latter.

TBH I suspect that's mainly for show and mostly he just drops them notes like "why don't you do a Godzilla episode?" and a Zillo Beaat pops out the other side.

I dunno, wouldn't he look better if it looked like he were too busy with other creative pursuits? Like, uh... A live-action Star Wars TV series...
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 10:07 AM on October 31, 2012


And, let's see how this affects Disney's stock price....

Ah-hahahahaha! 6% drop!
posted by IAmBroom at 10:10 AM on October 31, 2012


I wonder what his kids think of all this, if anything?
posted by Melismata at 10:11 AM on October 31, 2012


John Scalzi's thoughts
posted by never used baby shoes at 10:24 AM on October 31, 2012 [3 favorites]


I'm hoping that the inevitable end of Clone Wars means those guys will be put into the creative mix for the new movies. The production team on Clone Wars gets Star Wars pretty thoroughly.

Agreed. Much better than anything from Return of the Jedi onward. You can't get worse than what the films have been. It will be either more of the same, slightly better, or, though unlikely, an actually half way decent enjoyable film. A reboot would not be objectionable.
posted by juiceCake at 11:10 AM on October 31, 2012


Michael Giacchino, maybe.

I'm cool with this.
posted by Fleebnork at 11:11 AM on October 31, 2012 [3 favorites]


Apoch: I always knew Maleficent was a Sith Lord.

I didn't know she was getting her own film, portrayed by Angelina Jolie. Already some on-set photos have her garbed in brown robes. Is the story going to be how she was turned to the Dark Side? Is it too late to give her a lightsaber?
posted by CancerMan at 11:22 AM on October 31, 2012


I wonder if Disney would be reluctant to let one of their Pixar guys direct, after what Stanton did with John Carter. But I don't know how much they blame him. The only guy I would be totally optimistic with is Bird, but assuming they asked him, I worry he'd decline out of humility.

Stanton did a great job with John Carter. I would be up for him doing a Star Wars movie, if it wouldn't automatically result in negative reviews two days into production. (See my flow of consciousness babbling excited review from the JCM thread here)

That said, Stanton will have to wait before he gets another marquee live action film like John Carter to direct. I believe the movie will be better looked upon down the road, but just too soon for poor Stanton.

Most of the Pixar directors are proven competent filmmakers, but short of Brad Bird, I think Disney will strive to find just the right director for Episode VII and not necessarily, in-genre (sci-fi/fantasy?).
posted by Atreides at 11:48 AM on October 31, 2012


Tim Schaefer (creator of Grim Fandango) has an insightful take on the deal. Frankly, he's totally right, no matter how badly I'd like to see Manny Calavera on the big screen.
posted by Rock Steady at 12:06 PM on October 31, 2012 [2 favorites]


... And Lorenzo Lamas as "Meep".
posted by BeeDo at 12:15 PM on October 31, 2012 [1 favorite]


They've owned Howard the Duck since they bought Marvel anyway.

Now they own the rights to the character AND the movie. It makes me wonder if this was Disney's plan all along.


One more step in their cryptic master plan realized. Now they will begin stockpiling nougat.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 12:47 PM on October 31, 2012


In the meantime, I propose a fan-driven petition to persuade Disney to make a Pixar CGI Duck Tales version of Red Tails. Surely you mean TaleSpin...
posted by pupdog at 12:51 PM on October 31, 2012 [2 favorites]


Tony Stark is Gizmoduck.
posted by Groundhog Week at 12:58 PM on October 31, 2012


John Scalzi's thoughts

That.
posted by Artw at 1:23 PM on October 31, 2012


Bubba was sort of the Jar Jar of the Disney Afternoon...
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 1:23 PM on October 31, 2012


Stanton did a great job with John Carter. I would be up for him doing a Star Wars movie, if it wouldn't automatically result in negative reviews two days into production. (See my flow of consciousness babbling excited review from the JCM thread here)

Yeah, Stanton would be my choice, too.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 1:38 PM on October 31, 2012 [1 favorite]


Stanton would do a decent job. But I'd pick Ang Lee, Katehryn Bigelow, or Ridley Scott. But I'd pay good money to see a Star Wars movie directed by Werner Herzog.

Klaus Kinski would have made a marvelous Sith Lord.
posted by Strange Interlude at 1:58 PM on October 31, 2012


My vote is for Joe Johnston. The Rocketeer and Captain America draw on the same thematic and stylistic inspirations as the original trilogy; he can pull off that gung-ho retro optimism without coming off as dated or smarmy.

Also, his very first film work was on effects illustration and design for Star Wars, so it'd be a nice full circle.
posted by bettafish at 2:00 PM on October 31, 2012 [7 favorites]


Ever since Ride with the Devil and the Hulk movie, I've been suspicious of Ang Lee. Maybe my expectations were too high, but I came away disappointed, and have been leery of him ever since. I like Scott, but it seems that in recent years, he is affected a bit from Lucas syndrome, capable of producing some amazing stuff, but stuff that nonetheless is saddled with the baggage of meh.

I'd be willing to see Bigelow, but it would be a jump to a different type of film making. She's capable, tho'.

Johnston definitely has the pedigree. He needs a good script and actors.
posted by Atreides at 2:06 PM on October 31, 2012


Continuing from my previous comments in here:

Episode IX: 3 years after the end of Episode VIII.

We open at Skywalker's academy in the whatever system. He's talking with his five most-advanced students (including now 26yo female protagonist who we will just call Jane from now on and her surviving comrade from the previous movie). It's basically a low-key graduation ceremony ("I've taught you all that I know, and all of your future training must be internal. Be creative and come up with new, non-violent ways to use the Force."). He informs them that Chancellor Organa (Leia kept her last name) has asked Luke to move his Jedi Academy to Coruscant and explains his hesitance to do so (he's no politician). He doesn't share his biggest reservation though... he feels that he isn't ready to be a one-man Jedi Council. But Skywalker is going to send 3 of his graduates (including Jane) to Coruscant to aid Chancellor Organa and Admiral Solo in scouting and combating Imperial warlords. The other two will remain there to help Luke train the newbies so he can focus on the more intermediate students (the Academy is up to about 20-25 students of various levels of training).

So now we have two, diverging, story lines. The first is at the Jedi Academy, where Luke is overseeing his two graduates as they begin training the newbies. We see Luke training the intermediate students. We see the two graduates coming up with new, creative ways to use the force (maybe one of them is able to combine the force with his/her lightsaber to make it act like a flash-bomb or emp or something... I don't know, I'm not very creative). Meanwhile, the other 3 graduate travel to Coruscant and are shipped out on a scouting mission to figure out why it seems like some of the warlords are massing their forces (as implied by the end of Episode VIII).

The warlords massing is a distraction from the sneak attack that they are executing on Skywalker's Academy and the Republic with the 3 Jedis rush to save their master... don't really know how it plays out from there.
posted by Groundhog Week at 2:11 PM on October 31, 2012 [1 favorite]


I'd pay good money to see a Star Wars movie directed by Werner Herzog.

I would too, for the novelty if nothing else. However, I'm not sure I'd pay for my kids to see that movie.
posted by Area Man at 2:16 PM on October 31, 2012


My wife told our seven-year-old son that there would be a new Star Wars movie in three years. It made his day.
posted by Area Man at 2:17 PM on October 31, 2012 [1 favorite]


I'd forgotten about Johnston. He'd be perfect, but then again, he would've been perfect for the prequels too. He sorta made news a while back for pitching a Boba Fett spin-off film to Lucas, so it doesn't seem implausible that he'd do at least one of these sequels. But did he decline Capt America 2, or was he not asked back?

I kinda like the idea of a different director for each part, and maybe same writer for consistency.
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 2:19 PM on October 31, 2012


an enjoyable sequel to an iconic Sci-Fi property over 20 years later [linking to the imdb page for Tron: Legacy]

In all seriousness, Tron: Legacy was entirely frustrating for me, a deep deep fan of the original movie. It was GORGEOUS, really nicely stepped up the look-and-feel of the original. But...

