We are officially less than a year away from the first brand new Star Wars film since 2005! I am so excited for this. Let's take a quick look at how we've gotten to this point.
Back in 2013, George Lucas sold his company LucasArts to Disney, relinquishing all rights to all LucasArts studio franchises; namely Star Wars and Indiana Jones. Disney promptly canceled all projects that LucasArts had in production, using the name only for producing video games. This shook the world of Star Wars fans, whom for years had been extremely vocal over their distaste for the Star Wars prequel movies (Episodes 1-3) and for Lucas in general. Lucas had gone on record previously saying that the latest Star Wars movies were targeting a younger audience as were the following animated projects. This wouldn't change the hardcore fans opinions though. And why should it?!
As a fan I felt that Episode 1: The Phantom Menace was awful! Filled with lazy writing, boring politics, horrendous CGI, wooden acting, and terrible casting. George Lucas had written, produced, and directed this one, as he did with Episode II, Episode III, and Episode IV. He wrote the screenplay for every other Star Wars movie too, but did not direct episodes V and VI. There is a clear difference in writing between the original trilogy and the new episodes. The original had a passion and a clear love of science fiction and film making that you could feel while watching it. The Episodes 1-3 felt lifeless and expensive. (I'll go further into detail about the Original Trilogy vs. the New Trilogy another time).
So what does Episode VII have going for it? Well aside from George Lucas selling LucasArts and giving up the rights to everything related to Star Wars, he also has nothing to do with the writing or production and has completely handed over control to Disney and JJ Abrams the new director. We're not departing from the feel of the originals much though, as the original screenwriter Lawrence Kasdan returned to pen this one! Abrams and Kasdan are even bringing back the beloved characters from the original trilogy. We'll finally find out what happened to Luke, Leia, Han, and Chewbacca after the Rebel Alliance destroyed the new Deathstar and the Galactic Empire in Return of the Jedi!
That's not all either! Gone are the days of the movies just being another Episode in the Star Wars Saga, but now we're also going to be treated to spin off movies! The first spin off rumored to be in the works is a Han Solo story possibly starring Aaron Paul of Breaking Bad fame. We're going to see a new line of Star Wars comic books, the first issue was released last week with action figures attached to some of the collector's edition covers.
There are so many exciting possibilities that come with the new Star Wars, from new films to new TV shows or specials to comic books and novels. We have so much to look forward to and less than a year to check it out for ourselves! I personally cannot wait for this movie and really think it's going to be fantastic.
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