ST The Development Of The Sequel Trilogy

I wouldn’t read too much into it. His interviews are a lot of things, but rarely the whole truth. If they’d interviewed him an hour later he’d have said something different

 

True. But the fact remains: they didn't follow through with most of his ideas. I'm sure some a minority of them were kept. But everything points to the idea that the majority of them were rejected and there had to have been a reason behind that. What exactly was it about them that they felt the need to, as he put it, go their own way? To be clear, though, I'm not saying his treatments would have been better than what we got, just that I'm curious about what they they contained.

 

I don't even believe they scrapped "most of his ideas".

I can see Disney-LFL working in the majority of his ideas, tossing some key points, but framing and contextualizing them differently than George would have and him viewing it as them tossing "most of my ideas".

Lucas isn't in any easy place. Being the creator, and final authority, of canon Star Wars for decades and then handing it over, and no longer being consider the final word, can't be easy.

 

I don’t think the show even hit pre-production, just ideas. Same with young Han.

Besides..If Anakin can get twisted by a questionable male figure(who is old) at a young age to an adult, I see no reason to not have a female Sith/her sith husband this time around. That would have been more connected to the grayer morals of the stories considering Kylo would be in love with her. I can imagine some really great conflict within the characters.

 

Well, they didn’t follow through with various ideas in TLJ.

But episodes 7, 8, and 9 are three parts of a story (which itself is a third of the Saga). I’ve been getting the impression that many fans think that RJ made the narrative somewhat incoherent rather than just assuming we’ll get resolution to various issues in 9.

 

The impression I get from everything that's come out is that TFA is basically a prelude designed to introduce the new characters and revitalise the series, and TLJ is close to where George was going with things. So they didn't throw his ideas away, they just used VII to lay the groundwork in a way that didn't interest George.

 

Weird how my sister picked that up, with no history. She literally said almost verbatim what you wrote here after seeing TLJ. That TFA felt like a prologue, and TLJ felt like the real part 1 of this trilogy.

 

Not exactly. They threw out his treatments and the ST uses some of the story Lucas and Arndt were working on after the original treatments were thrown out.

 

I don't think that's entirely clear. We still don't know what was in the treatment and how it carried over.

 

I think the art books show the timeline. TFA shows pre-sale active Luke, while TLJ shows only post sale and with Arndt. The evidence shows Arndt was involved with exile post sale.

 

It seems fairly clear that Lucas left after they dropped exiled Luke as the starting point for VII. He was doling out fabuloso stamps on exiled Luke artwork. I doubt he was thinking that they weren’t using his ideas at that time. He was developing them with Arndt, right?

 

Yeah. TBH, I've always assumed that anything Arndt was working on in earlier days was things he and Lucas came up with. If I am correct, that means the exiled Luke and even what eventually became the First Order and Starkiller Base are things Lucas and Arndt worked on. In the Art of TFA book, the idea of a neo-Imperial group and I believe a new super weapon were in play before Abrams came on board. I think Arndt is the key here. If you hear of anything from him in early days its likely Lucas was involved with it.

 

I found this the other day that seems like an old draft of posts around the TFA days trying to work out the timeline of development from the WGA interview, SW articles and the ART of TFA book. This lines up very well with what we know from the TLJ art book. I think the line about Kira being revealed as a legacy character is incorrect supposition on behalf of whoever wrote this (I honestly don't know if it was me or someone else here!). But if the part I bolded is correct, then the exiled Luke, Jedi killer stuff, past trauma at Luke's academy etc was all from the outlines produced by George and MA ( I think, anyway).

Summer 2012 (EW/WGA): Shortly after her hiring, Kathleen Kennedy contacts Michael Arndt to inquire about his interest in writing the entire sequel trilogy. Arndt demurs, but accepts the Episode VII job. Kennedy's Episode VII pitch to Arndt is "the origin story of a female Jedi".