... It entirely disposed of the metaphorical space in which TRON took place. It just turned it into this cool alternate universe where shit is different but every being you encounter is basically a person. There was absolutely no attempt made to honor the concept made clear in the original that these aren't people, they are computer programs. Most of them were basically UNIX daemons, with specific tasks related to being inside a computer. The metaphor extended to the environment, with water-like energy that the programs would consume to refresh themselves, specific locales which had specific computer functions (the I/O tower, for example)... It was a really amazing world which was created, that had its own internal logic that could be taken apart and examined outside of the movie-watching experience.

Tron: Legacy had very little of that, if any. It's as if the people writing the sequel looked at the original film, had absolutely NO idea about any of the symbols and metaphors being used, and said, "oh, hey! here's this cool alternate universe. We could write an adventure story which takes place here" and then did so without fully understanding anything which gave the original underlying depth and texture.

I'm not saying it's not a good movie. It was BEAUTIFUL and a lot of fun and I don't regret seeing it. It didn't make me feel poisoned or betrayed. It just didn't feel quite right to me on a lot of levels, in the context of the first movie.

Now, I seriously doubt anyone could possibly make that mistake with the Star Wars universe. It's far better developed in so many ways. While I may have things to complain about when it comes to the prequels, the one thing I can't complain about is them feeling like they're not really set in the same universe. I may not entirely appreciate the story being told, I may not necessarily like HOW it's being told, but I never once felt like the story wasn't a Star Wars story that was somehow just set in the Star Wars universe.

But that's how I felt about Tron: Legacy. It felt like it was just this story, which happened to be set in the Tron universe without any regard as to what made that universe special in the first place.

(I'm enjoying Tron: Uprising quite a bit, but feel generally about it the same way I feel about Tron: Legacy. It's really not the same universe at all as TRON. But man, it's a lot of fun to watch.)
posted by hippybear at 5:23 PM on October 31, 2012 [5 favorites]


Man, my head is still spinning from this. Dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria...
posted by Kevin Street at 5:30 PM on October 31, 2012


Bigelow directed the best war movie in decades and directed Swayze, Reeves, and Busey so well that they were actually in a good movie.

And one of the best vampire movies ever and one of the greatest sci-fi thrillers since Blade Runner.
posted by Senor Cardgage at 5:36 PM on October 31, 2012 [2 favorites]


Every aspect of Tron: Legacy is glorious except for all of the story and dialogue. If the visuals and soundtrack were wrapped around anything of substance it would be fantastic.
posted by Artw at 5:37 PM on October 31, 2012 [5 favorites]


I think I will wait and see how well Disney remakes (and markets... seriously people! Market your films!) The Black Hole before I freak out.

I watched the trailer for The Old Republic yesterday, and I think there are enough people who know how to do Star Wars "right".
posted by Mezentian at 5:55 PM on October 31, 2012


While I may have things to complain about when it comes to the prequels, the one thing I can't complain about is them feeling like they're not really set in the same universe.

I agree, but I think the prequels did do inestimable damage by artificially collapsing and connecting parts of the Star Wars universe together. One thing the original trilogy had going for it was the hinted at largeness of this world inhabited by different races of aliens, robots, cultures of people, monsters, etc. You had that in little subtle details like the droids not being allowed in the cantina, suggesting that droids are some kind of servant underclass, or C-3PO saying "Thank the maker!" as though it were part of some droid religion, never explained. You really got the sense that there were whole worlds out there.

But in the prequels, characters and storylines got unnaturally grafted together either out of a lack of imagination or just pandering to the base, so it turns out that not only did Anakin Skywalker grow up on the same planet that Luke was sent away to live on, but while he was there he also built C-3PO, and by the way Yoda hung out with Chewbacca at the Battle of Kashyyyk, and R2-D2 was there, and and... There was so much of the prequels that just felt like a kid banging Star Wars action figures together and making up ridiculous story lines. And the "expanded universe," despite the name, helped nothing, because all the expanded stories ever did was retcon the stupid stuff from the prequels in the most expedient way possible and/or add ludicrous explanations to "contextualize" those tiny details from the original movies, hence ruining them completely. Anyone who's spent quality time on wookieepedia will be familiar with cringeworthy "explanations" along the lines of "Mon Calamari were known for their trap-sensing abilities, so were often put in command of dangerous missions so they could detect traps and warn the others..." OK, that's not a real example, but not far off.

Anyway, that's why I think this is the best possible thing for Star Wars right now, because if there's one thing that Disney/Pixar is good at, it's creating an expansive imaginary world that just feels right, revealing just enough to leave you wanting more.
posted by albrecht at 5:59 PM on October 31, 2012 [11 favorites]


I do have to agree with you, albrecht. My eyes rolled so hard when I learned that Anakin was building C-3PO that I spent enough time searching for them in the theater after the movie was over the ushers kicked me out.
posted by hippybear at 6:02 PM on October 31, 2012 [2 favorites]


The Force and especially how it relates to Yoda is another example of what I mean: in the original trilogy, you really got the sense that there was so much to the Force that it would take someone hundreds of years to master it all--it started in the first movie with Luke using the Force in a very limited way, but then Yoda showed him how it basically unlocks everything, from telekinesis to clairvoyance and death/immortality. So why oh why does it make sense that Yoda, who can lift an entire ship out of the swamp with his mind and who says amazing things like "luminous beings are we, not this crude matter," would lead an army of troops in battle and then fight it out in a lightsaber duel with Count Dooku?! The prequels reduced the Force to a kind of videogame attack combo, where you can ForceChoke or ForcePush, but only if you've got enough ForcePoints (and there's a blood test for that!), etc. I really think they just ran out of ideas. What was, in the original trilogy, a whole philosophy and lifestyle got turned into something much smaller because they thought it would sell toys or something.
posted by albrecht at 6:16 PM on October 31, 2012 [5 favorites]


What was, in the original trilogy, a whole philosophy and lifestyle got turned into something much smaller because they thought it would sell toys or something.

One word: midichlorians.

With that single stroke, Lucas eliminated the concept that so many SW fans grew up with -- that if they could just learn how to tune in, THEY could find The Force. (I know, it's not a real thing, but that is how it was depicted in the original trilogy. And it was fodder for young fertile imaginations.)

And suddenly, it's not something everyone can do. You have to be BORN with the right number of THINGAMAJIGS or else it's impossible.

It's as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced.
posted by hippybear at 6:25 PM on October 31, 2012 [5 favorites]


It doesn't take a lot of $4billion to establish yourself and your children ranging from 21-31 in age up in the position of being well-funded for life. (And that's even if you aren't someone who has more money than he knows what to do with already.)

I say, good for him. His entire family is set, and education causes get a lot of money. It's exactly what I'd do if I were in his position.
posted by hippybear at 6:46 PM on October 31, 2012 [1 favorite]


I disagree. I just watched the original "Tron" and while it had lots of wonderful Moebius and Wendy Carlos stuff, the writing seemed even more stripped of the techno-utopian ideas that inspired Lisberger and McBird. The original Tron is a generic fantasy story, with geeks in cyberspace.

In some respects, I think Legacy was an extension of that. Give the grid 30 years of Moore's law and a creator willing to let his pet programs evolve through genetic algorithms and you might just get nightclubs, arenas, and dictators. (Don't forget that almost all of the original Tron was anthropomorphism for the sake of plot, from accounting programs on motorcycles to inter-program romances.)

CLU and MCP are almost the same monster. The biggest difference is that CLU is Flynn's creature and has a bit of a daddy complex, while the MCP doesn't care about humans, only control of their data. And while there's a few throwaway lines in both films about efficiency run amok, they're little more than window dressing.

albrecht: What was, in the original trilogy, a whole philosophy and lifestyle got turned into something much smaller because they thought it would sell toys or something.

There is that. I think Episodes I-III had a great story, but without the writing and direction to really sell the emotions necessary for the story to work. The result is religion performed and explained by the apathetic, lovers without romance, and "brothers" with even less emotion between them. It's not an acting problem, because veteran actors with a history of complex roles end up sounding canned and wooden.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 7:16 PM on October 31, 2012 [3 favorites]


Lucas promises to use bulk of Lucasfilm deal $ for education philanthropy

All to be earmarked for ESL classes.






