Speculation Abandoned Concepts and Ideas from old Drafts...

When the Prequels popped up, they contained exciting characters, such as "Mace Windu" and planets like "Utapau" etc.

A lot of these were from the various original drafts ofthe Star Wars films.

My thoughts are, it is possible that any elements that haven't yet been touched upon on the silver screen, from all the abandoned drafts of the various films, might make their way in some form to the Sequel trilogy.

Specifically the earlier drafts of Return of The Jedi might show us snippets of where the story might have gone, had it continued, before it was condensed.

We have elements, such as spirits returning to life, and planet names such as "Had Abbadon" that can likely be re-used (the name of the planet, not neccasarily t's original purpose..which became Coruscant I believe)

Anyways, is anyone here super knowledgable about the old drafts, that could throw up some interesting plot points that were abandoned, which might be brought back to the forefront?

 

I was gonna mention the Whills. I don't think they're evil though. In fact I think they were just watchers who chronicled the events.

At one point the protagonists were going to be little people, but I think that became Willow.

The only other element that I can think of off the top of my head is "Nomi Starkiller." That was a very early concept which eventually became Luke Skywalker. But I could see Nomi becoming Luke's daughter.

 

There is the original concept of Luke Skywalker as a 200 year old hero of old that helps in the current time. If Luke is strong enough in the Force to become physically immortal, the end of IX could jump ahead in time to the droids telling the stories to kids letting them know the Skywalker is still out there when they need him.

 

The Whills and the name Had Abbadon spring to mind. I always loved that name.

 

agreed. Had Abbadon sounds like a great location to have the heroes in peril

 

Biblically speaking Abaddon was the angel of the bottomless pit (Hell.) LOST had a character named Abaddon.

 

One thing that I've mentioned before is that notion that after ROTJ, the galaxy might fall into a "dark ages." One of the reason I think this might be a possibility is that in the opening crawl of the early scripts, the Empire is already described as crumbling (i.e., similar to the latter stages of the Roman empire):

It is a period of civil wars.
The EMPIRE is crumbling into
lawless barbarism throughout
the million worlds of the galaxy.

So, you could just change "is crumbing" into "has crumbled" and there's a nice idea for the Episode 7 opening crawl.


As for other ideas... "Star Wars" began as a straight-up adaptation of the plot of Akira Kurosawa's movie "The HIdden Fortress" into a pulp space setting. That got changed over time with each new draft, but a considerable amount of the plot of that movie made it into ANH as well as that of TPM. If that aspect is kept—the "rhyming"—then Episode 7 might draw yet more inspiration from "The Hidden Fortress." But who knows.

 

I'm a fan of this analysis and Hidden Fortress, but I'll be the first to admit... I don't think there's anymore good stuff to get out of that movie. Episode 1 pretty much picked that carcass clean. About the only thing left is to have a Jedi turned gun-for-fire as the villain.

But there's so much more Kurosawa outside of the Hidden Fortress to borrow or steal.

 

Ability for Force Ghost to take physical form.

 

Those are good points... Well, how about leftover ideas from movies other than just ANH? I recall Lucas talking (before TPM) about how the OT featured the "evil father," and that we'd see the "evil mother" in the PT... obviously, that idea got left by the wayside (I think the that character got changed into Count Dooku, instead; one of the designs for the Sith Witch made it into the TCW as Ventress). So might we finally see the evil mother?

 

Maybe Luke had a bad hookup.

Seriously, though. That could be some juicy drama. Luke's guilt over a dark side user, mother of his kid(s) could be an interesting, new thing. It would be refreshingly different than "teen Jedi Skywalker slips towards darkside" yet again. Hell hath no fury like a Sith woman scorned.

And yeah, yeah, I know, Mara, Lumiya, Callista, blah, blah.

 

Who hasn't?

Yeah, it would be a new type of conflict with a yet again different dynamic. Another idea that might perhaps be yet another interesting dynamic is sibling rivalry, but I'm guessing the EU has touched on that as well already... I'm not that far into the EU yet.

 

Maybe Luke confronts the Whills for their lack of intervention. I dunno, just throwing something out there that'd make it narratively distinct from the previous films (which I think it'll need).

 

Count, that's exactly my take too. There's no Golden Age New Republic. Not yet. In the power vacuum that would ultimately form in the wake of the fallen Empire, there could be anarchy. A strong barbarian force takes advantage of that weakness and invades. And besides, it could be really cool to show space barbarians.

Maybe a little like this, perhaps:

 

Exactly. It happened after the fall of the Roman empire; and also, periods of "dark ages" happened in Frank Herbert's "Dune" series and Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" series as well—both of which influenced Star Wars to a great degree. So my guess is they're going to take it into that direction, which would be really cool to see. I could be wrong of course.

And yeah, your idea of an invading barbarian horde is a great one And the Mandalorians are a great candidate for that.


Which might raise yet another question: maybe in addition to (or instead of) looking at ideas that made it into early scripts and were left behind, should be we looking at the TCW for ideas and possible setups for the ST? And/or a source of indicators for how Lucas thinks about TGFFA nowadays? For instance, some people have been wondering whether the Mortis arc might be a setup for something. Maybe the Mandalorians, as portrayed in TCW, might be a setup?

 

Include a character named "Starkiller". No not the whiny putz from The Force Unleashed who could fart force lightning and clear out a room full of stormtroopers.

 

One could argue that there's a better candidate. If one were into that sort of thing.



(Well, someone was going to say it.)

 

Who dat? I dig the male pattern baldness. It's very relatable.

 

As someone who suffered from teenage acne, I find his complexion very relatable.

 

There's that too... glad that's been a while, for me anyway. But yeah, altogether a very relatable villain. I wonder whether he's holding that cable because he's having trouble keeping the cables in his A/V setup apart? That would be yet another relatable trait.

 

Nah, Bio-tech vacuum cleaner. The masses love galactic house cleaning.

 

Is that a Yuzzhin Vong (sp?)

 

Yuuzhan Vong. And yeah, it is.

Edit: That being said, if we're going to discuss EU characters, there's a thread for that.