A tiny bit of news broke this afternoon, as it was announced that Disney was acquiring George Lucas‘ LucasFilm and a new Star Wars film is being planned for release in 2015. Naturally, the internet went a little nuts. There was a bit of confusion surrounding the initial news nugget, but we learned a bit more as Disney and LucasFilm started revealing the details of the deal. Star Wars: Episode 7 will kick off a new trilogy, with LucasFilm president Kathleen Kennedy overseeing the franchise as the executive producer while Lucas acts as a creative consultant.
In concert with the acquisition news, Lucas and Kennedy released a video online explaining why the decision was made to sell the company to Disney and what this means for Star Wars going forward. Hit the jump to see what they had to say.
Click here to read our initial article regarding the Star Wars: Episode 7 news.
Click here to read our editorial regarding who should direct the new Star Wars films.
Click here to watch Lucas and Disney CEO Bob Iger discuss the acquisition.
Lucas begins by explaining why he decided to step away from the company and why Disney is the perfect fit for Lucasfilm:
“Obviously I’ve been talking about retiring for several years now. I wanted to get into sort of another stage of life where I’m not in the film business anymore, where I don’t have to run a corporation. It occurred to me one day that the perfect person to run the company was Kathy [Kennedy]. It’s just such a perfect fit, and I felt that I really wanted to put the company somewhere in a larger entity that would protect it. Disney is a huge corporation; they have all kinds of capabilities and faciliites. There’s a lot of strength to be gained by this.”
In this afternoon’s press release, it was revealed that a treatment for Episode 7 has already been written and an outline is already done for Episodes 8 and 9. Lucas reveals in the video that he’s written the treatments for the new trilogy, and he handed over all the Star Wars story nuggets that he’s accumulated over the years to Kennedy:
“I always said I wasn’t going to do anymore, and that’s true, I’m not going to do anymore. But that doesn’t mean I’m unwilling to turn it over to Kathy [Kennedy] to do more. I have story treatments of 7, 8, and 9, and a bunch of other movies and obviously we have hundreds of books and comics and everything you could possibly imagine. So I sort of moved that treasure trove of stories and various things to Kathy, and I have complete confidence that she’s gonna take them and make great movies.”
Kennedy revealed that they’ve already started talking to writers about penning the screenplay for Episode 7:
“We are absolutely going to make Star Wars movies and we’re in the midst of the really fun part of the process which is we’re sitting down with a couple of writers and we’re starting to discuss ideas and we’re starting to talk about what those stories might be.”
Though I’m sure they’d be abruptly abducted and never heard from again if they opened their mouth, I’m incredibly interested to hear what screenwriters Kennedy has been talking to about handling the script for the next Star Wars film. Hopefully we hear more soon, though I’m sure we won’t be lacking for Star Wars rumors in the coming weeks.
Watch the full video below:
ARROW Season 1 Finale and Season 2 Updates From Greg Berlanti, Marc Guggenheim, Andrew Kreisberg, Stephen Amell and David Ramsey @ PaleyFest
Fede Alvarez Talks EVIL DEAD Sequel and Sam Raimi’s EVIL DEAD 4; Says EVIL DEAD 2 Will Be “100% Original”
New Teaser Trailer for STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS Shows Plenty of Action with a Hint of Humor
Dane Dehaan Talks THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN 2; Says the Script is ‘Epic’ and ‘People Are Going to Love it’
Nicolas Cage Talks GHOST RIDER 3; Says it’s Possible ‘But it Won’t be With Me’
I can’t help wishing that this news came about 20 years ago but it’s better than 20 years from now.
I’d pay extra for Lucas Free Star Wars. They should have a big “100% Lucas Free™” stamp plastered across every piece of marketing for the movie.
Dave Filoni is doing spectacularly with Clone Wars, I think he should be in on this.
Well then! Hopefully this all turns out well. Personally, id like to see them take the films in different directions and stray from the Skywalker story. But maybe I’ll have to wait for the spin offs because that would deviate from the series as ” a whole”.
It will be weird to not hear the 20th Century Fox theme before a Star Wars movie.
To this day, I hear it on TV, I think Star Wars is starting.
Wow. Disney is even richer now. Their employees must get some nice xmas bonuses??
Sadly no. My wife works for Disney…they can treat their people like crap like any other company. Sometimes they get some cool stuff. But it’s really just like any other company…just with a cheery logo. Don’t get me wrong though, I love Disney and they do wonderful things. Some of the people they promote are actively trying to drive those around them insane.
I think I just heard WB cancel the Justice League movie. Could Disney have done more to kill the competition? Avengers 2 in May , Star Wars 7 in July (4th weekend ). Warner Bros. will be shut out of the summer of ’15 altogether.
Hopefully, Lucas’ input will be kept at a minimum. Look what he did to Indy 4.
Writing the initial story treatment outlines and then handing them over to another writer and director – whilst remaining attached only as creative consultant – is the approach George should have took with the prequels back in 1993, then they would have been a lot better;
Episode I: screenwriter/director Frank Darabont
Episode II: screenwriter Frank Darabont, director Joe Johnston
Episode III: screenwriter Frank Darabont, director Paul Verhoeven.
Although you were talking about the prequels, how about Frank Darabont to write the new trilogy’s screenplays and Joe Johnston directing… THAT would be something to get excited about!
Joe Johnston makes pretty bad movies for the most part, I don’t think he’d be in the top 100 directors I’d pick for the job.
I’m fairly certain it was David Fincher for Episode III, not Verhoven. The connections to Lucasfilm were being kept.
i’m really curious to see what the original cast thinks about this. i just don’t see Harrison Ford being enthusiastic about this at all. Mark Hamill and Carrie Fisher need work outside of voice acting. but holy shit. i’m still trying to wrap my brain around this
I always said if Carrie Fisher suddenly started trimming down that it would probably be a sign that she was trying to get into episodes 7-9. And she has done precisely that. Whether that means she WILL be used in 7-9 remains to be seen. The films may simply pick up exactly where Episode 6 ended, thus requiring an all new cast.
I\’m fairly certain it was David Fincher for Episode III, not Verhoven. The connections to Lucasfilm were being kept.
Mr.Rich316
The Star Wars film will come out in late May per tradition which leaves mid to late July
(WB’s prime summer event film time slot) wide open for Justice league. What should they do,
not release a summer film in 2015?
Mr.Rich316
The Star Wars film will come out in late May per tradition which leaves mid to late July
(WB\’s prime summer event film time slot) wide open for Justice league. What should they do,
not release a summer film in 2015?
Mr.Rich316
The Star Wars film will come out in late May per tradition which leaves mid to late July
(WB\\\’s prime summer event film time slot) wide open for Justice league. What should they do,
not release a summer film in 2015?