The E stands for "Ewok."
posted by Sys Rq at 7:21 PM on October 31, 2012 [1 favorite]


Hey, you guys, maybe they will finally make a good Dune movie! And think of the awesome lunchboxes that we'll see at Target!
posted by wenestvedt at 7:30 PM on October 31, 2012


the writing seemed even more stripped of the techno-utopian ideas that inspired Lisberger and McBird

I don't think TRON had any techno-utopia ideas in it at all. It wasn't that kind of story or movie. It's a very small story about a man who has his video game ideas stolen from him as part of some office politics and does some cracker-jack hacking to get it back and restore his name and status within the company. That the hacking happens inside an anthropomorphic cyberspace is just a thing, it's not the actual story.

There's nothing techno-utopian about it at all. Or perhaps you can explain a bit better where you're coming from.
posted by hippybear at 7:31 PM on October 31, 2012


I don't think TRON had any techno-utopia ideas in it at all.

Tron was originally conceived and developed in the same broad social circle as Stewart Brand (Whole Earth Catalog, The WELL), Bill English, SRI, and people working for Xerox PARC. Some ideas about the free flow of information across networks for the benefit of people did make their way into the final script. When Lisberger brought the story to Disney (who allegedly had not yet seen a story treatment created with a word processor), they made substantial changes to the script and storyboards.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 8:01 PM on October 31, 2012


But in the prequels, characters and storylines got unnaturally grafted together either out of a lack of imagination or just pandering to the base,

Yeah, exactly. The original films were magical because they were about a scrappy group of hooligans living at the margins of the galaxy who managed to bring down the evil government. The prequels recentered the entire universe around them-- like there were only ever about twelve people who really mattered.
posted by shakespeherian at 8:18 PM on October 31, 2012 [2 favorites]


Tron was originally conceived and developed in the same broad social circle as Stewart Brand (Whole Earth Catalog, The WELL), Bill English, SRI, and people working for Xerox PARC.

That's interesting, but isn't like anything I've ever heard about this movie before. Do you have any citations you can link?
posted by hippybear at 8:19 PM on October 31, 2012


Maybe this is to assuage my fears of this ending up in the hands of Michael Bay or Zack Snyder, but... Two more names to throw out for the fantasy Star Wars directors league... Neil Blomkamp (District 9), and Duncan Jones (Moon).

I wonder if Jones met Lucas in his youth during the production of "Labrynth"?
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 8:35 PM on October 31, 2012 [1 favorite]


Zack Snyder would do something amazing with Star Wars, visually.

Duncan Jones would at least bring an authentic '70s look and clunky feel, but it would be basically a remake of Starcrash without any of the charm and action as plodding as the script.

Blomkamp can make Halo first. Or an Aliens movie.

Wait... Disney now owns Labyrinth? Would a sequel or a similar idea be too much to hope for?
I want to see children terrorised, and maybe a little confused once again.
posted by Mezentian at 8:45 PM on October 31, 2012


Wait... Disney now owns Labyrinth?

That's an interesting question. Labyrinth was a co-production of Henson Associates and LucasFilm. I have no idea who holds the actual rights to the film. I suspect it's less LucasFilm and more Henson, but there are likely others who have better information than I do. In any case, it's the Jim Henson Company who seems to have been pursuing a sequel in the following years (yielding MirrorMask quite a few years ago -- less a sequel and more "in the spirit of...").
posted by hippybear at 9:23 PM on October 31, 2012


CBrachyrhynchos: " Some ideas about the free flow of information across networks for the benefit of people did make their way into the final script."

Ah, so like the subplot in the first half-hour of Legacy where Sam liberates the source code for the latest version of EncomOS to the filesharing networks on the eve of its retail release then.
posted by radwolf76 at 9:32 PM on October 31, 2012


We open at Skywalker's academy in the whatever system

Sorry, that's gotta be scene two. Scene one, the complete destruction of Endor. The Ewoks brought an imbalance to The Force and they must be sacrificed to atone for their perverse existence.
posted by Ber at 9:48 PM on October 31, 2012


The Ewoks brought an imbalance to The Force and they must be sacrificed to atone for their perverse existence.

I don't know, blowing up Endor seems kind of ... evil. And it's not like there's a third Death Star around. And isn't Endor a gas giant?

Besides, the Forest Moon of Endor might spin off into infinity, and I doubt there are enough disco jumpsuits for all the Ewoks, much less the myriad other lifeforms on the moon.
posted by Mezentian at 9:52 PM on October 31, 2012


I'm sorry, I got some of the details wrong, it was consultation with Alan Kay at Xerox PARC according to this article. At any rate, it looks like the Lisberger and McBird were doing pre-production for Tron while consulting with people who were already talking about intelligent agents, massively decentralized networks, free exchange of information, hypertext, and ubiquitous computing in the '70s. A hint of "information wants to be free" does pop up in the script here and there.

Something that was also interesting to me from the standpoint of a Disney family film from '82 is (from weak memory) Flynn's snarky question to Alan about Lora's bedroom housekeeping, implying that Flynn and Lora were ex lovers. At least to me, it establishes Flynn as a bit of an asshole, but I thought that Disney at the time tended to dance around the idea of adult sexuality by putting the start of the relationship at the end of the movie.

Wait... Disney now owns Labyrinth?

Labyrinth, as far as I know, is still owned by The Henson Company, and they list it as one of their properties. It's my sense that they're (probably quite reasonably) picky about if and how any expansions are produced. I suspect that the best hope for seeing either a Labyrinth or Dark Crystal sequel will be if Del Toro's stop-motion Pinocchio changes the fortunes of the feature-film wing of the family business.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 10:04 PM on October 31, 2012


I knew there was a Dark Crystal sequel in development, but not Del Toro's doing Pinocchio.
That thought scares me a little.
posted by Mezentian at 10:09 PM on October 31, 2012


Regarding the posited 'destruction of Endor' plot point: a delightful fan chestnut.
posted by mwhybark at 11:43 PM on October 31, 2012


Hamill offers his reaction, including the one he had when he first heard about the sequels during a casual lunch with Lucas and Fisher.

I love how Hamill could be so bitter about still being mostly associated with Star Wars, yet he's still as much a geek as the rest of us and embraces the whole thing.

It dawned on me that Lucas insisted on Han surviving ROTJ because he didn't want to bum out the kids, yet it seems inevitable that most of Our Heroes will die in 7-9, or be dead already. (And Chewie dying in the EU doesn't count.)
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 2:47 AM on November 1, 2012


For everyone talking about a Pixar Grim Fandango movie... Pixar announced some time back that they were doing a movie based on Dia de los Muertos with Lee Unkrich at the helm. If LucasArts is part of this deal, the chance of it happening is, I would guess, astronomical.

Announced at that same event: The Untitled Pixar Movie That Takes You Inside The Mind
From director Pete Docter (“Up,” “Monsters, Inc.”) and producer Jonas Rivera (“Up”), the inventive new film will take you to a place that everyone knows, but no one has ever seen: the world inside the human mind.
Oh shit. Can you say Psychonauts: The Movie?
posted by Rhaomi at 4:41 AM on November 1, 2012 [1 favorite]


It's either that or a Pixar version of Herman's Head.
posted by hippybear at 5:40 AM on November 1, 2012


Rhaomi: Oh shit. Can you say Psychonauts: The Movie?

I sure can. It kind of merges well with phong3d's theory upthread that the "Untitled Pixar Day of the Dead Movie" was merely a placeholder for Grim Fandango.
posted by Rock Steady at 5:44 AM on November 1, 2012


Except Psychonauts was a DoubleFine production, published by Majesco, that had nothing to do with Lucas.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 5:52 AM on November 1, 2012


Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish: Except Psychonauts was a DoubleFine production, published by Majesco, that had nothing to do with Lucas.

