Disney buys Lucasfilm, Star Wars Episode VII due in 2015

[Custard]

The announcement that Disney have purchased LucasFilm, and are planning to make Star Wars Episode 7 sent shockwaves throughout the film community.

But it's important to remember that it's a film that's been mooted since the earliest days of the franchise.

According to Mark Hamill Lucas has been planning Star Wars Episode VII for quite a while, they dicussed it on the set of the original movie...

"He talked about doing a VII, VIII, IX. You know when I first did this, it was four trilogies. 12 movies! And out on the desert, any time between setups... lots of free time. And George was talking about this whole thing. I said, 'Why are you starting with IV, V and VI? It's crazy.'

"[Imitating Lucas] 'It's the most commercial section of the movie.' He said the first trilogy's darker, more serious. And the impression I got, he said, 'Um, how'd you like to be in Episode IX?' This is 1976. 'When is that going to be?' '2011.'

"I defy anyone to add 36 years to their lives and not be stunned. Even an eight year old is like, 'No, I'll never be 47.' So I did the math and figured out how old I'd be. I said, 'Well, what do you want me to do?' He said, 'You'll just be like a cameo. You'll be like Obi Wan handing the lightsaber down to the next new hope.'

"And I'm thinking, 'I love the guy. If he wanted me to do light yard work at his house, I'd be out clipping the hedges.' So I went, 'Sure.' But I thought he just realized that he's going to be doing it the rest of his life and he'd rather not do that."

When the prospect of a TV series was brought up, Hamill went into outright denial. "See, the thing is, on one hand, the way I look at it is there was a beginning, a middle and an end and it's over. Even though it's never over. But for me it's over. But what'll happen is these fans will come over, 'But you just became a Jedi. Now what happens? It's like doing the story of how 007 got his license to kill and then not telling any stories.'

"So I said, 'I wish my agent had this much passion.' They really want me to do these stories. I loved it all, I really did, but I never in my mind ever thought it would be something I'd be talking about this long."

So, um, yeah. Here come 32 further films

How long til The Matrix returns, then?

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Nicely done.

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According to Mark Hamill Lucas has been planning Star Wars Episode VII for quite a while, they dicussed it on the set of the original movie...

"He talked about doing a VII, VIII, IX. You know when I first did this, it was four trilogies. 12 movies! And out on the desert, any time between setups... lots of free time. And George was talking about this whole thing. I said, 'Why are you starting with IV, V and VI? It's crazy.'

"[Imitating Lucas] 'It's the most commercial section of the movie.' He said the first trilogy's darker, more serious. And the impression I got, he said, 'Um, how'd you like to be in Episode IX?' This is 1976. 'When is that going to be?' '2011.'

"I defy anyone to add 36 years to their lives and not be stunned. Even an eight year old is like, 'No, I'll never be 47.' So I did the math and figured out how old I'd be. I said, 'Well, what do you want me to do?' He said, 'You'll just be like a cameo. You'll be like Obi Wan handing the lightsaber down to the next new hope.'

In the 1990s I was vaguely aware that Lucas planned to do up to at least 9 films, but it always seemed that in episodes 7-9 Luke would be turning to the dark side (echoing what was his father was to do in the prequel trilogy).  I thought going up to episode 9 would leave the series on a sour note unless there were then three more films covering Luke's redemption, to echo Vader's at the end of episode 6.  All in all these extensions of the story seemed pretty pointless with episodes 4-6 already told, but that would explain the "12 movies" anticipated above.

I don't think Lucas has had serious plans to continue beyond 6 films though, because with the two trilogies now existing it's not Luke's story being emphasised, but that of his father.  Lucas revised the end of 'Return of the Jedi' to confirm this.  The young Anakin, played by Hans Christian-Anderson or whatever he's called, turns up as if these films are his arc.  Pointless if episodes 4-12 are Luke's journey.

I suspect any vague intentions Lucas had for future films aren't important now anyway.  What they'll do is have Luke handing on the lightsaber, as they say, in one of the next three films, and then Shameless Custard is correct - we'll get 'Star Wars: The New Batch' thereafter, and absolutely fucking loads of it.

[Jemble Fred]

The thing is, since LOTR, each entire Star Wars trilogy edited together isn't much longer than just one dollop of Jackson's self-indulgence anyway.

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"[Imitating Lucas] 'It's the most commercial section of the movie.' He said the first trilogy's darker, more serious.

"Trade embargoes - they're serious" thought Lucas.  "Much more serious than what kids like, anyway." 

Somewhere along the line he must have turned this concept of "serious" into a synonym of "dark" rather than "boring".  Quite an interesting insight into his mind really.