Summer/Fall of 2012 (EW/WGA): Arndt begins initial work on Episode VII in concert with Kennedy and Lucas. At that time, the plot is about "Kira", a young woman whose village is attacked by the villains, and goes to find Luke Skywalker. Initial MacGuffins discussed include the remains of Darth Vader and ancient Jedi artifacts. The villain is called "The Jedi Killer". Arndt discovers that once the story reaches Luke, it becomes hard to return the focus to the younger characters, so the choice is made to have the younger characters save the day at the end of the script themselves and then find Luke. From there, the story naturally moves to have the location of Luke be a central MacGuffin/mystery. There are even discussions that Luke may not appear until Episode IX, but it is decided the film should end with Luke Skywalker. It is also at this time that the initial male lead "Sam" emerged - essentially a Han Solo-type. The full Lucasfilm Ltd. company is informed of the decision to make the sequel trilogy in September 2012.

January 9, 2013 (Art of Force Awakens): The formal story group for Episode VII has its first meeting, including JJ Abrams, Kathleen Kennedy, Michael Arndt, Lawrence Kasdan, Simon Kinberg, Kiri Hart, Rick Carter, and the Visualists. It is at this meeting that the "junk planet" Jakku is pitched by Michael Arndt. "Kira" being a scavenger on said planet is adopted in the same meeting. They pick five images from Kurosawa films to outline the film tracking Kira's journey from fearful scavenger to burgeoning Jedi. Lucas' outlines are provided to the group. Anakin Skywalker's lightsaber playing a critical role in the film is in play at this point, as is the "Jedi Killer" having caused some devastating incident that has led to the estrangement of Luke, Han, and Leia.


ETA: I just tried to find my art of TFA book, but can't find it. That last para feels like it came from the book. If anyone has it, might be worth checking.

 

Can anyone remember when George stopped being involved?

From the art books I can kind of piece together a vague timeline, which I'll outline in the next post as it may take some time.

 

Basically - it seems that the core basics of the ST are set right from the beginning.

Rick Carter recruits a concept team in December and their first meeting is Jan 9, 2013.

The Kurosawa stills we've now seen in the TLJ book are handed out at this meeting "perfectly illustrating Kira's journey of self-discovery, from fearful force sensitive to master"

January 2013. The first month primarily focuses on exploring who Luke, Han and Leia have become since ROTJ. New characters Sam and Kira are also created. George Lucas "provided his episode VII treatment to the project's creative team. And after months of internet speculation, JJ Abrams was officially announced as the director of episode VII on January 25"

All the haunted / dark Luke imagery from the TFA and TLJ book seems to have been generated in January or February. Lucas is giving out the Fabuloso stamp to designs of Exiled Luke's temple. The Jedi Killer, the Junk planet, Kira as Scavenger, Sam as a stormtrooper, the neo-empire and the SKB are all part of the ST story by May 2013 - by which time I believe George was still involved? Can anyone verify that?

Mark Hamill visits the art department in August 2013. And Michael Arndt turns in his outline for TFA, with a WIP script.

The biggest ST revelations - that Ben Solo is the Jedi Killer and that Han is killed by him come in September 2013, at which point Arndt was still involved in the story.

I think its between these events that meeting Luke is pushed back to episode 8.

Speaking in May 2013, Chiang talks about the original backstory for TFA:

After ROTJ, when the Empire fell, Luke went through a period of turmoil. He decides to reform the Jedi, Luke being the last. So he creates his own Jedi Academy and recruits people." One of Luke's pupil's was the character then known as the Jedi Killer. "Ultimately he turns against Luke. There's a big fight, and the Jedi killer is wounded and cast aside. There's this big through line of the Jedi Killer wanting revenge on Luke. And that's partly why he takes on this persona of Darth Vader: to haunt Luke"

On January 16th there is a meeting with George Lucas at Skywalker Ranch. "Among the pieces presented.... were additional portraits of Luke, the temple where he dwelled in exile, and the training of the young disciple Kira, later named Rey."

At this point in the story, thirty years after the fall of the Empire, Luke has gone to a dark place, " Chiang said. "He always had this potential dark side within him, being that his father was Darth Vader. So he is really struggling with that. He ended up secluding himself in this Jedi temple on a new planet, and he's just there meditating, reassessing his whole life. Gradually, over the arc of the movie, he rediscovers his vitality and comes back to himself."