Stop letting your reality get in the way of my Milla Vodello on the big screen!
posted by Rock Steady at 6:12 AM on November 1, 2012


I think the Psychonauts theory runs into the same problem as the Grim Fandango theory. Why would a company that can, overnight, create a million fans for their own in-house character designs simply by watermarking it with the company word mark need IP from two weakly-selling games?
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 6:18 AM on November 1, 2012 [2 favorites]


If Pixar was in the business of developing other people's art, we probably would have seen Howdy Doody, Herbie (or Busy Busy World), a Marice Sendak story, Mickey the cook, superheroes from one of the main universes, and a fish story using a minor character from Mermaid. Possibly another point against it is that movies based on video games have often been critically panned and box office flops. Why mess with complicated licensing agreements when you have the in-house talent and market muscle (possibly the most influential in the industry at this time) to promote that talent?
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 7:47 AM on November 1, 2012 [1 favorite]


I want to say something maybe I should have said before, in one of my many Phantom Menace rants.

I believe that in the 22 some odd years between Star Wars and the Phantom Menace, Lucas forgot how to make a movie. But I don't necessarily think he's got an evil heart. His issue is that he gets his head in the clouds and he's got nobody to resist his will, to temper his ideas.

I don't think it's an evil thing to be a toy maker. I don't think the prequels were cynical toy ads. I think Pixar and Cars 2 could be more readily charged with that.

I think that if some young dreamer approached George with a loopy plan, like, say to make an all practical effects Star Wars movie, he'd be way more likely to green-light something like that than the weird, nonhuman thing that is DisneyCorp. ever would.

That's probably what we've lost -- that oddball, human possibility.
posted by Trochanter at 8:08 AM on November 1, 2012


It's as if the people writing the sequel looked at the original film, had absolutely NO idea about any of the symbols and metaphors being used, and said, "oh, hey! here's this cool alternate universe. We could write an adventure story which takes place here"

...or, The Fate of Science Fiction in the Mainstream Culture Industry. What used to be called worldbuilding is now set design.
posted by RogerB at 9:24 AM on November 1, 2012 [1 favorite]


How about if the first script is written my Iain M. Banks? That should assuage the MeFi worries.
posted by Ber at 9:27 AM on November 1, 2012




Just as long as they don't start tapping writers from Bioware for scriptwriting.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 9:31 AM on November 1, 2012


That video is kind of surreal. I watched it without the audio, but it sort of came across as if Anakin Skywalker wanted to revisit the childhood that was lost to slavery and Jedi training...and he did it by going to Disneyland.
posted by Atreides at 11:26 AM on November 1, 2012 [1 favorite]


And now it seems Lucas is giving the proceeds to charity. Talk about a guy rising in people's estimation in a hurry.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 11:51 AM on November 1, 2012


Oh, I see you guys covered that already. Carry on.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 11:53 AM on November 1, 2012


Not to be too cynical, but he's giving the money to his own charity.

I'd make good and sure that his charity isn't too Wycleffy before flipping that Hero/Villain switch.
posted by Sys Rq at 12:13 PM on November 1, 2012


I didn't like episodes I to III, but I've never understood the personal animus expressed toward George Lucas. He's not a hero or a villain. He's a guy who makes movies. Some of them pretty good, some not. The movies matter a lot to me and I enjoy discussing them, but hating the guy is just silly.
posted by Area Man at 1:50 PM on November 1, 2012


Yeah, I don't get the, "George Lucas ruined my childhood!" thing. I just think he's a guy who overextended himself producing a trilogy of movies.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 2:36 PM on November 1, 2012


The People vs. George Lucas both gives pretty good context for the whole thing and does a good job of staying somewhat sympathetic to Lucas.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 2:58 PM on November 1, 2012 [1 favorite]


That documentary is currently on Netflix, worth a watch.
posted by Atreides at 4:35 PM on November 1, 2012


A spooky Halloween story.
posted by painquale at 4:37 PM on November 1, 2012


Netflix has suggested that I watch the documentary and I've avoided it because of the name. It really puts me off. I assumed the movie was a hit job.
posted by Area Man at 5:32 PM on November 1, 2012


No, it's actually completely awesome. Recommend it!
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 5:33 PM on November 1, 2012 [1 favorite]


I've avoided it because of the name.

It kind of screams fantitlement dickery.
posted by Artw at 5:56 PM on November 1, 2012


It kind of screams fantitlement dickery.

It brings balance to the Force.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 7:43 PM on November 1, 2012


I know we are all old and grumpy, so here's something I read today:

However, my own childhood experience of Star Wars began not in 1977 with its first film but in 1999 with the release of the most maligned of its prequels, The Phantom Menace. And you know what? For all the vitriol its name invites, that film blew my prepubescent mind. - ABC reporter Michael Collett.

As someone who didn't hate the prequels (but didn't exactly fall in love with them), I think what this person has written helps bring balance to the force too.
posted by Mezentian at 8:10 PM on November 1, 2012 [1 favorite]


For all the vitriol its name invites, that film blew my prepubescent mind

Fuck I'm so old.
posted by empath at 8:28 PM on November 1, 2012 [7 favorites]


What gets me is how people are so eager to chime in on their hatred of the prequels, in great detail, so many years after they were released. The movies I despise aren't nearly worth the effort it'd take to outline why I hate them.

On the other hand (of course), I think he deserves criticism for shunning the original trilogy theatrical cuts. It's how most of us first saw them. They're pieces of cinematic history. And to not have them available in the best quality is kind of a slap in the face to the guys who worked on the original effects. Which is odd considering he practically made the ILM guys celebrities in their own right.
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 9:14 PM on November 1, 2012 [1 favorite]


Via Den Of Geek: What did George Lucas ever do for us?

More than I realised.
posted by Mezentian at 4:44 AM on November 2, 2012 [1 favorite]


I don't think anyone else has posted this uproxx linkbait yet, but this was so charming I wanted to share: Darth rides Dumbo.
posted by Mezentian at 5:08 AM on November 2, 2012


The documentary does a good job of showing people's fascination with Star Wars prior to the prequels and then immediately following the release of Phantom Menace.

I enjoyed all the prequels, but perhaps its because I opted to allow moments I thought of as "classic Star Wars" to overwhelm those parts that gave everyone conniption fits. In every movie, there are good moments and scenes, with the balance between them growing more and more toward what I considered the "good stuff" versus the "Arggh...really George? stuff." Sometimes it was an attempt to ramrod too much exposition or the desire to insert "kiddie material" which ranged from fart jokes to the presence of an Anakin Skywalker cast too damn young. I even came to understand the presence of Jar-Jar, as failed an experiment that he became.

I think the frustration with Lucas was the result of the continual build up of him making decisions that seemed contrary to the original spirit of the original movies, such as the infamous who shot first (which comes up in the documentary). The fact that he continued to tinker with things over and over, with every release after every release, and every time declaring that this new variant was THE official representation of his vision, it grew old. It would not be so bad had he made available the theatrical versions in the same quality as the new stuff, but he didn't. The DVD release of the theatrical versions, in poor quality, as an accessory to the new stuff came across as a grudging after thought.

The movie isn't a hack job at all, but a generally decent documentary on how fans have changed in regard to Lucas and the franchise.
posted by Atreides at 6:43 AM on November 2, 2012 [1 favorite]


What gets me is how people are so eager to chime in on their hatred of the prequels, in great detail, so many years after they were released. The movies I despise aren't nearly worth the effort it'd take to outline why I hate them.

Cultural criticism often critiques works of dubious value. Even weak artistic creations reveal something about our society and storytelling, particularly when they're consumed in large quantities by that society.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 6:51 AM on November 2, 2012 [2 favorites]


However, my own childhood experience of Star Wars began not in 1977 with its first film but in 1999 with the release of the most maligned of its prequels, The Phantom Menace.

I thought that Attack of the Clones was generally considered to be the worst. I never saw TPM, to be honest, but EPII was pretty crappy.

What gets me is how people are so eager to chime in on their hatred of the prequels, in great detail, so many years after they were released.

