I’m completely overwhelmed with work at the moment so I can’t put up a proper post today. But I heard about this abandoned Star Wars movie and it got me revved up! Revved up good? Revved up bad?
Let’s find out.
Apparently, after Episode 9, Adam Driver’s people went to Disney and said, “We want to make a Kylo Ren movie.” The film was going to be about the continuing adventures of Kylo Ren and was pitched as a “reverse Darth Vader” movie, where Kylo learns to be good.
Kathleen Kennedy and Lucasfilm were on board. But when they went to the top dog at Disney, Bob Iger, he killed it. He didn’t see how Kylo Ren could still be alive, considering that he died in Episode 9.
Adam Driver’s package included writer Scott Z. Burns, and director Steven Soderbergh.
So the question is, did Bob Iger really not like the pitch? Or did he not like the team? Cause people have come back from the dead in Star Wars before. It wouldn’t be a difficult move.
My guess is that there was no way in a million years they were letting Steven Soderbergh direct a Star Wars movie. That would be a tough sell before the Disney sequels were made. But afterwards? When there were about three directors on the planet that the Star Wars fans would’ve approved of, and you’re going to bring in the guy who made Bubble?
I’ll say this. Disney would’ve saved about 200 million dollars on the production since Soderbergh would’ve shot the movie on iPhones. But I don’t think Soderbergh brings anything interesting to filmmaking in general, and definitely nothing to the Star Wars universe. The guy made one good film – his first one – Sex Lies and Videotape. Beyond that, he used Hollywood for his film school experiments and they fell for it every time.
However, if you took Soderbergh out of the equation, would a Kylo Ren movie have worked? I would say yes. Kylo was the only truly interesting thing about the sequels. He was a risky unique character played by a weird actor who’s impossible to look away from. That combination made the character irresistible.
But I agree that it couldn’t have been about Kylo Ren after Ep 9. It needed be about the Knights of Ren. Everyone loved that idea – of Kylo running around with the Knights and wreaking havoc. There have to be a couple of good stories there. Why not do that movie?
Disney’s just terrified of Star Wars right now. I’m going to make an analogy from my life so bear with me. When you are dialed in in tennis, it literally feels like you can’t miss. You look forward to every match. You hit every shot – forehand, backhand, serve – with unbelievable confidence. And you just don’t worry. You feel like you’re going to win every match you play.
But when you start losing and you stop having a good feel for the ball, and you start doubting your mechanics, and you start tinkering with your shots, you engage in the exact opposite experience. The court becomes a nightmare. You don’t feel like you understand the game anymore. When you’re playing during those times, tennis feels like a foreign language. You become a walking error machine.
That’s what’s happened to Disney with Star Wars. They are afraid of their own shadow when it comes to this franchise. And that’s likely the real reason they passed on a Kylo Ren movie. Even if they thought it would work, they don’t trust themselves anymore.
You can see this in their new Starfighter Ryan Gosling Star Wars movie. They won’t even tell us what that movie’s about. That’s an indication to me that they’re terrified that they’re wrong. And if they’re going to be wrong, they want that wrongness to happen during as short of a time period as possible. If we tell them that the idea is stupid already, they have to go through two more years of “Star Wars is terrible” until the movie comes out. Better to keep it under wraps and let it be stupid for the four weeks it lasts in theaters.
This is, what? The fifteenth developed Star Wars movie that has been scrapped now? They gotta figure some stuff out over there. They need a new team but, more importantly, they need a tennis player with some confidence. Someone who’s going to step onto the court and hit his groundstrokes with purpose. Not this pushy scared hope-my-opponent-misses game that Lucasfilm and Disney are playing right now.
