ST George Lucas Quotations Regarding the Sequel Trilogy -- No Discussion

News report quoting from Rinzler's book,The Making of Star Wars: The Return of the Jedi:


"Even though Lucas really wanted a bright, upbeat ending, and he fought against killing off any major characters — even Yoda, for a long time — during one story session, Lucas pitched a really, really dark ending. In a nutshell, the scene with Vader and the Emperor unspools the way it does in the final film. Vader sacrifices himself to take out the Emperor, and then Luke helps Vader to take off his famous helmet. And then — Luke puts on Vader's helmet himself. In the transcript of the story session with Lucas and Kasdan, Lucas says:

Kasdan immediately responded, "That's what I think should happen" — but Lucas didn't actually want to go that dark because "this is for kids.""


Source: http://io9.com/10-things-you-probably-didnt-know-about-star-wars-ret-1383276948
Date: 1983

 

George Lucas on the importance of female characters in the films. This may or may not contain some relevance with regard to Daisy Ridley's role in the film:

Source: http://web.archive.org/web/20081213000901/http://www.starwars.com/theclonewars/news20080805b.html
Date: August 7th, 2008

 

George Lucas, writing to the makers of Lost, on the unplanned nature of both series:

Source: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/blogs/live-feed/george-lucas-sends-letter-lost-53645
Date: November 30th, 2010

 

George Lucas on Return of the Jedi:

(It is ambiguous as to whether he is talking about the sequel trilogy or the prequel trilogy, though.)


Source: Rinzler, J. The Making of Star Wars: The Return of the Jedi page 9.
Date: 1983

 

Source: Bantha Tracks #8,
Date: Spring 1980

 

The last three episodes involve the rebuilding of the Republic. Only two of the main characters will appear in all nine films, & they are the robots, Artoo-Detoo & Threepio. Says Lucas:

Source: TIME Magazine,
Date: May 1980

 

Source: Rolling Stone
Date: June 1980

 

Source: Starlog
Date: July 1981

 

This, again, is from Rinzler's Making of Return of the Jedi but, depending on Lucas' level of influence over the sequel trilogy might debunk rumours that one or more of the Big Three die in the upcoming films:

Source: Rinzler, J. The Making of Star Wars: The Return of the Jedi
Date: Story conference circa 1983

 

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkgP19APekU
Date: 30th of October, 2012

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YyqlTi7lkhY
Date: 30th of October, 2012

 

Hello, the-poster-formerly-known-as-Echo-Base here. This George Lucas quote was published today:

Source: http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/movies/2015/01/12/george-lucas-strange-magic-movie/21624493/
Date: January 12th, 2015.

 

Lucas on the fate of his story treatments:

Source: http://www.cinemablend.com/new/How-George-Lucas-Star-Wars-7-Ideas-Were-Used-By-Disney-69271.html

Date: January 21st, 2015.

 

In light of the bombshell above, this quote from a few days ago takes on more meaning, too:

Source: http://screenrant.com/star-wars-7-force-awakens-george-lucas-role/
Date: January 17th, 2015.

 

From the third draft of the script (1975) comes this dialogue, from a scene set in the Kaiburr Crystal Chamber:

Source: http://www.starwars7news.com/2015/0...75-in-lucas-original-star-wars-treatment.html

Date: January 31st, 2015

 

Thanks to Immortiss for tracking this one down:

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udF96P7Zs14 [1 minute 20 mark onwards]
Date: June 6th, 2014.

 

What??? Is this for real?

EDIT: Oops! Didn't notice the "no discussion" thing up until now. Sorry mods! Please don't deactivate me!

 

Adding this old quote, just in case a certain rumour about the new film turns out to be true:


"George Lucas has dropped a bombshell on Star Wars fans by revealing that Harrison Ford wanted his character, Han Solo, to be killed off during The Empire Strikes Back.

The 70-year-old – who created the Star Wars franchise – admitted the actor kept asking for his character to die during the fifth instalment after he was frozen and sealed in carbonite and delivered to Jabba the Hutt."

Source: http://metro.co.uk/2014/06/08/star-...harrison-ford-wanted-han-solo-to-die-4754151/
Date: June 8th, 2014.

