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Lucasfilm "Licking Their Wounds" But Not Halting 'Star Wars' Development
Mild spoilers in TFA about certain characters that appear in the film.
Disney and Lucasfilm are reassessing their plans for future Star Wars movies in the wake of the disappointing performance of Solo: A Star Wars Story, which is having to fight to make much more than $350 million worldwide, sources tell The Hollywood Reporter. "They haven't slowed down development," says a source with knowledge of Lucasfilm's thinking, "but they are licking their wounds."
Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy and her team are regrouping and figuring out the direction of the movies beyond the final installment of the main series of films, Star Wars: Episode IX, which is scheduled for release Dec. 20, 2019. "It doesn't mean those spinoffs don't happen," says another insider of Solo's underperformance globally. "It just means they're trying to figure out how to make, and market, them differently."
[...] "They were developing anything and everything," says another exec. "It was a case of them stuffing so much sausage and not try to break the casing."
Meanwhile, Han Solo's blaster was sold for over 0.1% of the film's gross.
Also at Collider, Space.com, and Forbes (archive).
Related: Star Wars Franchise Loses Fourth Director in Two Years
Meet the New Star Wars IX Director: J. J. Abrams
(Score: 4, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Sunday June 24 2018, @11:03PM (15 children)
The real Han Solo character is mostly a sleazeball, shoots first, "better her than me," (being killed) etc. but shines through as a hero when it really counts.
The insurmountable problem with Han Solo stories in the theater is that Harrison Ford a) doesn't want to do it anymore, and b) so owns the character that most people won't ever think they'll be happy with anybody else. 1976 was a LONG time ago, in a galaxy without smartphones or the internet - they had to make this move sooner or later, probably should have tried it sooner instead of waiting until they had no other option.
Of course, I'd like to see them try to produce Lucas' ideas about microbes ruling the galaxy - pull that off and I'd really be impressed, try and fail and I'll still go see at least the first one in the theater just out of respect for having the chutzpah to try.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 24 2018, @11:33PM (1 child)
Go read the Lando Calrissian and Han Solo Trilogies from the late 70s early 80s.
Those books owned both characters. And if they had licensed the rights to make movies off of them instead of badly rehashing them, they would have had a couple of epic stories that would have made the fans and non-fan moviegoers alike want to see it. Blue Max plus Bollux was a far more interesting character duo than L337 and they even had a tragic sacrifice and surprising reveal at the end to leave you feeling sad then good. And while both Calrissian and Solo were made out as thieves, ne'er do wells and smugglers, they were also shown to have a soft spot for the underdogs, blowing a sure thing when plans went awry to help out someone in need rather than getting that big score.
Really, those two trilogies set the stage for all of the post-ROTJ extended universe novels that included the characters and up until the Prequels came out really had a positive impact on the star wars world that fans came to love after the original trilogy ended.
(Score: 3, Funny) by JoeMerchant on Monday June 25 2018, @10:50AM
Now you're ignoring the 99% - movie producers who invest millions of dollars per minute of screen time NEVER ignore the 99%.
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(Score: 5, Funny) by isostatic on Monday June 25 2018, @08:43AM (10 children)
The real Han Solo character is mostly a sleazeball, shoots first
I've seen the film, Greedo shoots first.
(Score: 2) by MostCynical on Monday June 25 2018, @10:24AM
Did they change the release date in the "digitally remastered" versions, or did they pretend it was always like that, and Greedo shot first?
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday June 25 2018, @10:52AM (8 children)
There was a DVD set of the original theatrical releases, that's the one I show my kids.
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(Score: 2) by darnkitten on Wednesday June 27 2018, @06:20PM (7 children)
Do you have the UPC or ISBN code? I'm stuck with the original trilogy on VHS...
(Score: 3, Informative) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday June 27 2018, @06:32PM (6 children)
They were last (and only) released in 2006:
http://www.syfy.com/syfywire/star-wars-original-trilogy-unaltered-dvds [syfy.com]
ALL of our physical discs (including Toy Story, Barney, etc.) have traveled to the great beyond, but our fair use backup copies live on...