When Arndt realises Luke would serve the needs of the story as the person everyone seeks but does not find till the Force Awakens' final scene "the plot points of an ancient temple and Rey's training would be temporarily shelved".

Essentially, the main beats of episode 7 from when George was involved got spread between TFA and TLJ, and always included a haunted, down and out Luke in exile "who was inspired by [Colonel Kurtz in] Apocalypse Now." The key difference seems to be Ben Solo becoming the Jedi Killer. The Neo-Empire and Exiled Luke were always there from the very start it seems.

By the way, here's the Alzmann quote on Force ghosts: We did talk a lot about how the final battle frontier for Jedi might be in the spirit realm. So you have to have a bad guy ghost. I wonder if this is something we will see in 9.

 

I would just really love if Lucasfilm called back J.W. Rinzler to give us the full development of this entire trilogy in book form after the release of Episode IX.

 

It would be interesting to know when George stopped his involvement. I'm pretty sure we had a timeframe for that as well, but I can't remember it for the life of me now.

What I would say, re TLJ is that while we don't know how George wrapped up Luke's story, and he probably had a more conventional take on her training - the haunted exile who had turned his back on the galaxy seems to have been in play from the very start.

 

Was it ever clear exactly when Lucas stepped aside? My guess is that it was a very difficult day for Lucas when Arndt said that he didn’t think he could make the story for VII work with Luke having a central, active role. I also think this is likely what slowed Arndt down, to the extent that they needed to bring in JJ and Kasdan to finish writing.

 

Not sure, but it seems a natural solution to take it to 8. I wonder if Luke would have died Obi-wan/ QGJ style? That feels like a George move.


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Could Lucas' departure have something to do with the direction of the film moving towards a structure similar to ANH, as well as designs that were deliberately closer to the OT? I recall one of his critiques being that they wanted to make a "retro" movie.

 

The Jedi killer was created in January 2013 as concept art and got his name in March 2013 according do Pablo.

For Anakin's lightsaber
Diablo Hellalgo‏@pablohidalgo
The idea of the Anakin-Luke saber came later. Like, oh, October 2013.

Does this mean GL continued to rework the story with KK, Michael Arndt and the SG after January 2013?

Pablo Hidalgo‏ @pablohidalgo
Not sure how you'd read that into that statement.

Pablo Hidalgo‏ @pablohidalgo
It evolved throughout 2012.

Do you know when did he stop being involved as a story consultant then?

Pablo Hidalgo‏ @pablohidalgo
He was always welcome to, but by 2013 he left it alone and concentrated on other things

Also interesting is Mark Hamill hinting at a much more active Luke than what we got.
https://www.rollingstone.com/movies...skywalker-from-star-wars-to-last-jedi-w514208
Part of my problem is, I went up north to Lucasfilm and the guys said, "Oh man, I've been drawing you for a year and a half, come in here." And I went into a room and I saw all these production drawings. ... Concept art from when Michael Arndt was still writing the screenplay. At one point, Rey and Luke are in scuba gear retrieving pieces of the sunken Death Star at the bottom of the ocean. I thought, "Holy crap. I love scuba gear. I love being in the water on film. It's so rare. We'll be in a tank at Pinewood, it'll be fabulous." Last time I wore scuba stuff was in the trash compactor [in the first movie]. They sent me to a school to learn scuba in case...

It also seems like Kira's training was supposed to have a greater importance and early descriptions of her character were also slightly more different.

 

I also think it's possible that Lucas' departure didn't stem from one particular point of contention. Perhaps he just wanted to provide the production with a few initial ideas for guidance, but always intended to step aside soon after Abrams got on board, in order not to impose himself too much.

 

Unless the TFA Artbook is wrong, there was already art under the June 2013 entry showing Proto-Maz with Chewie and other characters holding the ignited Skywalker lightsaber in some sort of catacombs.

 

Maybe it was just a blue saber?

 

I think also, George has been used to being top dog since 1978. I don't think he was ever going to be able to play consultant for long.