[mobias]

So if they did parts VII to IX would they get wrinkly old Mark Hammill, even wrinklier old Harrison Ford and positively mental looking Carrie Fisher to come back as older versions of the beloved characters or would they do a Star Trek and re-cast them? Had would it work?

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So if they did parts VII to IX would they get wrinkly old Mark Hammill, even wrinklier old Harrison Ford and positively mental looking Carrie Fisher to come back as older versions of the beloved characters or would they do a Star Trek and re-cast them? Had would it work?

I suspect they'll just have Hamill in as an Obi-Wan figure for a short while, playing a similar kind of role as Alec Guinness for a new chosen Jedi or group of them.  Can't see the rest being involved.

If they'd done episodes 7-9 from 1997 instead of episodes 1-3, I imagine there would have been more of an emphasis on telling a longer arc with Luke (feasibly going up to episode 12) that did lots of rhyming with episodes 4-6, but given Hamill's age that's unlikely to happen now.

[Custard]

I don't think Ford would touch it with a bargepole (what lights up and makes a whoosh noise, and will be in the shops for christmas)

But, well, he helped shite on the goodwill Indiana Jones built up, so who knows?

Personally, I'd quite like them to just leave the original cast and characters, and plan out a whole new run of films. Cos honestly, who wants to see the 2014 Mark Hamill swing a lightsabre about, like some kind of mad uncle at chucking out time

Actually, that sounds quite good

But yeah, new director, new writers, new stories, new everything. Someone offer Duncan Jones ten bags of gold to do it, and lock Lucas out of the edit room

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Cos honestly, who wants to see the 2014 Mark Hamill swing a lightsabre about, like some kind of mad uncle at chucking out time

Or like Yoda in episode 2 or was it 3.

[MojoJojo]

Has no one noticed the obvious thing - Star Wars is aimed at kids. Lucas doesn't care about adults - at least since Return of the Jedi and the ewoks.


Yes yes yes - Trade embargo's aren't something kids should play with. But what exactly was wrong with the empire in the original films - ruthless towards rebels and they killed Luke's parents for no apparent reason. But Darth Vader was black like a foreigner and had a baddy voice, so they were obviously baddies - just like the bad guys in the prequels. Its not like the target audience can read anyway.

[Custard]

I'd love a Darth Maul spin-off

He was soooooooo great mate

Good die young

[Big Jack McBastard]

I suspect they'll just have Hamill in as an Obi-Wan figure for a short while, playing a similar kind of role as Alec Guinness for a new chosen Jedi or group of them.  Can't see the rest being involved.

I've just thought the Jedi Academy may well feature and possibly be the springboard for, god knows what..

If they do the Extended Universe route then it's Truce at Bakura next up, fighting big lizard tech-vampire types who've nabbed a leg of the galaxy while the skinjobs were busy doin' wars on each other, followed by The Courtship of Princess Leia, now that, with the original actors would at least be funny. Han has a shit-fit when a new royal cock with a shitload of ships tries to get up Leia's bun and she nearly goes for it. There's also massive mental ships and swamp dwelling, force using witches in that one.

[Ginyard]

Go kick some disbanded Imperial arse, team

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Disbanded and quite possibly distended.

[Ginyard]

I'd buy a bicycle from them but I wouldn't trust them to show me how to scalp a mynock.

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Making it weirder is I'm trying to imagine Mark Hamill doing a stately Obi-Wan routine, offering sage advice to the next generation first in body, then in spirit.  I hadn't thought it through.

[El Unicornio, mang]

Maybe by 2015 they'll have the technology to make CGI characters which look real, or alternatively cast that lot up there and use CGI to make them look younger/slimmer. They kind of did it with Brad Pitt in Benjamin Button, although to be fair the years have been a lot kinder to him.

[Big Jack McBastard]

Slap a bit of make-up and fake hair on 'em and kick it off with with a bit further down the line in the EU, maybe when the Yu'uzhan Vong invasion kicks off, although that's pretty fucking dark what with Chewie dying, Admiral Ackbar dying, Han and Leia's youngest dying and loads of planets getting fucked including Couruscant. The invaders being 7ft tall psychos ferried in from outside the galaxy[nb](Kind of) they're untouchable via t'force in any case[/nb] in living ships (artificial technology is a rather sensitive no-no for em, so everyone is on their shit-list) with fuck off shielding and brutal weapons, fellows who prepare for conquest by routinely bodily mortifying themselves and feel torturing the already subjugated is the only way to toughen em up a bit.

[Jemble Fred]

It still seems sadder to me that Disney own Henson's world than bloody Lucas'. That said, I suppose many people would suggest that they've been pretty successful custodians of The Muppets so far.

