Once Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker hits theaters, the future of the big screen franchise will be uncertain. We can already expect another season of The Mandalorian, a new series headlined by Cassian Andor, and another trilogy of films helmed by Rian Johnson. However, Lucasfilm definitely isn’t stopping there. The studio is reportedly trying to figure out what direction the films will take after the Skywalker Saga concludes. According to Kathleen Kennedy, this is no walk in the park.
While speaking with Rolling Stone, the Lucasfilm president explained just how difficult it is to make a Star Wars movie. Apparently, part of this boils down to her view that the franchise doesn’t have any prior material to pull from.
“Every one of these movies is a particularly hard nut to crack,” said Kennedy. “There’s no source material. We don’t have comic books. we don’t have 800-page novels, we don’t have anything other than passionate storytellers who get together and talk about what the next iteration might be. We go through a really normal development process that everybody else does.”
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Kennedy’s comments are rather surprising, since she seems to have forgotten all about the Star Wars Expanded Universe. That assortment of comics, novels, and video games continued the Star Wars saga long after Return of the Jedi arrived in 1983. But when Disney bought Lucasfilm in 2012, the studio made those tales non-canon in favor of telling new original stories. Any EU media was subsequently re-branded as Star Wars Legends. There have also been several Star Wars novels and comic books within the new continuity. Regardless, Kennedy doesn’t sound like she has any regrets about launching the sequel trilogy with J.J. Abrams.
“I feel really fortunate that I’ve worked with so many great people that have been absolutely committed, J.J. being one of them,” added Kennedy. “He’s a huge fan, incredibly passionate about Star Wars, and has been from the moment he and I sat down and started talking about this.”
Which stories from the Star Wars Expanded Universe would you have liked to see in the new Star Wars films? Let us know in the comment section below!
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