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Willow News-EU, Sequels, everything

Discussion in 'Lucasfilm Ltd. In-Depth Discussion' started by jedi_jra, Nov 24, 2012.

  1. sluggo1313.

    sluggo1313. Jedi Knight star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 23, 2013

    I think a re-make of the original would/could be a great place to start, and would give them younger actors to move forward with. They could also add a bit more world building and back story to the movie to give them more building blocks to move forward with.

    Willow - Peter Dinklage
    [​IMG]

    Madmartigan - Nikolaj Coster-Waldau
    [​IMG]

    Sorsha - Evangeline Lily
    [​IMG]
    Bavmorda - Alice Krige
    [​IMG]
    Rool - Aziz Ansari
    [​IMG]
    Franjean - Bill Hader
    [​IMG]
    Fin Raziel - Helen Mirren
    [​IMG]
    General Kael - Stephen Lang
    [​IMG]
    Airk Thaughbaer - Karl Urban
    [​IMG]
    I think thats all the principals.
     
  2. GunganSlayer

    GunganSlayer Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    Jan 24, 2013
    I've always been a Willow fan, but honestly, it's not a film that needs a sequel or a remake. It works just fine as a standalone fantasy film. I know this is The Internet, and it's fun to debate and speculate over stuff, but, that's just my two cents.
     
    Sarge likes this.
  3. sluggo1313.

    sluggo1313. Jedi Knight star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 23, 2013

    The original is a good, popular movie. But I'd be all for sequels and/or a remake because I'd like to see more of that world and of those characters.
     
  4. Mr. K

    Mr. K Moderator Emeritus star 5 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Oct 23, 1999
    Yup!
     
  5. sluggo1313.

    sluggo1313. Jedi Knight star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 23, 2013
    I watched the move last night, while I still love the movie I definitely see were it could be remade and things that could be/should be added and changed in the remake and/or in projects that could/would follow, such as prequels, sequels, or "EU material". Hell, the story could even be split into 2 (I think would 3 be stretching it) movies.

    The Sorsha's Father sub-plot could be put back in, that would certainly explain her switching sides much better then just "he is fighting, I think I love him".

    I think General Kael could get more character development. Also, his "final battle" with Madmartigan could be longer and more exciting then the handful of moves it is in the original.

    There are/were a bunch of discarded ideas for the movie that could be worked back in (on the Blu-Ray you get a quick glimse of art of a human-cat king looking character).

    I think there is more to tell between Fin and Bavmorda, and with Madmartigan and Airk/Galadorn (why he left etc...)

    I think they potentially make the story longer, in terms of "in-universe time" and have an adolescent or teenage Elora play a role at some point. I mean, the whole story is about protecting the baby because she is susposed to be the only one able to over thrown Bavmorda, and then it happens any way with Elora playing basically no role in it (Bavmorda basically kills herself).

    I think the world could be fleshed out more, give us a sense of what Galadorn is, what Tier Ashlin is, where Nackmor is, how these kingdoms all relate to each other, what each stands for etc.... Make the destruction of Galadorn more meaningful etc...

    This could be hard to do while keeping it light hearted and kid friendly. I think it would be GREAT project for Brad Bird or Andrew Stanton or Lee Unkrich who work for Disney and have shown they can walk that line. I think someone like that would be a great successor to Ron Howard.
     
    Iron_lord likes this.
  6. Mr. K

    Mr. K Moderator Emeritus star 5 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Oct 23, 1999
    I WANT MORE BURGLEKUTT!!!!
    [​IMG]
     
  7. sluggo1313.

    sluggo1313. Jedi Knight star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 23, 2013

    Spinoff Movie.
     
  8. Mr. K

    Mr. K Moderator Emeritus star 5 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Oct 23, 1999
    oh....I'm so there. Meegosh returns to the village only to have Mr. Burglekutt put him to work in the mines.
     
  9. sluggo1313.

    sluggo1313. Jedi Knight star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 23, 2013
    I like this one myself

    [​IMG]
     
    Mr. K likes this.
  10. ezekiel22x

    ezekiel22x Chosen One star 5

    Registered:
    Aug 9, 2002
    Have to disagree with this. Madmartigan/Kael as it stands is my favorite duel sequence in any film, in large part because it's designed as a brief and visceral final fight more so than something dependent on intricate choreography or in-duel conversation.
     
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  11. sluggo1313.

    sluggo1313. Jedi Knight star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 23, 2013

    Visceral doesn't have to = brief
     
  12. The-Eternal-Hero

    The-Eternal-Hero Jedi Knight star 4

    Registered:
    Nov 3, 2012
    I hate the idea of a reboot/remake. That's just stupid. Warrick and Val are still fantastic actors. I always imagined Old Madmartigan as being kind of like King Henry VIIIth or Brian Blessed as Vultan, chomping on a leg of mutton, mulled wine spilling down his beard, rising from his cushy throne when the trumps of war call him forth, battered old campaigner kicking ass on the battlefield. Give those guys a seriously good script, with younger supporting characters, and we're on our way. One of the great things about Willow is that isn't burdened with all that crummy bogus Nu Hollywood "character development" bloat, usually nothing more than boring, wasted screen time on side characters, blunting them of any impression they might make. Yeah, remaking Willow would suck.
     