[Ginyard]

I bet you know your Thrawn as well, Jack. How did Captain Needa not know about those furry things in the Thrawn trilogy that blocked the force? If I'd been him I'd have had them running round Vader's meditation chamber like hamsters in a Quality Street tin. Give it a minute then in goes a tub of liquid nitrogen and out comes the 'I Win' flag.

Making it weirder is I'm trying to imagine Mark Hamill doing a stately Obi-Wan routine, offering sage advice to the next generation first in body, then in spirit.

Jedi lesson 1: No hand to eye co-ordination

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Maybe by 2015 they'll have the technology to make CGI characters which look real, or alternatively cast that lot up there and use CGI to make them look younger/slimmer. They kind of did it with Brad Pitt in Benjamin Button, although to be fair the years have been a lot kinder to him.

I want to watch that documentary on the DVD when it's out.

"We've built a healthy, active Mark Hamill in our computer here [starts showing us what's on the screen] using a motion-captured performance from the much more unfit and overweight real-life Mark Hamill [shows us a computer rendering of Luke Skywalker, aged about 60 and looking great, but moving as if he's carrying a huge bag of spuds]!"

[Big Jack McBastard]

Oh aye, the wotsits... Yalsmari? something like that, also cortosis that blocks the force n'all he could have had a neckbrace or 70s porno medallion made out of that and ripped the piss out of Vader's plans all day, until he went for his gonads of course.

[Default to the negative]

There's no doubt in my mind that the EU will be completely ignored. They'll want to tell their own story, according to what works best as a film, and trying to do so within the parameters set by hundreds of books and comics is just not worth the effort. The part of the audience which knows about that stuff is a minority; the part which knows and cares an even smaller one. The prequels didn't contradict too much of it because Lucas forbade the writers to go into the past before him. This time I think we'll end up with two separate canons.[nb]IMO, we already do. The EU is a what if/fanfiction canon to many people.[/nb]

The only alternative to that is to set Episode VII far enough in the future that the sprawling EU can plausibly be a part of its history, if the fans want to believe that, but can also be ignored by the screenwriters. If they opt for this solution, they'll have to go far, far into the future because the Legacy Era comics have a chronology that runs from 40ABY (After Battle of Yavin) to 138ABY. So about two centuries into the future, just to be safe. But they could still work in a Hamill cameo by having him appear as a force ghost, I suppose.

[El Unicornio, mang]

I want to watch that documentary on the DVD when it's out.

"We've built a healthy, active Mark Hamill in our computer here [starts showing us what's on the screen] using a motion-captured performance from the much more unfit and overweight real-life Mark Hamill [shows us a computer rendering of Luke Skywalker, aged about 60 and looking great, but moving as if he's carrying a huge bag of spuds]!"

They'll have to use CGI to make him move like a young man also. Basically they'll replace everything about all the actors with CGI except their eyeballs.

[Small Man Big Horse]

According to this AV Club article - http://www.avclub.com/articles/the-next-star-wars-movies-will-be-based-on-a-new-s,88198/ - it won't be based on the Extended Universe. There's other speculation, but the basic gist is that nobody really knows anything. It's worth scrolling down to the bottom though to see Carrie Fisher's rather unusual reaction to the news.

[Big Jack McBastard]

They'd be daft to bin the EU wholesale, not all of it revolves around Luke and co, they could easily cherry pick a few books, some of the X-Wing series or I, Jedi or any of the Boba Fett/Bounty Hunter short stories and weave them together. It'd be a shame to see it completely sidelined there's a hell of a lot of ideas in there.

[Jemble Fred]

Carrie Fisher's such a lovely crazy old lady. I'd love to share a laugh and a port and lemon with her, and then zoom off in a time machine and shag her younger brains out.

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Carrie Fisher's such a lovely crazy old lady. I'd love to share a laugh and a port and lemon with her, and then zoom off in a time machine and shag her younger brains out.

I'm afraid that shagging her younger brains out would create a paradox.

[Santa's Boyfriend]

Holy shit.  Have you seen the latest announcement?  I think this officially means we're not allowed to slag off George Lucas ever again, at least not with a clear conscience:

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/disney-deal-george-lucas-will-384947

By the end of the year, the $4.05 billion sale of Lucasfilm to Disney should be finalized. And since George Lucas owns 100 percent of his company - which has little to no debt - all that money goes to him.

After that, Lucas plans to quickly put the bulk of the money into a foundation which will primarily focus on educational issues, a spokesperson for Lucasfilm tells THR.

$4bn towards education.  That's a lot of children learning to read and write courtesy of Jar Jar Binks.

[SteveDave]

It could be about Han & Leia's kids with mad old Uncle Luke teaching them about the Jedi stuff seeing as they're only half Jedi. One of them goes bad. The others go after him. Cue family problems & light sabre fighting.

I'm waiting for my cheque Disney.