Big news for Star Wars fans:
Rian Johnson, the director of Brick and Looper, is going to write and direct the next two Star Wars movies.
Johnson wrote and directed Brick, The Brothers Bloom, and Looper. He also directed three episodes of Breaking Bad (early episode where there’s a fly loose in the lab, episode centering around Walt’s 51st birthday, and one of the final episodes where there’s a shootout in the desert).
Johnson is among the least successful directors to take on a franchise of such magnitude. His last three films—Brick, The Brothers Bloom, and Looper—have made a total of $72 million, according to Box Office Mojo. The last Star Wars film, Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, alone made $380 million worldwide. But taking a creative risk can pay off, as with Christopher Nolan’s direction of the Batman franchise.
Disney bought Marvel for $4 billion, turned it into a cash cow. Disney bought Lucasfilm for $4 billion a year later, looks to have the same plans in mind.
Revenge of the Sith made $380 million domestic. Worldwide, it made around $850 million.
Big difference is that Marvel already had A Plan for their movies when Disney bought them, and they have a very deep back catalog of stories and characters to mine.
With Lucasfilm, Disney has to come up with all new Star Wars stories on their own, and they’ve declared all the past expanded universe tie-in material as non-cannon. So forget all you’ve learned from Star Wars books & comics of the past & future history of the Republic, the Sith, the New Republic, etc.
I’m really glad of that, too. Star Wars’ expanded universe is mostly crap.
A great example: Star Wars has a guy named Porkins. He’s clearly a joke character. The expanded universe has this to say about him: http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Jek_Tono_Porkins
It’s just shit. You can’t take the same material that seriously when it was designed to be a pulp space action film.
I’m pretty sure the new Star Wars movies are going to suck, but having said that, I’m sure Rian Johnson will do a much better job than George Lucas did with the prequels, but that isn’t saying much.
My mother could have done a better job with the prequels.
That Rian is NOT a big blockbuster director could be a plus. It could mean movies that have a good story, good characters and action set pieces only when truly needed. Not a bunch of action bits with some lame ‘story’ to tie the loosely together.
I’m shocked that anyone in the visible universe might be shocked by this. Disney turns nearly everything it does into a cash cow. It’s what they do. It’s ALL they do. They are the Merch Terminator, and they will never ever stop.
Much of the expanded universe stuff may be no better than fanfic, but when it’s at its best it easily beats the canonical Episodes I-III.
Great news. I’m looking forward to the pre-prequel where we learn that Yoda and the Emperor went to the same pre-school together.
I’m just thinking… There are two ways to have a movie with outlandish fantastical developments:
Set it in a place that’s outlandish by default, anything that happens is outlandish by default as it’s a different world (think Futurama).
Set it in present setting, but introduce outlandish characters (think Rick and Morty; check it out if you haven’t, you’ll thank me later).
Disney now has a franchise doing it the first way with Star Wars (galaxy far far away), and a franchise doing it the second way with Marvel (superheroes in present day).
They can produce thousands of movies and products just with those two. That well will never dry. Hundreds of years from now Disney will still be milking Marvel and Star Wars, even more than they’re milking Mickey Mouse.
It’s pure genius I tell you. Respect.
While I agree, I-III at least fit the identity of the universe. They weren’t meant to be taken too seriously (except maybe for I, which may have tried but failed so very miserably).
I’m shocked that you’re shocked for someone painting something trivial as shocking.
“[Episodes I-III] weren’t meant to be taken too seriously”
Is that the opinion of LucasFilm/Fox, or of the fans? 🙂
Yeah, George Lucas said “The movies are for children,” but that was just backpedaling after the criticism of the slapstick comedy and racial stereotype language of Jar Jar Binks.
They actually tried to get Episodes II & III taken more seriously, by minimizing appearances & dialog of that character, and by the intensity of III being so high that it was the first Star Wars film to get a PG-13 rating.
I think you misunderstood me. 🙂 I’m not justifying I-III. They’re fucking terrible. And I agree they were probably meant to be taken more seriously than IV-VI.
But they still show their heritage well: They were supposed to be a pulp serial sci-fi story, just like Star Wars IV was before they added the number. The expanded universe tries to take itself (and the movies) too seriously.
I-III have too many problems to list, but among them is they’re just not a GOOD pulp serial sci-fi story. For I at least, you’d pick up the issue, read the first page, grunt in disgust and put it back. II and III might survive the first page test, but you’re not going to get much satisfaction out of them.
For my money, Indiana Jones does a much better job. And while some people hated Crystal Skull, it was at least fitting in the same tone: over-the-top, serial comic book style fun without the series or the comic book.
More directly: Isn’t this what they said they’d do from day one of the acquisition? Doesn’t make any sense to be surprised.