I feel the same way about Jurassic Park 2. JP2 and Attack of the Clones really stand out as 2 of the "most worse" movies I've ever paid for.
posted by mrgrimm at 12:47 PM on November 2, 2012


I never saw TPM

Oh man, you are in for a treat. Not the movie as a whole, mind you, but the finale lightsaber battle between the two protagonists and the antagonist is really cool.
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 1:11 PM on November 2, 2012 [1 favorite]


I just watched the rifftrax of TPM last night and even with snark I found that lightsaber battle pretty boring, so I think YMMsortaV on that.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 1:14 PM on November 2, 2012


Ok, ok, the first few minutes aren't so great. But after they make it past those force fields it gets better.
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 1:27 PM on November 2, 2012


It just goes on and on with so much spinning and backflips and music to create false tension and gravity. I know it makes me just another crotchety old fan, but I'll take this any day.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 2:19 PM on November 2, 2012


I thought that Attack of the Clones was generally considered to be the worst. I never saw TPM, to be honest, but EPII was pretty crappy.

I had honestly forgotten most of TPM (I saw it when it came out, but I was pretty young), and so when a friend asked if I wanted to go see the 3D re-release a few months ago, I went along.

It's terrifically stupid, but worse than that, it's boring. Definitely worse than Attack of the Clones, in my opinion.
posted by kagredon at 2:20 PM on November 2, 2012 [2 favorites]


Also, one of the better parts of Episodes II and III is Ewan McGregor's performance, and he's given very little to do in Episode I.
posted by kagredon at 2:26 PM on November 2, 2012 [2 favorites]


but the finale lightsaber battle between the two protagonists and the antagonist is really cool.

It's well choreographed - perhaps overly choreographed - but it lacks any sort of emotional stakes. We're supposed to be excited because this mysterious, evil looking Sith dude is facing off with our Jedi heroes, but:

-we really have no clue who Darth Maul is or what he wants. He's a badass with a dual lightsabre and apparently that is supposed to be enough.
-Qui-Gon Jinn is also an enigmatic character - we have a sense that he's a bit of a rebel in the Jedi order, but we don't know why or what his philosophy is that is at odds with the rest of the Jedi. But he's a Jedi, so our rooting for him is assumed.

Really, the only moment of interest is the brief period after Qui-Gon is killed and Obi-Wan is in trouble, and I would argue that is only because we feel some emotional attachment to Obi-Wan from the original trilogy, because he sure didn't do much in TPM.

Contrast with all the lightsaber battles with Vader in the original films. Each one has high emotional stakes - Vader faces off against his old teacher and friend, culminating in the death/ascendance/sacrifice of Obi-Wan, the wise mentor character; Vader attempts to trap Luke and turn him to the darkside in a duel that batters an unprepared Luke both physically and emotionally as Vader dismantles him; Luke faces Vader in a final confrontation that is not about physically defeating him, but about Luke claiming his destiny and saving his father.

They might be less well choreographed than the one in TPM, but they are the ones I would rather watch.
posted by never used baby shoes at 2:41 PM on November 2, 2012 [6 favorites]


The fight choreography in the prequels was definitely flashy and kinetic in a way that sort of worked as spectacle, but it ultimately worked better as an ad for a notional lightsaber combat game than it did as a meaningfully engaging fight. The point of contrast in the Plinkett reviews at one point between the sort of detached balletic nature of the TPM fight with Darth Maul and the high-stakes, subtle-but-brutal percussiveness of Luke vs. Darth (and Luke really wailing at Darth at the end of their fight) is a good one. The prequel fights are all action figure fights, cool gimmicky ideas but not very good fight stories.
posted by cortex at 2:44 PM on November 2, 2012 [1 favorite]


Attack of the Clones is definitely the worst. It has the whole cringey, creepy love story where Christianson and Portman don't even seem to like each other, and are forced to utter a lot of hokey dialogue right out of a morbid 14 year-old emo kid's journal.
posted by chrchr at 2:47 PM on November 2, 2012


Alright, I retract my recommendation. I'm still going to like it, though.

-we really have no clue who Darth Maul is or what he wants. He's a badass with a dual lightsabre and apparently that is supposed to be enough.

Eh, as far as PM goes he's basically an attack dog. I never got the sense that he had any plans of his own.
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 2:48 PM on November 2, 2012


Boy, though, I went crazy over the Duel of the Fates music video that was released shortly before TPM. I haven't seen Season 4 yet of Clone Wars, and nothing of 5, so I'm pretty interested to see how Maul is handled in those.
posted by Atreides at 2:52 PM on November 2, 2012


Qui Gon is a rebel in the Jedi order, as is Obi Wan, as is Anakin. The Jedi order is entirely composed of rebels.
posted by Artw at 2:53 PM on November 2, 2012


They're an order of Space Drow.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 2:56 PM on November 2, 2012


I retract my recommendation. I'm still going to like it, though.

Not saying you shouldn't like it; go ahead! The first time I saw it I was impressed with it, but that impression hasn't lasted. The music that accompanies it is kickass though.

I never got the sense that he had any plans of his own.

Which is a waste of him as a character, I think. All he is in the film is the embodiment of the final boss challenge.
posted by never used baby shoes at 2:58 PM on November 2, 2012


The Jedi order is entirely composed of rebels.

Except that guy with the really long, thin neck. I bet he pretty much toes the line.
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 3:01 PM on November 2, 2012 [1 favorite]


Samuel L. Jackson is actually pretty straight laced.
posted by Artw at 3:07 PM on November 2, 2012


If I were feeling charitable toward Lucas, I'd say Maul's complete lack of agency reflects on Palpatine as a character - he doesn't want an equal or (god forbid) a potential successor, just an enforcer.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 3:11 PM on November 2, 2012


He sabotages subsequent Darths as well, with Anakin offing Dooku and prospective future Darth Luke set up to off Anakin. Shitiest manager ever.
posted by Artw at 3:15 PM on November 2, 2012 [1 favorite]


he doesn't want an equal or (god forbid) a potential successor, just an enforcer.

But then why is he so interested in Anakin?
posted by stebulus at 3:18 PM on November 2, 2012


When is really, really hot and cold on new hires and kind of a dick.
posted by Artw at 3:34 PM on November 2, 2012


He is interested in Anakin because he is the super powerful Jedi/Sith who will bring Balance to the Force, for reasons that I am sure they either never explained or were so boring I forgot.

That, or he really likes young dudes.
posted by Mezentian at 3:35 PM on November 2, 2012 [1 favorite]


Less understandable is Anakin cooperating with grooming Luke as his own replacement.
posted by Artw at 3:36 PM on November 2, 2012


Yeah, Maul just seemed like a dutiful acolyte to me. Not especially evil. Did we ever see him do anything dark-sidey? Anything remotely as evil as Young Darth's child murder scene? Which, I've said before, is just plain unforgivable? -- there's some stuff you just don't get redeemed for. Plus, it seemed to me that Maul just plain beat Liam in the big fight. Wouldn't it have been better if he'd cheated?
posted by Trochanter at 3:38 PM on November 2, 2012 [2 favorites]


I can understand wanting to ditch Chris Lee though - dude is no man's hench, and likely to off you and take over at any time.
posted by Artw at 3:42 PM on November 2, 2012 [1 favorite]


Vader has been mad with griefy-evil for 25(?) years by that point, and maybe (in universe) they've decided to break the rule of always two there are.

And maybe Anakin and Palpatine really, really like Gladiator movies.
posted by Mezentian at 3:43 PM on November 2, 2012


Less understandable is Anakin cooperating with grooming Luke as his own replacement.

I don't remember if it's explained in the movies or just alluded to and then made explicit in the EU, but apparently Palpatine's management strategy (heh) is standard for the Sith--you're only supposed to ever have one Master and one Apprentice, and it just becomes a question of who can betray the other first. I figure that Vader was always planning to either off Luke before the Emperor got too far with him, or use him to dispose of the Emperor and then take over.

Then again, Anakin doesn't seem all that bright or savvy, so....
posted by kagredon at 3:46 PM on November 2, 2012


Kinda hard to cheat at a no-rules swordfight to the death. I suppose you could have him kick the dog with a fake submission and emotional plea and then a quick stab in the back, but that'd be pretty implausible as a gambit for such a blank-slate boogeyman character.
posted by cortex at 3:46 PM on November 2, 2012


Darth Tyrannas in Clone Wars doesn't do much, does he? He just kinda toots around the universe being a dick to all his allies and being more competent than Grevious.

Yeah, Maul just seemed like a dutiful acolyte to me. Not especially evil. Did we ever see him do anything dark-sidey?

