J.J. Abrams is officially on board to direct Star Wars: Episode VII, the first entry in a new trilogy. As Abrams gets the mothership in order, you better believe Disney is working on the fringes to realize the full potential of their recently acquired franchise. In particular, Lawrence Kasdan and Simon Kinberg are reportedly developing scripts that "could form the basis for spinoffs focusing on side characters.” One possibility that surfaced is Zack Snyder's version of Seven Samurai in the Star Wars universe. Since Snyder's reps quickly shot that down, it's time to move on to the next rumor which involves Yoda.

AICN hears the first standalone movie will center on Yoda. Details are obviously scarce---Old or young? CGI or puppet?---since Episode VII won't arrive until 2015 at the earliest. But Yoda: Jedi Grand Master sounds great to me. He seems like the right character (strong yet mysterious) to test out the spinoff waters. For comparison, AICN also hears that George Lucas has pitched a Jabba the Hutt movie around Lucasfilm. I say we completely ignore that half-baked idea for now and focus on the fact that Yoda is (allegedly) up first, and that is good.

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