    Count Yubnub likes this.
  13. The-Eternal-Hero

    The-Eternal-Hero Jedi Knight star 4

    Registered:
    Nov 3, 2012
    Willow is ripe for expansion. I'd love to see it happen if it was in the right hands.

    The Willow EU:

    [​IMG]

    Written by Wayland Drew from the screenplay. It's a novelization but it's actually very well written in a 1980's young adult fantasy style. Wayland Drew expands on almost every scene, providing more detail and background (those buzzards circling Bavmorda's castle are Night Herons; now you know); the novel includes at least four deleted scenes (two of which can now be seen on the Blu-Ray); George Lucas composed three vignettes that were inserted into the text, giving background to three characters; Drew wrote a fourth himself, for Vonkhar.

    [​IMG]

    Some dropped concepts, alternate dialogue passages and the same deleted scenes are featured in this solid comic book adaptation.

    [​IMG]

    I used to own this; sadly I sold it for $40.00 -- it now goes for $95.00 and up and I really miss owning it! Allen Varney expanded on the movie extensively, doing a really good job of solidifying what we see in the movie. I'm not sure if it's "canon" (it definitely contradicts the novelization and the later books in places). Good stuff, cool maps & illustrations. Willow did not attract the toymakers like Star Wars did. Lucas actually had to choose between a limited action figure run or role playing character pieces -- he opted for the role playing pieces. He's such a geek!

    [​IMG]

    I love this novel. It's one of the best fantasy novels of the 1990's. Chris Claremont's rugged, rough-and-tumble, head-first, heart-on-sleeve prose style takes getting used to, true. But this is one of Lucas's most complex and elaborate fantasies. Just as Return of the Jedi and the Ewok TV shows (live action and animated) prefigured WILLOW, this book prefigured the Prequel Trilogy and The Clone Wars. The world building is thick as a thousand cinder blocks. There's a map of the spiritual dimensions that you have to memorize in order to understand the magic system! Lucas narrated the entire trilogy in a 7-8 hour marathon onto tape, then discussed the project with Claremont over dinner, and then line-edited every chapter of the trilogy, making editorial contributions. They made a great team. This is really imaginative and original fantasy. Not for everyone; but I love it. I've read the trilogy five times, I'm reading it again right now.

    [​IMG]

    The difficult "middle book". It's not as strong as SM or SS but it's still good. After a shaky start it settles into a long middle section driven by Elora's character driven story and Willow's magical sleuthing. Lots of Mortis-level weirdness in this book, you can see where Lucas was driving the cart. Overall, still impressively unique and different from other fantasy epics.

    [​IMG]

    Just amazing. Ideas pour almost uncontrollably out of this book. It's really wild and very original. From a soul-stealing creature who carries the souls in tiny bells adorning his wide-brimmed hat, to a Demon Elora retracing her path in space and time to confront her nemesis, The Deceiver, while armies of humans and "Fae" square off to start the war to end all wars, this is just an awesome book from first page to last. It even fills in some story gaps from the movie.

    [​IMG]

    Who doesn't want to hear these glorious themes blaring out over theater loudspeakers in surround sound?

    [​IMG]

    There's also a library of concept art, like this stunning piece by Jean Moebius Giraud, to draw from.

    [​IMG]

    Before the movie was even released, George Lucas was developing an animated TV series which would have introduced original characters. Some of that material could be explored and mined.

    Willow could make an incredible, high quality franchise with movies, TV miniseries, animated tv series, internet webisodes, spin off novels, comics, games and anything else. I myself am still hoping for it too happen.
     
    Barbecue17 and Count Yubnub like this.
  14. DarthBoba

    DarthBoba Manager Emeritus star 9 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Jun 29, 2000
    Sounds like I need to find the Shadow books...never read them.
     
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  15. The-Eternal-Hero

    The-Eternal-Hero Jedi Knight star 4

    Registered:
    Nov 3, 2012
    They're still in print! Give 'em a try.
     
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  16. Sarge

    Sarge Chosen One star 10

    Registered:
    Oct 4, 1998
    I read Shadow Moon and didn't like it. It was different in almost every way from the movie: Willow had "grown" so much that he was a different character, the world seemed like a completely different place from the movie, and Madmartigan and Sorsha aren't in it. To me, it wasn't a sequel to Willow, but a different story altogether.
     
  17. sluggo1313.

    sluggo1313. Jedi Knight star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 23, 2013

    They aren't very good.


    The problem with just continuing it at this point is that the movie is what, 25 years old? The effects are dated, the actors are older or dead, they don't look like their characters anymore etc... Thats a very HARD sell to an audience, espically a young one (Which Willow is aimed it, its much more CoN then LotR). It worked with TPM, but Willow is nowhere NEAR that success and pop-culture element that Star Wars was. Its much more likely a sequel of the original movie. Ask anyone under the age of 20, most probably wouldn't even know what Willow is. At this point, it would be another Superman Returns.
     