 

I just stumbled across the following story conference online for the possibility of making Splinter of the Mind's Eye into the low budget follow-up to ANH, if the latter had flopped at the box office. I have bolded parts that *may* be relevant to The Force Awakens:

Source: http://cinetropolis.net/star-wars-splinter-of-the-minds-eye-story-conference/
Date: Original conferences, 1976.

 

This post has some more of the conversation. This part may explain BB-8's role:

Source: Star Wars Insider #145 Quoted from http://boards.theforce.net/threads/...cussion-thread.50017195/page-15#post-52006666
Date: Original Foster/Lucas discussion: 1976.

 

Again, I wonder if there is any possible relevance between the part I have bolded and The Force Awakens?

Source: George Lucas, Rolling Stone interview, sourced from http://boards.theforce.net/threads/...cussion-thread.50017195/page-18#post-52186011
Date: 1977

 

I don't have the direct quote for this one but it is allegedly in Rinzer's Making of Empire Strike Back book:

Luke's journey to becoming a Jedi Knight would have had a lot more bumps. One idea that got tossed around a lot in the early stages of planning ESB was the notion that Luke's light saber had a crystal hidden in the hilt, with secret encrypted information on it — including the coordinates of Minch Yoda's planet. And Luke would have been "humiliated" when he couldn't use the Force to stop an attack by a bunch of ice monsters on the rebel's Hoth base. (With Han telling Luke, "You're not a Jedi knight, and you never will be.") Meanwhile, Darth Vader senses that Luke used the force to destroy the Death Star and there's a new wannabe Jedi in town — so Vader uses telepathy to choke Luke in his spacecraft, nearly killing him — except that R2D2 jumps the ship into hyperspace and takes it to Yoda's planet.

Source: http://io9.com/5661073/10-things-you-didnt-know-about-the-empire-strikes-back

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EDIT: I just checked and this comes from the Leigh Brackett draft of ESB.

 

This doesn't relate directly to the sequel trilogy but this book does give insights into Lucas' attitudes to the Vietnam War while he and John Milius were attempting to make Apocalypse Now. Presumably the same mindset later fed on into Star Wars:

"The film would take a pro-war, action-oriented approach while at the same time while at the same time supporting and clarifying the "unconventional warfare methods" of the U. S. Army Special Forces... What Milius and Lucas was thinking about is suggested by the first scene... The idea is that American troops will have fun and win the war by adopting, Green Beret-style, guerilla methods. Milius later noted that he and Lucas were "great connoisseurs of the Vietnam War"; one imagines young boys with an enthusiasm for all things military."

Source: https://books.google.com.au/books?id=UmPdEg5fVkQC&pg=PT117&lpg=PT117&dq="george lucas" pro-war "star wars"&source=bl&ots=9gOp8926QM&sig=GKA6_35GJ-ELeuyN3zHsc7W77WY&hl=en&sa=X&ei=mwsrVY7eNovgao7fgcgL&ved=0CEkQ6AEwCQ#v=onepage&q="george lucas" pro-war "star wars"&f=false
Date: Book published in 2000. Lucas' involvement was circa 1970.

 

Although the early rumour that Finn is a pacifist has been more or less debunked now, here is another quote that indicates Geroge Lucas' pro-war, anti-pacifist attitude. It comes from the Phantom Menace soundtrack album's liner notes:

Source: http://www.jw-collection.de/scores/episode1.htm
Date: 1999.

 

Depending on how you interpret these statements by Lawrence Kasdan, he might have the same anti-pacifism attitude as George Lucas. This is from the Star Wars story conference transcripts by Rinzler:

Source: http://neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=563277 (quoting from Rinzler's book)

 

Again, not direct quotes but here is some more information that discusses George Lucas' apparent pro-war, pro-Vietnam, anti-pacifist views. More generally, they talk about the effect of Star Wars on attitudes towards war, whether intended or otherwise. These excerpts come from two articles for "Mother Jones", an American magazine about social justice issues which is apparently considered quite reputable:

Source: http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/08/how-star-wars-saved-american-triumphalism
Date: August 15, 2013.

Source: http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/08/gi-joe-real-wars?page=2
Date: August 13th, 2015.


UPDATE: One more piece that expounds Lucas' views. This one contains actual quotes. He consciously makes war film for teenagers and "loves aerial combat" yet in other areas his views are those of a liberal democrat yet not profound in any way:

Source: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/george-lucas-billionaire-down-on-capitalism/
Date: January 21st, 2012.