Timber

It basically comes down to them being rushed. No one wants to wait 3 years between movies anymore and the 2 year turnaround without getting their ducks in a row from the start wasn't going to work for one writer/director.

joe_b

I think they confirmed during last week's panel that she's not. To quote Boyega: "Phasma? She dead."

dex14

Though being dead doesn't seem to be an obstacle for being in this movie.

GoldenJCJ

tanman

That's what I get for responding at work.

Michael Corvin

Ranger

Maybe Rey found Luke's medal and his X-Wing?

Who's flying the A-wing? Rey?

milo bloom

As I've noted from source on the inside, there was a plan for the trilogy. One thing that proves it is the book with the Art of The Force Awakens shows Palpatine's chair from the throne room on the Death Star II, so him being in this movie isn't a total surprise.

TLJ went off track because production started while TFA was still being made and RJ was somehow allowed to chart his own path. I guess Disney gave RJ final cut, but I don't know why they would do that for such an important franchise.


I agree with you a lot about the PT. Its flaws are many, but there's so many great concepts being presented that it's still fun to watch them (especially watching The Clone Wars animated series) set between 2 and 3). The PT and TCW really help flesh out the world of Star Wars and watching the OT afterwards feels far richer than it did before.

As for the ST, so far, I mostly agree with you. The further adventures are great to see, but having tossed the EU in the trash it's hard to really absorb them into the gestalt that is Star Wars. I mean, for comparison, something like Rogue One feels like it came directly out of GL's original notes. If you found somebody who had never watched any Star Wars at all and showed somebody R1, then 4, 5 and 6, I believe they would totally accept them as a four movie saga; they fit so perfectly together. Solo is kinda there, but doesn't have the heart that R1 does with Jyn and Cassian and such.

But, again, going back to my source, one of the things they mentioned about the writing of TROS, is that JJ and his team would watch all of the existing movies in chronological order and take notes for things that could be used or needed to be wrapped up in Episode IX. With the return of Billy Dee, Ian MacDermaid, and showing the wreckage of the DSII on that planet,I think what we're going to see in TROS is a movie that acts as both a sequel to TFA and TLJ but also a wrap up to the entire saga. There's been rumors on some of the leaks sites that talk about this movie being on the scale of Return of the King. I think after RJ showed you could make a 2.5 hour long SW movie, JJ is not going to be afraid to go long to make sure everything is wrapped up. To paraphrase a certain quote: "I've got a good feeling about this..."

tanman

^wow. That just makes me so sad. So it seems like they did have a story arch laid down but then sacrificed it to let RJ make his own movie and so they could stick to their really aggressive release schedule. Man that really sucks. So instead of one long cohesive story among three movies we've got three separate movies.



What could have been if JJ had just done all three and Carrie Fisher hadn't passed in the middle of production. But we STILL wouldn't have had a reunion between the three of them. That's the biggest mistake in the entire ST.

Rob V

Having seen Endgame over the weekend and all prior 21 MCU movies, it's pretty astonishing that the writers were able to keep everything pretty cohesive and tied together (for the most part). One of the first things I thought of when I left the theater is how somebody at Disney had the foresight to tie 22 movies together... but the leads over Star Wars couldn't get 3 stories planned ahead of time.

Jay G.

No, they didn't. Marvel was working a few movies ahead at a time, and there's often only loose continuity between the movies, especially in Phase 1. The series started off as nearly completely disparate films with only hints of a possible team-up. Marvel could let the filmmakers go off and make mostly standalone stories with only a few continuity points in each. It also started with a slow release schedule, only 1 or 2 movies a year. Now, over time the amount of crossover and continuity has increased, but even in Phase 3 you have movies like Doctor Strange and Guardians of the Galaxy 2 that don't rely on any other characters or overarching storylines, and Black Panther, Ant Man and the Wasp and Captain Marvel that are mostly standalone and only carry over some plot points from earlier films. So it's not like those 22 movies are one singular serial story. And their output has increased, but they're juggling so many characters that 3 years go between sequels for the standalone films.

