BTS Notes & Quotes on the changing Star Wars Saga 1975-2012

As per DarthBoba's suggestion, I've put together a compile of the more important quotes and information provided over the years regarding the changing overall vision of the Star Wars series/Saga:

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B4UwMUg-9EVSQjR1V0M1Rk52OVU/edit

My own commentary is in bold. I've tried to keep opinion and speculation to a minimum (although I've taken the liberty of keeping some of Mark Hamill's and Gary Kurtz's recent accounts separate) - this is a resource for reference, and also clarification and context for any new members who might find references to "the 12-part serial" or the "trilogy of trilogies" in certain threads a bit confusing.
And, of course, to encourage wider participation in some of the 'heavier' threads on the forums.

As I've mentioned at the start of the document, zombie really did all the hard work when he wrote The Secret History of Star Wars, I certainly encourage anyone who hasn't read it, and finds this sort of material fascinating, to get a hold of it immediately.

The document can be updated with any newly discovered information, or corrected if there's any glaring errors.
One quote in particular I couldn't find was one I seem to recall from Gary Kurtz around 1979 suggesting that a future SW film could be about the formation of the Republic and the Jedi. I thought it was in Alan Arnold's Once Upon a Galaxy, but I couldn't find it - little help?

 

Speaking of zombie... does he not really come around here anymore?

 

Nah, he's done trying to sell us things.

It'll obviously take time, but I'd like this humble little google doc to eventually be a sort of bare-bones curated Wookiepedia, focusing mainly on film lore.

 

Nah, he got a bit bored with the TSHOSW stuff and started focusing more on the OOT issues - which tend to just provoke flame wars in the CT forum. His site (savestarwars.com) is definitely worth a look, simply as an historical record - it's got all sorts of information regarding film prints & the like, including the old Super-8 reels. Pretty dry stuff, though.

TBH, I can't really blame him for being well & truly over the TFN forums, some of the hatred directed towards him on the original TSHOSW thread was ridiculous, not to mention the hijacking & general stupidity. You'd think he was talking about abortion, gun control or US foreign policy.
I don't agree with all of his contentions (which is why I've left as much opinion of the document as I could), but I'd rather argue in a civil manner over them, otherwise why bother? It's just a movie series, after all. Besides, a civilised argument can be a learning experience for all concerned.

I'm really grateful to him for publishing his original eBook of TSHOSW in the first place - it's what got me onto these forums & sparked my interest in such matters in the first place, despite being a SW fan since 1978, not to mention resurrecting another similar, non-SW related project I'd been stuffing around with for ages (nearly ready to go, but it'll be an ongoing thing).
His TSHOSW site is still active, that's where some of the info about the 'tangential' movies in the 12-part series turned up, plus he seems to be working on an article about the upcoming Sequel Trilogy.

 

The Disney Trilogy may be cool for the youth of today, I'm glad they have a new school writter & new school director. I'm a fan of episodes 1-6. People can argue all they want about Star Wars. Everyone can like what they want & dislike what they want.

 

VERY interesting stuff! I like this part:

GL: What I want to do is direct
the last sequel. I could do the first one and the last one and let
everyone else do the ones in between.
RS: It wouldn't bother you to have someone else do the ones in
between?
GL: No, it would be interesting. I would want to try and get some
good directors, and see what their interpretation of the theme is.
I think it will be interesting, it is like taking a theme in film school,
say, okay, everybody do their interpretation of this theme. It's an
interesting idea to see how people interpret the genre. It is a fun
genre to play with. All the prototype stuff is done now. Nobody
has to worry about what a Wookie is and what it does and how it
reacts. Wookies are there, the people are there, the environment is
there, the empire is there . . . everything is there. And now people
will start building on it. I've put up the concrete slab of the walls
and now everybody can have fun drawing the pictures and putting
on the little gargoyles and doing all the really fun stuff. And it's a
competition. I'm hoping if I get friends of mine they will want to do
a much better film, like, "I'll show George that I can do a film twice
that good," and I think they can, but then I want to do the last one,
so I can do one twice as good as everybody else. [Laughs]

Even though the saga turned out different from what they were thinking back then, this has certainly become reality now!
...except for the fact that GL will probably never direct Star Wars again.





"Pass on what you have learned"
/LM

 

Nice work. A very helpful and exhaustive summary of the series' shifting plans, from the beginning to 2012.
Really useful when you don't want to go through SHOSW again, with its many chapters and specifics, to get a clear view on this tricky subject.

