ST The Development Of The Sequel Trilogy

"What the **** is this" -Bob Iger skimming through the pages of the script

 

“The microbiotic world”. Sounds absolutely terrible. I think Lucas just likes to say stuff. In all of the info that’s been revealed about the storyline he was developing with Arndt there’s not a hint of this kind of thing.

 

This sounds like Lucas lost his marbles. This sounds like Osmosis Jones or one of those CG films that aren’t made by Pixar or Dreamworks that are desperate for something that Pixar or Dreamworks hasn’t already applied personification traits to.



That said... if there’s one thing that I think we can all always appreciate Lucas for it’s his imagination. When it all comes together it’s magic like few things have ever been and when it doesn’t, well, it’s considerably worse than the ST we do have.

LUCAS: “Guys, forget about midichlorians...”

(All in room breath sigh of relief)

LUCAS: “It’s time for the microbiotic world now!”

(All in room face palms)

 

It's hard to say what's nuttier. A ST about the "microbiotic world" or expecting a studio to pay $4bn & then produce it.

 

Might not be practical on screen but would be fun to tie in Mortis, the Yoda arc in TCW Season 6, the Yuuzhan Vong, Beyond Shadows in FOTJ, Abeloth and the other Dark Gods in the Cult Encounters article.

 

I have no idea what exactly Lucas is talking about, but it sounds like something weird and new and interesting, and I for one would have liked to see it. Imagine that. Star Wars expanding into genuinely new directions in ways that amount to something more than an empty semantic reshuffling of pre-existing elements.

 

This is a stunning revelation, as it rings eerily true to Lucas' original concept of the Whills/Force:

Recording the events and possessing much more power than the mortal players resembles this new information about the Whills "controlling the universe." Seems like he merely came to a point where he made the force and the Whills completely separate entities.

I know the fandom has mocked Lucas for "making it up as he goes along" but wow... the man really does keep his files in check. And now I can't help but wonder if Mortis and the final Yoda TCW arc really were a sneak peek into Lucas' final chapters.

 

My guess is the Yoda arc in TCW made him even hungrier for this sort of stuff. Still, the Art of TFA and TLJ books give us a reasonably okay clue to a lot of Lucas' early ideas for the ST, and this "microbiotic" stuff is nowhere to be seen. But yeah, I agree, Lucas likes to say stuff. So, yeah.

I am interested to know more, though. In the same way as I'm interested in Tolkien's once proposed sequel to Lord of the Rings. Just as a bit of what-if fun.

 

This sounds AWESOME.

 

Stuff you can't see without a microscope isn't very cinematic, like Midichlorians (I also felt it was an answer nobody really needed/wanted but I digress). At least in the case of disease the effects can be seen. The Force is invisible but the effects of the Force is what is shown. I wouldn't have thrown out his ideas but they need reconceptualization to make them cinematic as Star Wars is/was a very visually told story.

 

Not sure when “weird” became synonymous with good. There are plenty of very creative weird movies that are awful. To me microbiotic creatures who control the universe sounds terrible as a Star Wars concept. Getting into the “microbiotic world” within the story sounds even worse.

Where Lucas loses face here IMO is that he had years to pour hundreds of millions of his own cash into producing this. Instead he tells us over & over that there’s “no story” beyond RotJ. Then he thought he could pocket $4BN & get someone else to risk a fortune on such a wacko idea for a ST. Then when they decide not to he moans & complains about it. He should’ve taken the risk of making this himself, or made it a condition of Disney’s purchase. Even if it meant only getting $2BN out of them.

 

In the right context beings that drain the Force from others in order to live could've been a cool story. I think the first Aftermath novel references the idea for the Sith.

 

He has said before that the reason he sold was to spend more time with his family. He said point blank that the time was more important to him. It’s not because he didn’t feel confident about the story or making money.

 

Out of any Lucas ST era ideas we have, this is the first indication of anything significantly different that we haven't seen in the 2 films. It could have been an idea Lucas had that never quite made it into any drafts, but it does sound inspired by the Mortis/Yoda arc stuff on TCW.

 

Nah, it doesn't sound like Lucas lost his marbles.

I don't think Lucas literally means the movie takes place in the microscopic per se. I think he's just saying that the world of the force opens up more to us. Maybe Luke and the other characters learn more perhaps, spiritually, about it...and the those freaky alien creatures, the Whills, who operate it, or understand it better than our heroes. This sounds like it begins to move beyond Jedi/Sith beliefs. Maybe Luke even 'goes' there, to this other energy plane of existence, and for the first time we see that netherworld of the force is like, which surrounds and penetrates everything. Done right, it could be cool as hell. Done wrong, and yeah, it would be weird bad.

Lucas likes to say a lot of stuff. He seems like the kind of guy who has a lot of ideas and some stick and some don't, and some need a half hour to be explained well, and 140 characters doesn't do it. And many others probably need other creatives to evolve those ideas. Weird...sure. But at least its imaginative. Gotta give him credit for that.

 

He says a lot of things. What we know is he had time to spend months working on his version of the ST with Arndt & Lucasfilm. There’s no reason why he couldn’t do that still as company director. Then had a Filoni or Ron Howard or whoever direct the movies. But why put a fortune of your own money & risk your company on an idea that in his words will be hated as much as TPM? That would be stupid. Better to get Disney to front the cash & all of the risk, then you can propose any kooky ideas you like without a care in the world. Quite a shrewd operator that Lucas. In this case though a bit too optimistic to actually think it would play out like that.

 

At least Lucas was thinking outside the box, trying to bring microbiotic actors into the series. Disney's played it super safe so far by only casting macroorganisms.

 

I am really disappointed that we will not see Darth Plankton in the SW Universe

 

& recontextualizing the Force as a food that these creatures feed on so they can control the universe is genius. He went so far outside of the box that he could barely see it. The box became microscopic.

I thought it was Darth Penicillus, leader of the evil anti-biotics.

 

Or Darth Molecule. Split him in half, and he still survives.

 

It was to be the greatest story ever told, set in a petri dish.

Jokes aside (at least for a second) I feel like the ST writers perhaps did retain at least some of the spirit of what old George was on about here. The ST has focused more than any of the prior movies on the idea that light & dark forces are at play in the background & are shaping events. The implication that Rey is at least to a degree a representative chosen by the Light & has risen to confront the Darkness, etc etc. Personally I'm glad they kept this all vague & spiritual, with Force eating micro-organisms left to the occasional Star Trek episode where they belong.

 

His name is Maulecule

 

I concur!

 

So instead of the first Jedi temple, characters will have looked for the Whills? One of the oldest idea for SW Lucas tried many times to include in his movies, this is big. This kind of weird stuff is generally relegated to animated series like the Mortis arc or the Yoda arc in TCW. It seems like those two arcs really inspired him to go further into the foundation of his mythology. Can you image the worldbuilding? Instead of just small mentions here and there in reference books and novelizations, we would have seen the actual thing. Being fan of the weird side of SW, I am so bummed right now. The Art of books stated characters found old artifacts but no mention at all about any of this. What might have been... Filoni, I'm counting on you.