  18. The-Eternal-Hero

    The-Eternal-Hero Jedi Knight star 4

    Registered:
    Nov 3, 2012
    They're worth reading for their own sake. The world they create is rich & layered and the story is original and good. The whole point of the trilogy was to show the movie's story & characters from a different perspective. Willow is still the same character, just as old Old Obi wan in the OT is recognizable as young Obi from the PT.

    @Sluggo You're entitled to your opinion but I disagree. The last thing we need is another friggin' remake/re-heated "origin" story. I've shown the movie to a lot of people of all different ages over the years and they've all loved it; the younger the better, too. Put together a seriously good script & make a good looking movie and it could work. I think it's a much better bet than rebooting Indy. Although I think a TV series would be more successful than a feature film. You could have a very strong series based in that "world" without focusing 100% on the existing characters: like Agents of SHIELD, Dark Angel or those CSI shows. There's plenty of content to mine & room for expansion.
     
  19. sluggo1313.

    sluggo1313. Jedi Knight star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 23, 2013

    Showing the movie to a handful of friends doesn't prove your point. The orignal is OLD, and the majority of the audience they'd be going for wouldn't know it existed or haven't thought about it in years. Aside from a personal "I really like the original a re-make threatens that for me for some reason" reason, remaking the movie makes the most sense if they are going to bring that franchise back.

    They can't do an Agents of Shield type show in a world that no one knows about it. No one would care.
     
  20. The-Eternal-Hero

    The-Eternal-Hero Jedi Knight star 4

    Registered:
    Nov 3, 2012
    So you're basically just asserting your opinion. The film isn't as well known as SW or Indy but it's not as obscure as you're making it out to be. Whenever standout fantasy movies of the past are mentioned in articles it usually gets a shout-out, and the Blu Ray release got a fair bit of press; heck they built a whole hour long TV special around it (Life's Too Short); so there's some awareness there. I don't feel "threatened" by the idea of a remake; I just think it's a redundancy and a waste of time. Before GOT was turned into a TV show very few people outside of fantasy fandom had any idea whatsoever what it was. MTV is sinking money into a Shannara TV series; again, stop the average person on the street and ask them about Shannara & you'll get a blank stare. For that matter, before there was a big movie, how many average moviegoers had any clue what The Avengers was? I'd rather see some creativity on the part of the producers if they choose to make use of this property & yet another remake/reboot/origin-story is as far from original as you can get. Most audiences are ignorant of most genre material until you put it under their nose and explain what it is & why they should care. All they have to do is educate the consumer & hope for the best. These days, with an hour-long block of promotion before a movie is shown, advertising on every digital device as soon as you turn it on, geek websites, twitter, YT etc. it's not that hard to make viewers aware of what's being produced even if they're not 100% familiar. Anyway, as much as I love the film, the storyline's not that great; I'd rather see a fresh story with new characters added instead of another retread. As for likelihood: it is very likely that they will make Willow their next project to develop after SW & Indy. It's the only other big, potentially crowd-pleasing, tentpole compatible genre property Lucasfilm owns, it's virtually untouched, and fantasy is hot right now. They'll want to make the most of their investment & Willow has a built in, if relatively small, audience; fortunately, its genre (fantasy) has an gi-normous global audience.
     
  21. sluggo1313.

    sluggo1313. Jedi Knight star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 23, 2013

    Some people mentioning it on the internet doesn't = wide audience knowledge or a desire for more. Hell, whent he movie was released it was considered a moderate success at best.

    You think Lifes Too Short (a tv series, not a 1 hour special) was built around the Willow release? You really don't know what you're talking about. The movie got mentioned a lot and the special that came out a couple years later used it as a plot device, but the show was made because of the Blu-Ray release of the movie.

    And yes you do feel that your verison of the movie is threatened by a re-make, and thats fine. Many big fans of movies and franchises feel the same way.

    Game of Thrones, Shannara and Averagers weren't/aren't built on 25 year old movies that were only modest hits and very few people remember.
     
  22. The-Eternal-Hero

    The-Eternal-Hero Jedi Knight star 4

    Registered:
    Nov 3, 2012
    I feel like I'm arguing with Walking Asperger's. I'll just let it lie . .
     
  23. sluggo1313.

    sluggo1313. Jedi Knight star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 23, 2013
    Must suck getting your butt kicked by Walking Aspergers.......
     
  24. EHT

    EHT Manager Emeritus star 7 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Sep 13, 2007
    OK... everyone please play nice.
     
  25. Blur

    Blur Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 11, 1999
    Just saw Willow on Blu-ray for the first time. I have seen this film in all of it's incarnations, i.e. theatre, VHS tape, and DVD. However, this Blu-ray blows them all away - though it's been years, I believe the picture quality (PQ) is probably even better than it was when I saw this in the theatre back in '88....

    That being said, with the PQ being so good, some of the effects look quite obvious. However, this is still a great fantasy flick with an amazing score....
     
    EternalHero likes this.