Walt Disney Acquires Star Wars (LucasFilm Ltd) - Star Wars Episode 7 Announced!

[admin]

The Walt Disney Company has just agreed to acquire Lucasfilm Ltd. in a stock and cash transaction. Lucasfilm, as most people know, is actually owned solely by George Lucas, who founded the company back when studios still made mistakes that big. The estimated deal is worth just over $4 billion, half of which is a cash deal. Obviously, this deal includes the Star Wars franchise, and Disney acquires ownership of Lucasfilm in its entirety. That means they get the ownership and rights to live action film production, consumer products, animation, visual effects, and audio post production (yes, they actually get Industrial Light & Magic [ILM] as well). Disney has no plans to consolidate or move any of the current employees of any of these divisions - at least not yet. And Star Wars Episode 7 is already in the works.


Discuss "Walt Disney Acquires Star Wars (LucasFilm Ltd) - Star Wars Episode 7 Announced!" here. Read the article.

[brianedm]

Best news I've read all day! So stoked! Disneys track record recently has been pretty good as well. They can't mess this up as badly as the Phantom Menace

[Clint DeBoer]

They can't mess this up as badly as the Phantom Menace

That was the first thing I said

[sholling]

I expect Disney to do a lot better job than Lucas did on the last three. I wonder if Skywalker ranch goes with it because Lucas was thoroughly ticked off at his neighbors for blocking his expansion plans. Ticked off enough that he threatened to move the company out of California and convert his land to low-income housing.

[mike c]

best first decision would be: fire george lucas as consultant.

i never liked star wars, but i admit, the first 3 was genius.
the last 3 proved the first 3 was a one-off kind of thing (for lucas)

[SnowmaNick]

They can't mess this up as badly as the Phantom Menace

I don't know, did you watch John Carter?

[FirstReflection]

It'll be very interesting to see where they take Episodes VII, VIII & IX. There has been so much done already in books and comics as part of the Expanded Star Wars Universe. In the past, I always assumed that George Lucas ultimately had the last word on what was canon and what was tantamount to fan fiction. But George himself stated that he's looking to pass along Star Wars to "a new generation". So who knows what will be adopted into canon, and what will be rendered incongruent.

In my opinion, if the new Star Wars movies are actually called Episodes VII, VIII & IX, I feel that they must continue to follow the Skywalker family. Given that Episodes I, II & III primarily followed Anakin's journey, and Episodes IV, V & VI primarily followed Luke and Leia, I think it makes perfect sense that Episodes VII, VIII & IX would follow Ben Skywalker and Jacen Solo.

I think there'd be something of a revolt if all of the Expanded Universe characters were ignored completely, but I can't imagine the new movies being slavish to the EU stories. It'd be a shame to not have Thrawn in the movies. I could do without the Clone Emperor though, as well as the Yuuzhan Vong and Chiss.

So I'm envisioning something of a "cherry picking" scenario - taking bits and pieces and characters from the EU, but moving the timeline around. I think the main thrust of the story should be Jacen training Ben, Jacen turning to the Dark Side and becoming Darth Caedus, and then Ben, and Jaina and Anakin Solo teaming up to defeat Caedus and the Imperial Remnant. Thrawn could serve as the main villain in Episode VII, Lumiya as the main villain turning Jacen in Episode VIII, and then Jacen/Caedus as the main villain in Episode IX. That keeps it "all in the family", so to speak, and without the need of getting into "phantoms" and huge, outer-galaxy alien threats and all that. Luke, Han and Leia could have small roles and cameos - maybe Jacen could kill Leia instead of Mara Jade.

This would clearly eff up the EU timeline, but I think it condenses the Skywalker/Solo family drama, keeps the best villains, and discards the rest without outright saying that none of the events in the books or comics or games ever happened.

Of course, the REAL joy will be in seeing what Disney does with Indiana Jones! Which, as we all know, was just Han Solo's dream while he was frozen in carbonite...

[adk highlander]

I love the fact that the Mouse is now Vader's boss.

[Adam]

Great. Now I can't stop imagining Minnie Mouse in a gold bikini.

Oh, I'm not being sarcastic. It's hot.

[jinjuku]

It'll be very interesting to see where they take Episodes VII, VIII & IX. There has been so much done already in books and comics as part of the Expanded Star Wars Universe. In the past, I always assumed that George Lucas ultimately had the last word on what was canon and what was tantamount to fan fiction. But George himself stated that he's looking to pass along Star Wars to "a new generation". So who knows what will be adopted into canon, and what will be rendered incongruent.

As long as they don't base them on the Zahn novels. Yech! Honestly they should have just left the franchise alone.