Speculation Who do you want to direct Episode 7?

No.

 

Ohhhhhh! well then!

 

I'm betting my non-existent reputation on Joe Johnston if I'm wrong I will gladly admit it on here lol I'm just going by my big old gut and it tells me Johnston.

 

I'm just gonna toss this out there and see what the reaction is (though I can imagine pretty well, I think, what it will be).

As it seems some of the more logical / desired / first-choice candidates are already involved with other projects through 2015 and thus cannot commit to doing Episode VII, what if the obvious answer to getting the ST (and LucasFilm's working relationship with Disney) off the ground has been sitting there in Northern California all along? Hypothetically, if Kennedy cannot find that 'one' who she feels is right for the job in time for VII, is there any chance at all that someone could be persuaded to put retirement on hold for one last go around?

Now, I know so many folks are happy to see Lucas go, but when he's worked with other writers (particularly Kasdan, who is now on board - though apparently not for VII), the franchise has spun gold. I'm just sayin'. I don't expect it any more than you do, but still, crazier things have been known to happen.

 

Whoa, homey, you're throwing raw meat at the frothing pit bulls.

 

I wouldn't refer to ROTJ as gold.

ESB, however...pure gold.

 

I think ROTJ is a nice silver medal. It ends the saga wel enough...........well it did until now.

But SW gets overlooked too much. It's almost unfortunate. But that film laid the groundwork and made the crazy out of the box adventure of ESB possible.

So I think it was a nice double gold with those and a silver medal for ROTJ. Yes, even with the Ewoks and burp jokes.

 

Oh, I know.

edit:I like how you put that, by the way.

And I should say that I am very excited to see what kind of results this changing of the guard will bring us (I want to make this clear), and I'm not necessarily stumping for Lucas, but as this ST is to be linked thematically and is based off of story treatments written by Lucas, I do think there have been worse ideas than having George giving us one last hurrah in the director's chair before bowing out. Maybe if George only oversaw the technical aspects and someone else the players (like the original idea for ROTJ)?

 

I wouldn't mind.

 

The plot was horrible.

But I would say that Bird did a decent job with what he had (average actors, under average franchise and a poor plot)

 

What's wrong with Quentin Tarrantino.

 

Nothing. He's fine for crime drama or ultra violent B-quality stuff a la Kill Bill, Pulp Fiction. But I think most would agree he's not right for Star Wars. Now, directing episodes for the Underworld series is a different matter but i doubt he'd doit or that Disney would let him.

 

Here's a thought: Lets let Disney decide.

 

Instead of saying "I think they should pick" we should be saying "I hope they have picked", because chances are a director was hired about a month ago, maybe longer. Someone has been quietly working away on this already. Ardnt hasn't just started writing the script, for example. He probably started ages ago.

Remember, when the official site reported on Ardnt it also said that pre-production has begun. Usually, that doesn't happen without a director.

 

Fincher? I say yes.

 

If he did it, I would back that play. But I think that it's best, for the mental health of the community, that he stay retired. And frankly, he deserves to not have to be the whipping boy of the geek community. Let someone else carry that weight.

 

Well, Lucas' original idea was to make the Star Wars franchise sort of a film school competition between him and his friends. The plan was to have Lucas direct the first (ANH which he did, obviously) then have his friends take turns directing subsequent episodes and then Lucas would direct the last episode to trump them all so-to-speak (in a friendly competition way) At the time he was planning it he would have been intending on direct the "last one" which depending on the time he said it would have been either episode 9 or 12.

But that was the past and he is "retired" now, so I doubt he will do it, but then again, I wouldn't rule out anything at this point (remember just a couple of years ago Lucas was telling us that the Tragedy of Darth Vader was over and now we are starring down the barrel of at least 3 more movies so who knows?)

 

Everything I know about the industry, and Disney, and Kennedy, and the writers, and what I've read in articles, tells me it's almost certainly down to these 5 names (with perhaps 3 of them already eliminated):

- Matthew Vaughn
- Jon favreau
- Joe Johnson
- Josh Trank
- Robert Zemeckis (If he wanted it)

From there, I think Zemeckis wasn't interested. I think they probably met with Josh Trank and thought they'd leave him on Marvel to cut his teeth, sort of like what they're probably going to do with Trevorrow and what they already did with Mark Webb on Spiderman. Given Kennedy's relationship with Johnson I'd wager she views him as their "safe" backup choice if MV or JF don't seem up to it.

My guess is that it will go to Mathew Vaughn. He seems to have the best mix of what they'd want and here's why:

- There's already been some slight pushback on the idea of Favreau based on his other movies after Ironman.
- Vaughn's Xmen reboot, by contrast, was a critical success with solid acting performances and a lot of emotional drama.
- Simon Kinburg produced Vaughn's X-men First Class, wrote the script for its sequel, which Vaughn was set to direct. And also wrote the script for the first Sherlock Holmes, which Vaughn's best friend Guy Ritchie directed. So, Kinburg and Vaughn know each other very well and for all we know... Vaughn and Kinburg learned of this thing together.
- Vaughn dropped out of the sequel about the same time the Star Wars news went public. His friend said it was because he was interested in directing another indie comic book movie from the creator of Kick-Ass but I'm not buying that he'd turn down Star Wars and it doesn't sound like the creator of Kick-Ass is either. He's what he said about Vaughn and Star Wars:

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And that's from a cool comic book guy like Millar. Vaughn HAS the mix we want. He loves the material. He's good with actors. He values story. He has a classical style. Stardust, Kick-Ass, and Xmen First Class were all solid movies that let him utilize various practical and CG effects. And he's young enough to give this his all.

As a Star Wars fan I hope he gets it but it's reassuring that the other choices are all solid too.

 

Fine post, Ender. You've done a good job of extolling the virtues of MV.

 

Vaughn's best film is Layer Cake.

 

I think it will be Vaughn.

 

The following directors would be my wish list:

Joe Johnston - Episode VII
Guillermo Del Toro - Episode VIII
Jon Favreau - Episode IX

Joe Johnston would be great to open the new trilogy, as he has the most connections to the OT, having worked in those films, and having ties with Lucasfilm.
Guillermo Del Toro could handle what I think would be the darkest chapter of the new trilogy; he has experience in this department, having directed films like Pam's Labyrinth and Hellboy.
Jon favreau could bring the sequel trilogy to a happy, satisfying conclusion, sort of like ROTJ, or live the door open in case Episodes X - XII are ever made.

 

Just to say again (because I like repeating myself), I still think Rupert Wyatt (Rise of the Planet of the Apes) is a possibility. A couple of months ago he mysteriously left the Apes sequel and ever since then he's just disappeared. By that I mean that we've heard nothing of him since, no other directing gig or anything. Food for thought. Rise of the Planet of the Apes proved, IMO, that he’s a very talented director. He’s also young and keen (barely forty, I think), which are two things I’m sure the makers want in abundance.

 

I'm honestly uninterested in any director who may have serious visual differences from the rest of the saga. As for Matthew Vaughn, there's a possibility of him getting it, I'm sure, and his work on X-Men: First Class was quite solid, but not spectacular.

In case it hasn't been brought up, what are people's thoughts on Andrew Stanton? I haven't yet seen John Carter which I heard was less than great, but if you look at his Pixar efforts, he has a very strong sense of visual storytelling, which was such a key element to the existing saga.

 

Brad Bird is my #1 pick
then Spielberg
then Arndt (because he's intimately familiar with the script, Toy Story 3 is awesome and I think, like Bird, he could make a great transition into big budget directing)