Not in the movies, but he was a seething ball of hate even before his legs got cut off and replaced with mechanical spider legs, and he and his other decided to kill all the Jedi and the Sith, and... something to do with Force Witches.

Of course, it occurs to me that Assage Ventress was probably being groomed to off someone as Sideous' apprentice.

So, in conclusion: I really don't think they have a strong continuity happening (or continuities).
posted by Mezentian at 3:48 PM on November 2, 2012 [1 favorite]


Re: Cheating in the swordfight:
I was thinking maybe he bests Obiwan and Liam has to sacrifice himself, or something...
posted by Trochanter at 3:48 PM on November 2, 2012


Yeah, Maul just seemed like a dutiful acolyte to me. Not especially evil. Did we ever see him do anything dark-sidey? Anything remotely as evil as Young Darth's child murder scene? Which, I've said before, is just plain unforgivable? -- there's some stuff you just don't get redeemed for. Plus, it seemed to me that Maul just plain beat Liam in the big fight. Wouldn't it have been better if he'd cheated?

But! You know! He's scary looking! Therefore evil!
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 3:50 PM on November 2, 2012


Assage Ventress is pretty much the best one, and she's not even a proper Darth.
posted by Artw at 3:52 PM on November 2, 2012


I figure that Vader was always planning to either off Luke before the Emperor got too far with him, or use him to dispose of the Emperor and then take over.

The later is the exact proposition Vader makes to Luke in ESB - unite to overthrow the Emperor and rule the galaxy as father and son.
posted by never used baby shoes at 3:59 PM on November 2, 2012 [2 favorites]


Nooooooooooooo!
posted by Artw at 4:02 PM on November 2, 2012


And of course then there's this bullshit.
posted by Artw at 4:08 PM on November 2, 2012


Darth Tenebrous is in the house!
posted by Mezentian at 4:12 PM on November 2, 2012


Oh my:
Darth Tenebrous, had been searching for the right apprentice to train for the sole purpose of eventually possessing through the virulent midi-chlorians he had dubbed "maxi-chlorians" in order for his consciousness to survive until the creation of the Chosen One.[5] Years after his meeting with Damask, Tenebrous discovered another Force-sensitive Muun—a lower-caste female—and conscripted her as a disciple, for she was not strong enough in the Force to be considered for apprenticeship. Tenebrous, using Bith scientific methods, had predicted that the offspring of Damask and his disciple would be strong in the Force. For this purpose, he tasked his Muun disciple to seduce Caar Damask and bear him a child.

My head hurts.
posted by Mezentian at 4:13 PM on November 2, 2012


There's so much to giggle at in that wiki entry, not in the least the worst SW name ever: "Hego Damask"
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 4:15 PM on November 2, 2012


the worst SW name ever: "Hego Damask"?

Savage Oppress wishes to challenge for the title.

I actually thought Hego Damask was Ice Cream Guy's name. And what about the Elan Sleazebaggano?
I'm afraid of wasting valuable time and braincells on the hunt for worst SW name ever.... but Hego Damask sounds like he wants to sell me space insurance, which seems fair enough for a member of the Banking Clan.
posted by Mezentian at 4:24 PM on November 2, 2012 [2 favorites]


"Darth Maul - but yellow!"

Yeah, that's kind of crap.
posted by Artw at 4:34 PM on November 2, 2012


Thank you never used baby shoes, as I read through the comments I was screaming that inside my head!

I have always presumed that the whole "master and apprentice" thing was like a cell deployment organization. Cause, you know, the Sith were then only one freak food poisoning or turbo lift accident away from extinction, if it wasn't.

... Or one Jedi like his father before him, from the same.
posted by Atreides at 8:33 PM on November 2, 2012


Re: Dooku in Clone Wars. He was a pretty fun, if limited, villain in the movies. His smug and snark ways were a nice step up from Maul.

But from what I've seen up through season 3, his animated version is more of the typical sullen, dour type villain, which is a shame.
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 9:05 PM on November 2, 2012


Nobody tell TWF about Birdemic.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 9:53 PM on November 2, 2012 [2 favorites]


Qui Gon is a rebel in the Jedi order, as is Obi Wan, as is Anakin.

Obi-Wan wasn't nearly the rebel we all assumed going in. If anything, he struggles to keep both his master and apprentice in line. But like was mentioned, he was one of the better things about II and III.

As for Ep I, here's my simple but wordy fix: Keep Qui-Gon on the ship on Tatooine and send out Obi-Wan, who hopes to prove himself to his master by getting the ship parts. He's brash and smugly asserts his authority over Padme (who, as actual Queen, asserts herself just as much).

They bicker and inject some life into the movie, but over the course of the trilogy they establish a sibling-like friendship. This also sets up another emotional layer as they deal with Anakin's descent. (The main trio in IV-VI all had a strong link amongst each other, but in I-III, it's only about Anakin's relationships with the other two.)

Obi-Wan also gets to discover and try to train Anakin (duh), whose potential has a profound, humbling impact on Obi-Wan. Still, Padme is irritated, but has a soft spot for the kid (granted, he should be a teenager).

Being less restrained than Qui-Gon, maybe Obi-Wan actually coaxes some funny out of Jar Jar. And he screws up the mind trick on Watto, which not only emphasizes his inexperience, but would be a funny callback to his mind trick in IV. This group would also better echo the "ragtag bunch" quality of Luke and co, without having a copycat makeup.

With Qui-Gon on the ship, maybe Maul tracks it down and breaks in and scares the hell out of everyone (a la Alien). A frantic duel breaks out within the constricted spaces before breaking outside. Qui-Gon holds him off as Obi-Wan returns and the ship takes off. Although, Qui-Gon dying right there could parallel Obi-Wan's death in IV, while adding more tension to the final duel with Maul.

That would've been cool, right?
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 10:10 PM on November 2, 2012 [3 favorites]


Ok, you guys. I'm at Disneyland and literally stepped out of Captain EO 20 minutes ago and my whole perspective on this has flipped. That was written by Lucas, starred Angelica Houston, and was directed by Francis Ford Coppola and is, without hyperbole, the worst thing of any kind ever created by humanity. We are doomed. Doomed, I tell you.

Of the 33 films Francis Ford Coppola has directed, three are excellent and the rest are mediocre at best. That's a terrible batting average.

I've never really understood his appeal. His work, when it's halfway competent, is indistinguishable from any random studio-grade director-for-hire. It very often doesn't even meet that standard. There's just nothing special there.

Yes! Episode III should have been - in an edited form and with better dialogue - directed by Coppola.

It would have been very slightly better. Maybe. I hate to think it could have been any worse, but if anyone could do it, it's Coppola.
posted by Sys Rq at 10:41 PM on November 2, 2012 [1 favorite]


Now I can dust off that script I wrote a while back and send it into Disney and at last the world can know the adventures of Darth Black, Darth Evil, Darth Gun, Darth Sword, Darth Guisarmes Voulge, and Darth To The Music Of Time!
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 7:32 AM on November 3, 2012


Darth Lucerne, the Sith Hammer.
posted by Artw at 8:03 AM on November 3, 2012 [2 favorites]


Darth Gygaxian Pikechart.
posted by Artw at 8:06 AM on November 3, 2012 [1 favorite]


Darth Banhammer
Darth Regret
Darth Rejection
Darth Complicated
Darth Trogdor
Darth Infection
Darth :(
posted by Rock Steady at 8:27 AM on November 3, 2012


A fun game to play is to assume that most Sith names came from taking a word that starts In, and dropping that (Darth (In)Vader, Darth (In)Sidious)

You get things like:

Darth Flexible
Darth Fertile
Darth Able
Darth Accurate
Darth Dependent
Darth Fallible
Darth Obedient

and so forth. Over beers with (geek) friends, it can get pretty funny.
posted by never used baby shoes at 8:45 AM on November 3, 2012


Darth Gimp
posted by homunculus at 8:51 AM on November 3, 2012


Darth Sufferable
posted by Sys Rq at 8:51 AM on November 3, 2012


never used baby shoes: A fun game to play is to assume that most Sith names came from taking a word that starts In, and dropping that

Darth Ternal
Darth Somnia
Darth Sect
Darth Formation
posted by Rock Steady at 8:58 AM on November 3, 2012 [1 favorite]


Surely then Darth Tercourse would be a popular Halloween costume.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 9:03 AM on November 3, 2012 [3 favorites]


I forgot one of my favourites:

Darth Sane
posted by never used baby shoes at 9:10 AM on November 3, 2012


I like:

Darth Solence
Darth Ception
Darth Surrect
Darth Herit
Darth Trepid
Darth Finity
Darth Sulin
Darth Fomercial
Darth Stagram
Darth Ternet, explorer
posted by painquale at 9:39 AM on November 3, 2012 [1 favorite]


Surely then Darth Tercourse would be a popular Halloween costume.