I have no memory at all of this 1979 Gary Kurtz's quote you mention about a future film covering the formation of the Repbublic and the Jedi. Never came across.
But I guess it must be really hard to get your hands on if Zombie hasn't traced it in his book. Do you approximately remember when you stumbled upon it, and where ? Maybe Bantha Tracks ?

 

I could have sworn it was in Alan Arnold's Once Upon a Galaxy, but like I said, couldn't find it. Wasn't in TSHOSW, either. Wasn't Bantha Tracks, I went through all the early ones when compiling the quotes.

It might not have been Kurtz, could have been Lucas (or even Lawrence Kasdan?) - or maybe I'm just getting it mixed up with Kurtz's more recent remarks - but I also recall it being referred to in various discussions around here about the 'odd' films of the 12-part series. Don't take it as gospel that such a quote was made back then, I could be mistaken.

 

Oh, alright.

 

Incidentally, does anyone feel like a bit of homework and assembling similar such documents about, say, the information about the PT during the OT era, the original visions of the Jedi Knights & so on? There was a great thread a while back full of quotes from GL, but unfortunately the move truncated so many of the posts that it's not what it once was - not to mention that it was simply a massive thread & not sorted.

With a handful of Google documents, this stickied thread could serve as a very handy resource on the boards. Having to do yet another web search for that quote you've used a dozen times but can't remember, or the link's dead, or even just going back to TSHOSW for an incomplete snippet, is a pain in the butt.

Of course, it's always worth mentioning one of the truly great SW resources on the web when it comes to such discussions:

http://starwarz.com/starkiller/

For the most part, it's all the early drafts of the films of the SW Saga that are available to the public in their complete forms. And it even has that 1983 'Fall of the Republic' piece of fan fiction that so many still believe was the real deal.

 

Starwarz.com is indeed fantastic...hell, it's the main reason I identified the Legacy comics as taking 90% of the trappings of the ANH rough drafts and just running with them.

Anyway-I suppose I could give it a try.

 

can someone explain what TSHOSW means?

 

The Secret History of Star Wars. It's a book that caused quite a stir a few years back.

 

Thanks

 

Read it with an open mind, it's not the anti-GL diatribe many make it out to be, nor is it necessarily the absolute truth. For the most part, it's really just a massive presentation & analysis of absolutely everything publicly available that was known about the Star Wars Saga until about 2009, and it addresses whatever contradictions exist.

 

I'm actually not THAT big of a fan to care.

 

Isn't it possible that at some point Palpatine was intended to survive the fall of the Empire?

 

Cop-out.

 

Haha, I've never actually had much interest in 'original scripts'. I'm quite happy to view the final product as the only cannon.

 

awesome how you linked those together! thanks for the info (and explanations)

 

Hey everyone, just FYI, zombie put up his own take on the history of the sequel trilogy/saga development plans. Thoughts?

 

Interesting how he ignored mentions of Palpatine not appearing until Episode IX on his own website.

 

Given that it's part of Kurtz's somewhat muddled, embellished accounts (similar to Mark Hamill's), it would only confuse matters & not really serve any purpose. Most likely the Emperor was intended to appear in Chapter/Episode 12, when the majority of the series would focus on Luke & co.
Kurtz simply assumed that episodes VII-IX of the 9-ep Saga would follow much the same storyline, rather than being a new construction altogether, set decades after ROTJ.

There's a thread regarding Gary Kurtz's accounts here: http://boards.theforce.net/threads/according-to-gary-kurtz.50003998/

The article's great, really an expanded version of his original appendix in TSHOSW (it now sort of divides things up into eras as my doc does, although not in the same sections, plus he doesn't mention the 'low-budget' vision), and his speculation regarding the new films seems to be on the money.
My only issue is his dating of the newly discovered 12-ep outline to late 1977/early 1978 - IMHO I'd be inclined to place it around mid to late 1978. He also claims that there's no 'trilogy' structure beyond the OT in this outline, although the outline seems to state 'trilogy(ies)' next to Episode Seven (ESB), implying that there might be one more (it's hard to see what it actually says, though).

 

I don't feel like that has been proven.

 

Lucas's interviews with Alan Arnold at the end of ESB's fiming clearly indicate that, at this time when the 3 trilogies of nine episodes structure was definitely settled, each trilogy would be seperated by a 20 years gap, and that ROTJ (episode 6) would see the resolution of the Empire versus the Rebellion plot.

The time span has been modified since (PT taking place 32 years before ANH, and elusive ST's period varied from time to time), But Gary Kurtz recollections appears to be basically irrelevant.

It was maybe relevant in 1977-1978, when the 12 episodes plan was still valid. But not in 1979 and thereafter.