Go ahead an insert the RonBurgandy.meme right here as this new Star Wars shit has escalated quickly.
Yesterday brought the absolute confirmation of something we pretty much already knew, in the form of the Disney head cheese confirming that singular character films were coming from the Star Wars universe, and that Lawrence Kasdan and Simon Kinsberg are working on them. Yoda has been the most rumored name so far, but today EW adds to that.
It would seem –if EWs rumors source from anywhere more legitimate than, say, their own assholes– that franchise favorites Han Solo and Boba Fett are up for solo adventures. Not only that, but these adventures would take place before and during the original trilogy- Solo’s film would likely be an origin of sorts, while the Boba Fett story would take place between OT films.
Guys, this shit is so so dangerous.
I actually have a fair amount of faith in new Lucasfilm shepherd Kathleen Kennedy, but surely Disney and co. have to see the danger in repeating the prequel’s mistakes. With a new trilogy you can blaze forward- hire good people, tell new stories, integrate older elements selectively and with an appropriate addition of age. The films looking and feeling different will be much easier to swallow. But plunging back into the film and optical-effects and plywood production design universe that Lucas oversaw… no good. This is all without even getting into the problems that come when you start rooting strands of dialogue and stories fixed in people’s imaginations into flesh and blood movies. Who the fuck really needs to see the Kessel Run or watch Garret Hedlund* win a CGI Millenium Falcon off Lando in a card game? Have Star Wars fans not been burned by this shit enough? Do these people need to be reminded of the Patton Oswalt routine just the one more time?
Star Wars is as built on feelings and textures and the eccentricities of its time as it is on stories and costumes- trying to add to that with movies that will look, smell, taste, and feel differently will be tough to make work, as evidenced by AN ENTIRE TRILOGY OF PREQUEL FILMS. Granted, the Boba Fett story would me much easier to pull off with a truly visionary and invested director behind it, but the Han Solo film sounds like a bad idea, top to bottom.
That’s what was so great about the Snyder samurai/jedi film that was bandied about and then shot down- it could take place anywhere in the timeline and be isolated.
Maybe it’s just me. I’m really not much of a diehard Star Wars fan. I don’t even really remember seeing the special editions in theaters, and yet I still feel I have some understanding of what makes the original trilogy a classic, the prequel trilogy a disaster, and the prospects of these solo films so dubious.
How do you feel about this chewers? What young actor could pull off a Han Solo in his early days? What director would be best suited for a bounty hunter story a long time ago, far far away? Joe Johnston claims to want the job, and he’s got some kind of dibs having designed the guy’s armor. But do we really want the guy who made the ugliest Marvel movie with the most clunky FX and thin filmmaking to tackle a classic Star Wars character?
Is it time to pull a Travolta at the end of Broken Arrow, to stand up, spread our arms and take what’s aimed at us?
*Admittedly, Hedlund would not be a bad choice, if you’ve seen his non-Tron work.