Not to mention that Marvel has shifted and adapted over those years, adding in new movies and characters they maybe weren't originally planning on, and dumping other projects. Remember when The Inhumans was going to be one of the planned theatrical films? They've been able to weave together the franchise films masterly, but a lot of it has been on the fly, not fully planned out 10 years ago. The flexibility of the standalones has allowed them to basically hide some fumbles, like how Ant Man was in pre-production for years and then lost its first director. They weren't under a mandate to get Ant Man out there on a certain date. If they had made Ant Man based on their original plans, maybe his first team up would've been in Avengers 2 (since Hank Pym made Ultron in the comics), but that movie wasn't dependent on Ant Man, so they fit him into Civil War instead.

And, again Marvel had a wealth of material in the comics to take from. It's a bit easier for them because they had decades of stories for many of these characters, and even The Avengers movies borrow from them extensively.

Not to mention there's some luck in Marvel managing to find all the right creative minds at all the right time and hit on something audiences have responded to. Marvel too some risks with some odd director choices, and aside from Ant Man, they all paid off without issue. DC planned out their comic movie universe and team up movie years in advance as well, but they picked a creative mind to lead the project that had a vision that didn't seem to resonate with audiences. DC is course correcting now, but simply having a plan in advance isn't going to guarantee success.

I feel like Disney wanted too much too fast from Lucasfilm. They wanted a serial story told in 3 episodes coming out at a rate of every 2 years, and oh yeah, cram in some standalones in between them. Lucasfilm took some risks with director choices, but ended up having issues with 3 of them. Disney's only been so lenient with the release schedule up to this point. They allowed the first 3 films to be pushed from May to December, but didn't yield on Solo, to its detriment.

I think Disney is learning that Star Wars isn't Marvel. Lucasfilm doesn't have decades of comics about Rey, Finn, and Poe to draw stories from. The Star Wars universe, as it is, doesn't have a wide expanse of characters and settings to draw from, with the focus up to this point people really a single interconnected story about a small group of characters.

All that said, I've been happy with 3 out of the 4 Star Wars movies so far, with only Solo being kinda meh. I do worry a bit about Episode IX though, since while I like how TLJ was daring to take the series into a bold new direction, I'm not convinced JJ Abrams is the man to wrap up this storyline.

Rob V

I gotta believe the JJ is secretly shitting himself that his story won't come close to the wrap up success that Endgame has been. Endgame wasn't the greatest movie ever but it was a very, very good to great ending, IMO. I don't think Star Wars can adequately be wrapped up in 2 - 2.5 hours with all the ideas that are out there.

milo bloom

This is why them dumping the EU continues to bother me. They could have had decades of stories to pull from, even if they didn't stick to it precisely, they could have pulled ideas here and there like the Marvel movies have apparently done, and they wouldn't have had to struggle to come up with new stories.

Jay G.

They can still pull from the old "Legends" EU. In fact, they already have, putting Thrawn in the Star Wars: Rebels TV show.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_...ar_Wars_Rebels

The bigger problem with the old EU is that it's all events either in the years immediately after ROTJ, or before (sometimes centuries before). The books assumed people wanted to continuing adventures of Luke, Leia, Han, Chewie, and others. Which worked for the books, especially when they started in the 90s.

However, for the movies to incorporate the original cast, you needed a time jump of 30 years, and the old EU didn't have any stories from that far out. You also needed a new cast of new characters, to carry the franchise into the future. So the old EU isn't as useful as a pool of characters and stories to pull from for Star Wars as the comics have been for Marvel.

milo bloom

I hadn't read any of the old EU in years, but I'm pretty sure they were approaching 20-25 years after ROTJ, which is not far from TFA's 30 years. And even if they didn't have a story set then, there was still plenty of background info they could have used.

I'm aware of them pulling bits and pieces like Thrawn (he was awesome in Rebels) but there's still so much they could have used it's painful. Though I do wonder if they're going to be pulling from Dark Empire (my absolute favorite bit of Legends) to resurrect Palpatine.

Josh-da-man

Jay G.

I think I stopped early on, because many of the books were crap. I curse thee, Kevin J Anderson!

