Reusing concepts from early drafts of the scripts

Lucas never completely drops an idea - he merely files it away for possible later use. I thought it might be interesting to discuss all the instances of Lucas delving back into his "dropped concept files."

Here's a few I know of:

-Cloud City was originally going to have aliens called the Whatnots, who attack our heroes. From SW The Annotated Screenplays: "The notes indicate that the aliensx should be semistoic creatures, sort of tall, think, white, maybe similar to the aliens in Steven Spielberg's Close Encoutners of the Third Kind (1977). They should be very noble but threatening; they carry a spear or a pneumatic dart gun or a long pole with a beam that comes out of it. There's an alien chief described as fair, wise, and noble."

Sounds just like the aliens of Kamino to me. When Lucas told his concept artists how he wanted the Kamino aliens to look, they were rather surprised, (as described in the Art of Episode II). They really shouldn't have been, though, since that idea had existed for about 20 years.

-The flying creatures that the Kaminoans ride went through several unused incarnations. They were originally developed to be on Bespin. Later, they were going to be used by the Gungans in TPM. Both of those concepts were dropped, only later to be used for Kamino.

-The name Mace Windy appears in early drafts of ANH, obviously inspiring the name Mace Windu for the PT.

-In the revised rough draft of TPM, Naboo is called Utapau. This was actually the original name of Tatooine in the early drafts of ANH. I really hope we see this name by the end of the saga. It's almost as if it's Lucas's default planet name, and then when he thinks of a better one, he drops it.

 

I never heard of half the stuff you listed. Very interesting. I've read the Lucas whould like to visit the Wookie homeworld Kshyyyk( Is that spelled right? )Let's hope he puts it in Episode III.

 

AOTC almost used another original GL idea, originally, the dart Jango Fett used was called a "Kyber dart". While the spelling is different, the pronounciation is the same as the Kaiburr Crystal, something which was an essential part of the first drafts of ANH.

 

The underground lava lair of the Emperor may also appear in Episode 3 now that we are hearing rumors of a fiery volcanic planet. Remember the production concept painting by Joe Johnston depicting the confrontation between Luke, Vader and the Emperor in the lava riddled cave with a stone throne in it as originally envisioned by Lucas to wrap up the story? Could still be used as a cool Sith lair of sorts in a new movie!

 

In an early draft of ROTJ, Vader tries to reach out to Luke while he is sleeping, which was supposed to be similar to Anakin's sleep/dream sequence in AOTC.

I find it amazing that George keeps these ideas in head for so many years and reinterpets them for the PT.

 

Not really that amazing; to me, anyway. People who create hate to throw away things, even if there's good reason not to use them. I've kept awful stuff I've written years ago because I didn't have the heart to throw it in the trash.

 

GL is also infamous for recycling names. In an early draft there is a character "Prince Valorum Espa ." He was from what I can tell an early incarnation of the Emperor. I found it interesting that 2 of the names from that one name were eventually recycled in Chancellor Valorum and Mos Espa.

 

Count Sandage became Count Dooku and podracer Wan Sandage. There were also many different people with similar names; Chewie Antilles, Leia Lars, Clieg Oxus, Anakin Starkiller, Biggs Starkiller, Clegg Whitesun....there's a load of stuff like that in the Arcana section of the Unofficial SW Encyclopedia

 

1. Lando was suppose to be a clone - that is why Leia did not trust him on Bespin. His father wanted a legacy of him. Obviously GL used the Jango/Boba relationship instead.

2. The Outlander nightclub idea appeared in the early drafts of Star Wars and in early Ralph Macquarrie paintings.

3. "Emergency Powers" appeared in the Radio Dramas. Vader uses them to try and catch Leia.

4. Ewoks were suppose to be Wookies.

 

The ship that carried Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon to the Trade Federation Ship in the beginning of TPM was one of the scrapped designs for Leia's Blockade Runner from ANH.

 

Then again, he might be nuts enuf to actually do that, and since this isn't the Ep3 Spoilage forum...

***Quick Edit!***

 

This is all great stuff

This is probably a stupid question but...does anybody know where I can get these Annoated Screen Plays? They sound fascinating.

 

The Annotated Screenplays are available from any good bookshop. Amazon.Com sells it.

It really is a must have item for ANY SW fan - and especially those speculating on the upcoming EpIII.

 

"Ewoks were suppose to be Wookies."

But they had a big smoking addiction, which stunted their growth

Boba Fett was originally a stormtrooper, then later part of the Mandalorian shocktroopers. Those ideas were touted for AotC as well, which is another reason why the Clones have the slightly Fett-like look

 

In one of the early drafts of ANH, there's an invasion of Utapau complete with hover tanks, speeders, etc that very closely resembles the invasion of Naboo.
I just think it was neat that Lucas finally got to use that idea after so many years.
I'll have to take a look at the scripts again sometime.
Also, correct me if I'm wrong, but in one of the early drafts, instead of a trash compactor, the heros are in some sort of a dark hall and are forced to fight a huge creature from wookie lore. I forgot it's actual name (I think he still called it the dianoga), but the sequence reminded me somewhat of the rancor battle or the acklay... It's been over a year since I read it though.

 

That_Wascally_Droid, that's all the more interesting since Utapau was also the original name of Naboo.

 

I, too, hope that Utapau is used, seeing as how this will be the last SW flick, he should at least have it mentioned in the background or something for us fans.

 

Yeah, I'm really hoping it will be a primary Episode III planet. It really deserves it after all this time.

 

Maybe it will be the new fiery planet!!

 

- The Jedi braid goes back to early drafts

- The name Cliegg Lars

- Anakin accompanying a queen into hiding, carrying her bags, arguing with her and them falling in love under pressure go way back as well

- The flying whales were around from the get-go

- a 3-way Jedi-Sith duel goes back to early ROtJ drafts

- Yoda fighting goes back to early ROtJ drafts

- the idea of various Guilds and Cooperate Alliances go back to early drafts

- the Prophecy goes back to early drafts as well

 

Hmmm interesting First_Stage_Lensman, especially the fact of how old a concept the "Duel Of Fates" was. I'm curious though, where exactly did you uncover all that information?

<[-]> Saber

 

Here's 2 good sites.

Jedi Bindu scripts

Star Wars Archive

 

In the early drafts of Star Wars, princess Leia was the 14 year old princess of Organa Mayor.
GL later used Organa as Leia's last name.
Like Leia in SW early drafts, Queen Amidala was 14 years old in TPM.

Cloud City was supposed to be the capitol of Alderaan. They refered to it as The Cloud City of Alderaan.