One of the consequences of George Lucas selling Lucasfilm to Disney is that he, in effect, gave his blessing for the studio to do whatever they want to his beloved “Star Wars” franchise. However, another consequence to this decision is that fans will never truly know what Lucas had planned for the oft-rumored sequel trilogy that he may or may not have made.
One of the people who has a good idea of the direction of Lucas’ potential sequel trilogy is Mark Hamill, aka Luke Skywalker. And since the actor has been very vocal about his, um, differences of opinion with writer-director Rian Johnson about “Star Wars: The Last Jedi,” Hamill is beginning to spill the beans about what could have been with Lucas sequels.
Speaking to IGN, the actor had this to say about Luke’s ultimate fate in the supposed Lucas sequels, “I happen to know that George didn’t kill Luke until the end of ‘[Episode] 9’, after he trained Leia. Which is another thread that was never played upon [in ‘The Last Jedi’].”
READ MORE: ‘Star Wars: The Last Jedi’s’ Mark Hamill Has A Lot To Say [Interview]
While this doesn’t tell us much about the overall plot of any George Lucas-written sequels, it does give us an idea of a little bit of what Lucas had in mind. Clearly, if Hamill is to be believed, Lucas wanted the sequel trilogy to still focus on the Skywalker siblings, and their adventures post-‘Return of the Jedi.’ Obviously, with the amount of time that passed between when Lucas would have made this trilogy, and the eventual sequels that Disney produced, it wouldn’t have been logical to use this treatment. Luke and Leia are well into middle-age when the current sequels take place, so seeing Luke train Leia would have been a little…silly.
But Hamill wasn’t done comparing this new sequel trilogy to a hypothetical George Lucas trilogy. “George had an overall arc – if he didn’t have all the details, he had sort of an overall feel for where the [sequel trilogy was] going – but this one’s more like a relay race. You run and hand the torch off to the next guy, he picks it up and goes,” says the actor.
He continued, “Rian didn’t write what happens in ‘9’ – he was going to hand it off to, originally, Colin Trevorrow and now J.J. [Abrams]… an ever-evolving, living, breathing thing. Whoever’s onboard gets to play with the life-size action figures that we all are.”
One can’t help but read this as Hamill being a just a wee bit displeased with how Disney is handling the new films. Invoking the holy name of George Lucas is always a quick way to ignite the ‘Star Wars’ fandom into a fury, and comparing him directly to Rian Johnson, who Hamill has made no qualms about publicly disagreeing with, it could be said that Hamill is well-aware that he is aiming ‘Star War’s fandom anger at Johnson and Disney.
No matter what Hamill thinks about Luke’s fate, Lucas’ sequels, or Disney’s handling of the franchise moving forward, that ship has sailed. Now, all eyes are on Abrams and ‘Episode IX.’
Lucas didn’t plan to make the sequels any earlier. In fact, the deal with Disney did involve getting his treatments, and one can assume Lucas did count on them using them. I mean, how can the “relay race” model be any more effective than using actual treatments from a legendary storyteller famous for his bottomless imagination who is the creator of the story in the first place?
He did make the sale understanding that they would realize his original treatments. He said they then changed their minds to make a more “retro” trilogy. It’s all very disappointing.
