More Star Wars movies on the way!
Last week, George Lucas sold LucasFilm, along with all rights to any upcoming Star Wars movies, to Disney. Right away, Disney announced the release of a new Star Wars movie in 2015, and their plans to continue producing new Star Wars movies every couple years. This is good news for Star Wars fans, for many reasons.
Lucas has proven that he makes much better movies as a consultant on the back-end, leaving tasks such as writing and directing to more talented minds. The best two Star Wars movies, in my opinion, are The Empire Strikes Back and The Return of the Jedi, both of which Lucas came up with the story and produced, but hired out the directing and screenwriting to others. As evidenced in the three newest installments, when he’s writing the scripts and directing them himself, his movies are hard to watch at best.
The the movies look like video games, mostly because they were shot pretty much entirely in front of green screens and built mostly from computers. Disney usually does a much better job with their movies of mixing physical sets with computer graphics, making for a much more realistic look. They have also demonstrated the ability to take risks and work with talented, edgy filmmakers (Gore Verbinski on Pirates of the Caribbean, for example), and have a good track record on big-budget, fantasy films.
I’m not sure how it will work, but the new movie will continue after the events of Return of the Jedi, and from what I’ve read, will include Han & Leah, as well as Luke’s kids trying to restore order to the galaxy. There’s no word on who will write, direct, or star, so it’s hard to tell how the new movies will look/feel. Disney will need to figure out a way to set up a new, engaging story that can carry for at least a few movies, or create new characters that people love, otherwise I don’t see how they can keep people interested in a new Star Wars movie every few years. Franchises that are able to sustain life over the long-haul typically have a central character that people wish they could be (see James Bond). Six movies in, Star Wars is starting from scratch. Let’s hope the folks at Disney can find a way to breath some new life back into a once storied franchise.
A couple of good articles on the subject:
http://www.slashfilm.com/your-questions-answered-disney-purchase-lucasfilm-star-wars-episode-7/
http://www.slashfilm.com/your-questions-answered-disney-purchase-lucasfilm-star-wars-episode-7/
http://www.vulture.com/2012/10/7-questions-we-have-about-star-wars-episode-7.html