But even if they got 20-25 years after ROTJ, that's 20-25 years of EU backstory to deal with. Marvel went with origin stories and starting their series from scratch, while Star Wars was starting up again 6 episodes in on a Saga. It's a bit like if Marvel had done Phase 1 up to Avengers, then stopped, then came back with Infinity War. Who are all these new characters? What happened in between? It'd look like a confusing mess to those who hadn't read all the books.

And it's still not far enough in, especially dealing with all new characters and an audience surrogate to re-introduce the world to people, and maybe even introduce people totally new to the franchise to it.

But prove me wrong. You say there's a wealth of material there, so what existing Legends story should they have used for these episodes instead?

tanman

Why does that bother you? I mean I understand why it would bother someone that years and years of stories are suddenly non-canon but what does that matter anyways? Also they had to start fresh otherwise it would have been like pulling off a mission impossible laser filled heist without stepping on an established lore here or there. Plus just because they determined it was non-canon doesn't mean they couldn't have lifted a choice plot point or two to drop in the movie. They just chose not to.

tanman

I agree. The ball is in his court now. But to be fair to him he's in a much tougher situation. It would have been like if Kevin Feige had Joel Schumacher direct IW and have the Russo Bros direct Endgame.

RichC2

Not a popular opinion, but I find Abrams to be a better director, overall, than the Bros -- but if he's attempting to tie up decades worth of lore with a neat bow he's going to run into issues. Him being writer/director definitely seems like a poor idea. That's too much self-input for a franchise like this. The Marvel movies wisely had Chris Markus and Sephen McFeely guiding the general plotlines and characters for the last few Captain America and Avengers movies.

Ultimately I'm kind of seeing it like one was a Season Finale and the other a Series Finale -- and sadly, the latter is rarely satisfying.

story

Which is which?

The thing about Star Wars is it created the franchise film. Yes, franchises were around before it but it laid so much groundwork for how these things are done that it broke the mold and cast a new one. Much like movies were around before Birth of a Nation but that movie really cemented cinematic storytelling techniques, or horror movies were around before Night of the Living Dead but that movie really cemented how these movies play out. The trick is Star Wars has to decide every single time how it plays with expectations. Will it continue to use what made it the franchise of franchises or will it reinvent how it does it? We give more leeway to other films that do or at least purport to reinvent how things are done for how it's made and how it's marketed (Blair Witch Project, Lord of the Rings, or even The Matrix). But when the one that set the standard tries something new, it's held to a weird standard that doesn't measure up to what it was, isn't as fresh as what's fresh, and ultimately leaves people excited or blaise (or mad, apparently, with The Last Jedi).

That's not just Star Wars, though. How many institutions like companies, stores, labels, etc. set the mold, then try to reinvent because others who used their mold to make a twist in it are more nimble, only to be told essentially thanks but no thanks? This is a pattern that goes beyond movies. If they stay the same, we get bored. If they change, we get mad. But if they don't change we get mad. But if they change and it's not like the others who changed, it's boring.

It's not easy starting the movement and to stay relevant.

And as much as I really enjoy the Marvel movies, I enjoy the Star Wars movies more. It's simply a more-engaging universe for me. But I like them both, just like I enjoy a T-bone and a ribeye.

Great, now it's 10 in the morning and I want a steak.

JTH182

I find it kind of hard to believe JJ (the master of secrecy and mystery) would just spoil the Emperor being the Big Bad in this movie 8 months before release. I'm sticking with Snoke being Plagueis, and they need to find the Emperor's secret files on the Death Star or something to figure out how to kill him for good.

I know it's just wishful thinking, but I'm sticking with my Plagueis theory to the end.

Shannon Nutt

The problem with Star Wars movies these days is that fans always come up with better theories than what the movies deliver. Elaborate, well-thought out ideas about characters and stories...then the movie comes out and the plotting is pretty simplistic.

stingermck

I'm done with fan theories after getting so burned on TLJ. And these media sites keep promoting someones Reddit theory like its news. I'm going to take whatever the movie gives me. It's just easier that way.

jpcamb

wait are we talking Walking Dead or Star Wars??