nothing is disappointing about throwing whatever george lucas wrote in the trash and starting over
Are you crazy or high? 😮
“Legendary storyteller”
lmfao. this attempt at rehabilitating george lucas once the first disney star wars came out has been incredible. nobody wanted another george lucas directed star wars before then
If not this bullshit hipster criticism of George Lucas, he might would not sell Star Wars and would do the third trilogy, which would be great! but no! everybody had to bitch about how bad episodes 1-3 were! The more I watch episodes 1-3, the more I value them, I imagine how great it would be to have another trilogy from Lucas . . . not this crap we have now
Pretty sure pretending 1-3 are now anywhere remotely competent movies all the sudden when this new trilogy started happening is the actual “hipster” thing to do
“One can’t help but read this as Hamill being a just a wee bit displeased with how Disney is handling the new films. Invoking the holy name of George Lucas is always a quick way to ignite the ‘Star Wars’ fandom into a fury, and comparing him directly to Rian Johnson, who Hamill has made no qualms about publicly disagreeing with”
or media writers are just really intent on making this narrative reality and reading this into everything mark hammil is going to say til the end of time now
Mark is exactly right concerning the lack of cohesiveness and tension in this trilogy, if you can even call this a trilogy. JJ did a fine job setting up the story. Rian made a good stand alone movie, but not really a very good middle installment of a three part story. He did nothing to set up the drama going forward. Instead, he tore down a lot of what had been set up in 7, i.e. killing Luke and Snoke. And a pretty poor job of esablishing charater motivation going forward. What’s the drama for 9? If the hero is Rey, what’s her journey? Waht does she need to learn about herself and/or overcome to be victorious? Kylo is a good character, but not exactly the most foreboding villain. If he’s the worst thing the good guys have to worry about, it doesn’t seem so bad. I almost feel that JJ is going to have to either undo or scrap some of, or most of what Rian did just to make a compelling final installment of this series.
I must respectfully disagree. JJ didn’t really set up anything at all. All of a sudden there’s this thing called The First Order (which is such a stupid name for a villain group for the final movies). They’re never explained, and came out of nowhere.
The New Republic is also never shown except for when they get blown up (by a completely unoriginal super-weapon). Snoke is never explained and he’s a painfully boring character, although in TLJ he had charisma and was far more intriguing and entertaining.
Abrams didn’t set anything up. He simply ripped off the first movie.
Sorry to have to respond to your post. Nothing personal and I hope IX is great and everyone loves it. It just boggles my mind that people hated TLJ with such vitriol, while not only giving TFA a pass, but throwing such praise on it as if it were as good as the originals.
I think Abrams will do wonders with Episode IX, as he did with VII. VII had such a huge emotional tug, with its fanbase, that Abrams seems to recognize.
I think Lawrence Kasdan, deserves alot of the credit for making VII such a success.
VIII was a fine movie, just unfortunately, didn’t please it’s core fanbase but attempting to draw in new fans. I think this is one of those movies, that the Director purposely made it in this direction, to essentially divide it’s fanbase in order to draw in nee fans. Whether it worked or not, we’ll see in December 2019.
IX can go in any direction, but Hamill will definitely return and there will definitely be a few more surprises in store for movie audiences.
The Last Jedi was garbage. The franchise is over.
Lucas had the plan to make 7, 8 and 9, before the planed the prequels. In fact, Mark Hamill said it so in 1983 when “Return of the Jedi” was released. He talked with Lucas about being in the film in 20 years ahead, and give Luke Skywalker an “Obi Wan Kenobi type of character”. By the late eighties Lucas came with the idea of develop the prequels, and he got a script with Lawrence Kasdan (an script more atractive than the prequels became), and over the nineties he did several changes. Bad changes.
I simply cannot believe that people blame the direction of Star Wars on The Last Jedi. JJ Abrams had already set up that Luke was a recluse and The First Order came out of nowhere, because he’s a complete hack.
But even Hamill himself seems to blame everything about Luke’s character on Johnson, as well as rabid bugman fans. Like what did they think Luke was doing on the planet all this time? TFA established he was a hermit; why blame Johnson for “ruining his character?”
It drives me nuts that people like TFA and hate TLJ. I’m the opposite. I thought TFA undid the victories of the original trilogy, and was a shameless remake. Total trash, and Abrams sucks a fat one as big as his ugly Jewish nose. But TLJ picked up the pieces and tried to do as best as it could with what was left, and excelled in that by going in totally new directions and being original and unpredictable. All you people who love TFA and hate TLJ are the problem. Dumb mob rabble.
Although for from the greatness of both SW trilogies made by George Lucas, TLJ is still a LOT better than TFA