With any luck not succeeded by Darth Fection and Darth Flammation (or a stay in Darth Tensive Care). As a Darth Sider's tip has it, you have to be Darth Telligent about these things. Darth Decision and Darth Toxication can lead to bad emotional Darth Vestments.
posted by RogerB at 9:50 AM on November 3, 2012


Darth Maul of the Americas
posted by Trochanter at 9:55 AM on November 3, 2012 [1 favorite]


Darth Diegogo
posted by painquale at 9:56 AM on November 3, 2012


Darth Like Flynn
posted by Trochanter at 9:58 AM on November 3, 2012


Darth Agoddadavida
posted by Trochanter at 10:01 AM on November 3, 2012 [2 favorites]


Darth Cognito
Darth Jurious
Darth Iquity
Darth Quisitor
Darth Jera
Darth Yoface
posted by painquale at 10:04 AM on November 3, 2012


Darth Nsmouth, who we all remember from Lovecraft's lone venture into precognitive Star Wars fanfic.
posted by cortex at 10:09 AM on November 3, 2012 [2 favorites]


Darth Kwell
Darth N
posted by Rock Steady at 10:11 AM on November 3, 2012


Darth The Midnight Hour, Babe, More More More
posted by stebulus at 11:00 AM on November 3, 2012


Darth Nocuous
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 11:44 AM on November 3, 2012


Darth Ferno
Darth Terlock
Darth Ertia
Darth Kling
Darth XS
Darth N-Out
Darth Igo Montoya
posted by painquale at 11:47 AM on November 3, 2012


Darth God We Trust
posted by painquale at 11:51 AM on November 3, 2012


Darth Breeding
posted by koeselitz at 11:54 AM on November 3, 2012




Darth Beanplater
posted by homunculus at 12:05 PM on November 3, 2012


I've been thinking about the Star Wars films in general, as in, what are they shared attributes of the six films? What elements should we expect in a Star Wars films? This is in terms of everything from plot devices wipes transitions, and sort of a came up with this mental list:
  • Every movie starts with a shot in space following the end of the scrolling text.
  • Every first movie involves Tattoine (really - we can leave the sand planet behind).
  • Generally, the movies conclude with two or more different action/story events occurring simultaneously, i.e., ESB - Vader/Luke dueling and Solo/Leia and Co. escape from Cloudy City or Anakin's space battle above Naboo, duel between Jedi/Sith in palace, and Amidala's efforts to capture Trade Federation leaders or RTJOJ capture of shield generator and Luke/Vader/Emperor/Space Battle...etc.
  • Presence of one or two characters as comic devices, R2D2/C3P-O and Jar Jar Binks.
  • Speed - in space or on the ground.
  • At least one giant, massive creature per trilogy - Space Slug ESB, underwater monsters in PM.
  • Lightsaber duels, of course.
  • Female leadership: Mon Mothma, RTOJ, Princess Leia original trilogy, and Amidala in new trilogy.
  • The use of wipes in transition from scene to scene.
  • John Williams scored a la symphonic scores.
  • Mentors die in the first film of a trilogy.
  • Romance blossoms in second film of a trilogy.
  • A city is located in an exotic geographic location in the second film of a trilogy - on a sea in AoTC and in the clouds in ESB.
  • A battle involves furry people in the third film of a trilogy.
  • Asteroids play an important role in the second film of a trilogy.
  • Trash/Scrap collectors play a role in the first film of a trilogy.
Hrm, just a few thoughts there! Should any or all of these be expected in Episode VII?
posted by Atreides at 1:01 PM on November 3, 2012


Atreides, you could look at those as running themes but you could also look at them as a complete failure of imagination.
posted by localroger at 1:19 PM on November 3, 2012


Shakespeare is all just kings and crossdressing, really.
posted by Artw at 1:26 PM on November 3, 2012 [4 favorites]


Shakespeare doesn't have nearly enough Darths.
posted by painquale at 2:59 PM on November 3, 2012


Oh man, and I thought the Disney-Star Wars jokes were getting out of hand...
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 4:22 PM on November 3, 2012


Shakespeare doesn't have nearly enough Darths.

Darth Laertes.
posted by Artw at 4:35 PM on November 3, 2012


Darth Rosencrantz and Darth Guildenstern. Always two there are.
posted by homunculus at 4:53 PM on November 3, 2012 [1 favorite]


Darth Board.
posted by Atreides at 6:07 PM on November 3, 2012 [2 favorites]


Darth Shadow
Darth Q-Bert
Darth Jazzy Jeff
posted by koeselitz at 6:10 PM on November 3, 2012


Darth Vader tells other Disney-owned characters that he’s their father

Also: Darth Fresh Prince (Always two there are.)

"In West Mos Eisley I was born and raised
In Watto's shop where I spent most of my days
Sweeping out, fixing, slavin' all cool
And all racin' some pods outside of the school
When a couple of Jedi said "we're needing some parts"
Started making trouble in my neighbourhood
I got in one little race and my mom got scared
And said "you're moving with these creepy Jedi or Coruscant..."

And that's why I don't write musical parodies.
posted by Mezentian at 7:35 PM on November 3, 2012 [3 favorites]


I think we might have gotten away from the "Darth (In)Something" theme here, although honestly it was becoming a little Darth Ane.
posted by JHarris at 6:41 AM on November 4, 2012


Darth I've Created A Monster
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 9:47 AM on November 4, 2012


Oh and Darth Darth Revolution
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 9:48 AM on November 4, 2012


Oh Darth, where art thou?
posted by arcticseal at 10:52 AM on November 4, 2012


It's a world of screams, a world of tears
It's a world of hate and a world of fears
There's so much that we share that its time we're aware
It's a Darth world after all
It's a Darth world after all
It's a Darth world after all
It's a Darth world after all
There is just one battle station (that's no moon) and one giants laser
And fear will keep the local systems in line
Though the Emperor conquer and the stormtroopers shoot
It's a Darth world after all
It's a Darth world after all
It's a Darth world after all
It's a Darth world after all
It's a Darth, Darth world
posted by Mezentian at 11:23 PM on November 4, 2012 [1 favorite]


Darth and the world Darths with you
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 10:39 AM on November 5, 2012 [1 favorite]


I came here to chew bubble gum and Darth Vader, and I'm all out of bubble gum.
posted by gauche at 10:53 AM on November 5, 2012


Sith and you Sith alone.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 10:59 AM on November 5, 2012 [1 favorite]


Imma let you guys finish Dartherbating, but I just wanted to say that the Disney made Tron: Uprising has consistently risen in my esteem over the past season and IMO just peaked to Cowboy Bebop/GitS/Samurai Champloo levels with it's most recent episode, #10.
posted by P.o.B. at 1:56 PM on November 5, 2012


Is it available online?
posted by Atreides at 3:51 PM on November 5, 2012


But can it be as good ad Clone Wars or Scooby Doo?
posted by Artw at 3:52 PM on November 5, 2012


I actually do think Tron: Uprising is better than Clone Wars. Which we both know is not a light statement to make because Clone Wars is some of the best stuff to come out of the Star Wars universe in a few good years.
posted by P.o.B. at 4:14 PM on November 5, 2012 [1 favorite]


Their Star Trek is largely forgotten...
posted by Artw at 4:19 PM on November 5, 2012


There was Droids
posted by P.o.B. at 4:19 PM on November 5, 2012


And that fucking Ewok cartoon...
posted by Artw at 4:20 PM on November 5, 2012


I want a portal to an alternate universe where Hanna-Barbera bought the Star Wars franchise in 1979

I want an EM sniffer into the universe where they made five seasons of Johnny Quest, THEN bought the Star Wars animation rights.
posted by localroger at 6:50 PM on November 5, 2012


Breaking: Harrison "Han Motherfucking Solo" is open to the idea of Star Wars VI. Maybe. In some capacity.
posted by Mezentian at 7:05 AM on November 6, 2012


That's be the seal of doom.
posted by Artw at 7:06 AM on November 6, 2012


*nukes the fridge*
posted by Sys Rq at 7:21 AM on November 6, 2012


That was one of his better recent movies!
posted by Artw at 7:29 AM on November 6, 2012


*nukes the fridge*

Almost as crazy as using an inflatable raft to survive a drop of thousands of feet from a moving airplane AND just happen to land in a body of water.

