After the news that George Lucas sold LucasFilm — including the Star Wars franchise — to Disney for $4.05 billion, we also found out Star Wars: Episode VII is planned for 2015, with at least two more films to follow. George Lucas wrote the treatments for the films, but won’t be producing or directing. A rumor was going around that the next movies would be based on the Thrawn trilogy, but a purported LucasFilm source says they’ll be based on an original story.
“It’s an original story,” a LucasFilm source tells me. In other words, forget the Star Wars novels. Forget the graphic novels. Forget everything you think you know about what happens to Luke Skywalker. According to my sources, [Star Wars: Episode VII] will literally be nothing you’ve ever seen or read before from the Star Wars universe. I also hear from several sources that, no matter what you may hear to the contrary, no director has been officially attached to the project. [E!]
I’ve already forgotten everything I knew about the Skywalkers, thanks to the prequels and alcohol.
Meanwhile, a (former) friend of George Lucas has been talking about the outlines for the three movies (which admittedly may not be the current version).
The Wrap caught up with writer Dale Pollock, author of Skywalking: The Life And Films Of George Lucas, and he claims the filmmaker allowed him to read the outlines for his originally planned twelve part story. He says, “It was originally a 12-part saga. The three most exciting stories were 7, 8 and 9. They had propulsive action, really interesting new worlds, new characters. I remember thinking, ‘I want to see these 3 movies.’” Of course, a lot has changed between then. Pollock also notes they feature a Luke Skywalker in his 30s or 40s, so that might not allow Mark Hamill to come back. [First Showing]
We’ve found a totally real, exclusive Facebook screencap about Star Wars: Episode VII you guys:
[Image sources: Paul Shipper (via Laughing Squid) and Dorkly]
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Dear Disney and LucasFilm,
Congratulations! You now possess the power of the force and with it comes a great deal of responsibility. So here’s what you’re going to do:
STEP 1 – you’re going to set the new films (Episode 7, 8 and 9) 30 years after episode 6 (Jedi) and you’re going to have the FULL original cast back playing themselves as older people. DID YOU HEAR ME? You are going to cast Harrison Ford as Han Freaking solo, Mark Hamill as Luke Skywalker, Carrie Fisher as Leia, Billy Dee Williams as Lando and even Denis Lawson back as Wedge Antilles. HERE’S THE CATCH: THEY DON’T HAVE TO BE THE MAIN CHARACTERS. They are older now and you can use them as side characters revolving around NEW lead characters. We don’t care what new characters take over leading roles but you HAVE to bring back the old cast for this all to be LEGIT and to come FULL circle. PLEASE don’t cast new actors in these roles and don’t CGI faces to make them look like the actors 30 years ago (Like in Tron Legacy) PLEASE!!! You can even kill them off in the first scene, just don’t replace them.
STEP 2 – DON’T LISTEN TO ANYTHING GEORGE LUCAS SAYS! You paid him $4 Billion so tell him to shut up take his money and go make Radioland Murders Part 2! Put somebody in charge of directing who knows what we want. WE WANT EMPIRE STRIKES BACK ON CRACK. That means ACTING, ACTING, ACTING, ACTING, CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT, DRAMA, DEATH!!!!!
STEP 3 – Whatever you did to make AVENGERS as good as it was, do the same for STAR WARS! I feel the force is strong with you and your company can pull this off. The prequels were the worst films EVER MADE! They showed us just how evil the dark side of the force can be when it seduced George Lucas and took over his ability to distinguish right from wrong! Please redeem the Star Wars Universe. DO OR DO NOT…THERE IS NO TRY
Sincerely,
Geeks
Please tell me you copied and pasted that from your secret diary.
Star Wars Christmas Special! Star Wars Christmas Special!
Geroge Lucsa for the director or GTFO!
Whatever, fine, don’t make it officially “Episode VII” then, but if Disney loves money they should give Pixar the Thrawn trilogy to play around with.
It would be pretty awful of them to just take a dump on relatively cohesive storytelling in the expanded universe from the past two decades
Seriously? That’s nearly two decades worth of work, some of it actually quite good, nearly all of it better than anything Lucas did with the prequels, and they are just going to ignore it completely? Total bullshit.
I stopped reading the books & comics years ago but if I remember right at one point there was a cut-off in terms of how far past episode VI they would allow anyone to write in case Lucas ever wanted to do VII – IX but eventually they opened it up. So unless the story takes place hundreds of years later than they’ll be stomping on established work.
/nerd-rage
Not looking to start any sort of Trek or SW fight, but there were plenty of Trek books that got ignored when the movies were made (wasn’t there a “First Contact” book that was totally different than the movie version?). Has it gone on record that the “expanded universe” books are canon – George said, “Yep, this is official.”? Personally I couldn’t muster up two farts and a belch for the books, and I don’t see why fans are so eager to see them made into movies.Don’t you want something fresh, something you don’t expect? I agree wholeheartedly with the first post – there could be some awesome reveal moments in them: the fate of the republic hinges on an elder statesman having to fire up his ancient YT-1300 freighter and fly into the rescue. An old Jedi steps quietly into the fray, his light saber powering up – whatever. Don’t you want it to be epic? Have some fist-pumping shout-out-loud moments (like we should have got with the prequels)? Or do you want to have some fan fiction adapted to the screen with a story line you already know?
Star Wars! The quest for more money!
The books are canon unless a movie overrides them, I thought all good nerds like me understood this. If they decide that everything in the Republic was happily ever after for 30 years, THEN some galactic calamity draws Han and Chewie out of retirement, so be it.
Please don’t treat the SW Expanded Universe like it was anything but a cash cow. The Zahn trilogy was good, then, as with a dozen other never-ending series, the Skywalker family had enough excitement for eighty lifetimes, and depressingly killed off Chewbacca, 2 out of the 3 Solo kids–an act of fratricide between twins in one case–and Luke’s wife (um…spoiler, I guess?) The excuse was “oh, well, in a realistic depiction, main characters would die.” Yes, well, in a realistic depiction there wouldn’t be Star Wars at all. Keep your peanut butter the fuck away from my chocolate.