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(Score: 2) by darnkitten on Tuesday July 03 2018, @04:44PM (4 children)
Thanks--I have downloaded Harmy's Despecialized Edition, and have the requisite lucased DVD/Blu-Ray sets, but I would like to get a personal DVD copy of the theatrical release, to spare my poor old VHS copies.
I'd also like to donate the original theatrical releases to my local library (I donated my spare VHS copies, though most people can't play them anymore, and also donated the Star Trek: the original series DVD sets with the unaltered effects), so the upcoming generation will be able to see them the way they were intended.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday July 03 2018, @06:08PM (3 children)
Watching the original Star Trek series in reruns on a B&W TV set in the 1970s was very instructive, on my set at least you could see the cut-out around the Enterprise as a brighter shape than the background star field - the effect was invisible on most color TVs.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by darnkitten on Tuesday July 03 2018, @08:16PM (2 children)
Cool--I will have to watch it in B/W. Oddly, I don't believe I've ever watched ST:tos in black and white, aside from the VHS release of The Cage/Menagerie which spliced together existing color and black-and-white footage in an attempt to reconstruct the pilot.
Even though we had a (B/W) TV back in the late 70s, I don't recall Star Trek being broadcast, at least at a time I was allowed to watch--my exposure (around at age 9 or 10) was through 4 episode prints shown one time at the base matinee (instead of the usual westerns), as well as some of the Blish novelizations and a handful of photonovels I searched out at the base library after being blown away by those four episodes in the theater. I went to every matinee after that, in the vain hope they would show Star Trek again, and, disappointed, would sneak out of the theater and go to the library, leaving my little brothers to watch the movies--I've generally disliked westerns ever since.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday July 03 2018, @10:30PM (1 child)
It was on just before dinnertime at my house, really made my dad made that I wanted to watch it instead of jumping up for another plate of burgers & green beans.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by darnkitten on Tuesday July 03 2018, @11:31PM
Yeah--Star Trek vs green beans? No contest. Somehow adults just don't see the obvious.
When Next Generation happened, my mom was became a fan, so dinner was delayed anyway.
(Score: 2) by darnkitten on Tuesday July 03 2018, @04:50PM
I also should try to get the LD set the DVDs are based on, as I still have a laserdisc player.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Spamalope on Monday June 25 2018, @01:36PM
Most things about the first Star Wars were copied except the effects. (2001 proved it could be done, but Lucas did pioneer visual and sound effects)
First, Star Wars is epic fantasy set in space not sci-fi. Thus the wizards, damsel in distress etc.
Han Solo's character only works if he's a 'Romance Novel' villain. Those men are female fantasies that are somehow sociopaths or at least rogues who are transformed into worthwhile people when the female lead wins them (often they're only transformed as to that woman). His character absolutely depends on getting this right. So in the recent movies it seems we have one where the writer may have known but sought to pop that bubble instead, replacing the bodice ripper rogue with a 'see men never change and look what happens' figure before killing him once he's unsympathetic. It's a movie, he should have died in a romance novel roguish exploit so the story telling is good and to keep the fantasy element.
This recent movie seems to miss the point of the character completely. His character should make the men think he's a jerk and the women think about batting eyelashes. (bonus points if the women don't know quite why) If the women think hes a jerk and the men reject the story telling you've done it completely wrong. Either they don't understand, or do and have an ax to grind instead.
FYI, The original is just the hero's story set 'in spaaaaace'. It's the Gilgamesh/King Authur epic. Story boarding cribbed from Kurosawa's Samurai films and 'The Damn Busters'. Marcia Lucas's editing transformed the horrible mess, changed the plot and made a success out of the horrible mess of the original.
(Score: 2) by arslan on Monday June 25 2018, @10:37PM
Yes, that's why I said it was only in the trailers, after watching the movie Alden was pretty good as a young Solo. The trailers didn't really help the cause.