It would be incredibly strange to meet Old Man Solo, or rather, "Get Your Ball Off My Falcon!" Man.
posted by Atreides at 8:52 AM on November 6, 2012 [1 favorite]


Breaking: Harrison "Han Motherfucking Solo" is open to the idea of Star Wars VI. Maybe. In some capacity.

"Look, I ain't in this for your story, and I'm not in it for you, Kathleen. I expect to be well paid. I'm in it for the money."
posted by entropicamericana at 9:01 AM on November 6, 2012 [2 favorites]


Since you all might be electioned out, why not enjoy Topless Robot's "Best/Worst Moments in Ep VII" competition?
posted by Mezentian at 2:34 PM on November 6, 2012


That's be the seal of doom.

Am now writing the screenplay for Indiana Jones and the Seal of Doom.

It's either going to be set in a notary's office or the arctic (or maybe both). Haven't decided yet.
posted by never used baby shoes at 3:27 PM on November 6, 2012 [1 favorite]


Almost as crazy as using an inflatable raft to survive a drop of thousands of feet from a moving airplane AND just happen to land in a body of water.

No, no, no. The inflatable raft landed on a steep, snow-covered mountain slope, and they slid down it like a toboggan ride, reducing their speed (somewhat). Then they went off the cliff and landed in the river, but that was just a few hundred feet.

It could happen.
posted by zardoz at 3:53 PM on November 6, 2012 [5 favorites]


Eclectic Method - Disney Wars
posted by homunculus at 3:56 PM on November 6, 2012




Interesting... He might be a good choice.
posted by Kevin Street at 4:01 PM on November 8, 2012 [1 favorite]


Another site seems to have confirmed it, and that he's done treatments for the whole trilogy.

Sounds like a genuine fan, instead of the guys who did Transformers ("We totally respect the source material, honest!").

Speaking of which, that site also unfortunately mentions that a Transformers 4 in the works. I guess it couldn't all be good news today.
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 7:01 PM on November 8, 2012


He's not keeping the $4 billion.
posted by Melismata at 2:26 PM on November 9, 2012


Yep, Toy Story 3/Little Miss Sunshine writer confirmed. And a whole bunch of directors who probably we never in contention anyway (Kevin Smith? Tarrantino? Spielberg?) are walking away from any suggestion they would be interested.

And Gullielmo Del Toro is making (or trying to make) a Justice League Dark movie.

So, to recap:
Disney owns everything, and is making a Rocket Raccoon movie, and Warners/DC has made more progress on an offshoot version of the Justice League than it has on your actual JLA.
posted by Mezentian at 9:16 PM on November 9, 2012 [1 favorite]


Not looking forward to the Toy Story/Star Wars jokes, but Star Wars is sort of a cross between Buzz and Woody, isn't it?

Apparently Bird is set to direct a movie written by Damon Lindelof (for Disney). I wonder if there's any chance he'd drop everything to do SW VII. Spielberg doing IX would be kind of a cool way to wrap up the trilogy.
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 11:22 PM on November 9, 2012




Could Disney buy Dungeons & Dragons?
posted by Artw at 7:07 PM on November 11, 2012


Could Disney buy Dungeons & Dragons?

That sounds familiar.

Also, Celestia, Luna & Cadance would make lovely Disney Princesses.
posted by radwolf76 at 7:14 PM on November 11, 2012 [1 favorite]


Mezentian: "Rocket Raccoon movie"

what
posted by DoctorFedora at 11:20 PM on November 11, 2012 [1 favorite]




Can Star Wars 7 have an old Han Solo reminiscing about shooting Greedo first? And other people tell him he's remembering it wrong?
posted by crossoverman at 7:13 PM on November 12, 2012 [1 favorite]


Chewie was the only other person in the bar who could even remember that, and Han was so cool when he did it, I gather it wasn't an uncommon event, so he may not even remember.

Now, the Rodians having three arms? Even Clone Wars and The Phantom Menace has disproved that rubbish. Also: my Kenna Greedo figure has only two arms.
One more than the drummer from Def Leppard, one less than Special Edition Greedo.
posted by Mezentian at 3:10 AM on November 13, 2012


Now, the Rodians having three arms? Even Clone Wars and The Phantom Menace has disproved that rubbish. Also: my Kenna Greedo figure has only two arms.
One more than the drummer from Def Leppard, one less than Special Edition Greedo.


a perfect medium
posted by kagredon at 9:33 AM on November 13, 2012


According to Blastr (or EW), Disney is planning 2-3 Star Wars-themed movies a year.

Salt, anyone?
posted by Mezentian at 3:44 PM on November 15, 2012


According to Blastr (or EW), Disney is planning 2-3 Star Wars-themed movies a year.

Look, I think the universe is flexible enough for this to be possible, even if it's not necessary or warranted. I'd have thought they might want to get through the next trilogy before they start trying to extend the brand.

I am tiring of the Marvel movies now that The Avengers has been released, but I guess each character has fans of their own, so the Iron Man, Capt America, Thor fans might be part of some kind of "niche blockbusters" since surely there's a diminishing rate of returns on these now. It can't stay at Avengers box office levels forever.

But Star Wars could try this out. The EU suggests there are lots of great stories to be told in the SW universe. But man... 2 or 3 a year? Don't kill your golden wampa too quickly, Disney.
posted by crossoverman at 4:00 PM on November 15, 2012


I'm hoping they're counting direct-to-DVD productions in that.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 4:54 PM on November 15, 2012




Hollywood Reporter is now stating as fact (albeit unconfirmed) that "Lawrence Kasdan and Simon Kinberg have closed deals to write installments of the new Star Wars trilogy".

That could be exciting.
posted by Mezentian at 2:34 PM on November 21, 2012 [2 favorites]


Kasdan would sweeten the pot for me, although I'd still wait for reviews and recommendations before spending any money on it. Good writers so often get screwed by directors and studio that it's not an automatic sell.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 3:17 PM on November 21, 2012


One Star Wars movie every two or three years would be cool, two or three every year is insane, even if they were movies that focused on other characters in the same universe. As a franchise, Star Wars is more like James Bond than Marvel Comics. It's a central story about a fairly small (albeit growing) group of characters.

But Lawrence Kasdan writing a new Star Wars movie? AWESOME!
posted by Kevin Street at 3:44 PM on November 21, 2012


"Lawrence Kasdan and Simon Kinberg have closed deals to write installments of the new Star Wars trilogy".

If only Kasdan had been asked to polish the scripts for the Prequel Trilogy. Ah well, looking forward to his contribution to Episodes VIII and IX.
posted by crossoverman at 6:12 PM on November 21, 2012


I don't do the tweet thing, so this thread has been my place for updates. Unfortunately, I see that Bird has tweeted that he won't be directing 7, at least.

Kasdan's presence is definitely reassuring, in that the storylines likely won't go off into some crazy new direction. Weird that the news is so vague: so he might just do 8 or 9?

My second reaction was that, yeah, I wish he'd been involved in the prequels (the world might be a happier place...). On the one hand, his work hasn't seemed particularly prosperous the last couple decades. On the other, he didn't seem too busy to contribute either.

And I liked most of the names on that directors list until it got to MacFarlane, when I suddenly got nauseous. It was bad enough that he almost got his hands on the Flintstones (though it seems we've been spared).
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 7:24 PM on November 21, 2012


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