Remember when a ‘Star Wars’ release was a big deal? Okay, they’re still big, but a new ‘Star Wars’ film used to be huge. The lesser reaction today isn’t necessarily a knock on the franchise’s quality (although some might argue it is), we are just growing accustomed to the galaxy far, far away being regularly available in theaters. It’s like if a solar eclipse happened every year. It’d still be cool, but there’d be much less hype without novelty.
Franchise star Mark Hamill feels the same way. Sitting down with CinemaBlend while doing press for ‘The Last Jedi’ home video release, Hamill expressed concerns that maybe ‘Star Wars’ should slow its roll.
“I will say they should pace themselves, because you don’t want to over-saturate it. I said to Disney, ‘Really? Five months after we come out comes [Solo: A Star Wars Story]? Can’t you at least wait until Christmas?’ But they’ve got things booked – they’re doing Marvel and their own movies, so that’s beyond my [purview.]”
Disney has been staying true to its plan to release a main ‘Star Wars Episode’ every other year with another random tale branded as ‘A Star Wars Story’ in between. Soon the main ‘Star Wars Episodes’ may conclude with the sequel to ‘The Last Jedi’, Episode IX, but Disney looks to only up production afterward. ‘The Last Jedi’ director Rian Johnson has agreed to make his own trilogy set in the universe and so has ‘Game of Thrones’ showrunners D.B. Weiss and David Benioff. So that’s, what, two concurrent trilogy releases and maybe more ‘A Star Wars Stories’? I guess it’s a big universe, as Hamill explains.
“Well, there shouldn’t be [a limit to the storytelling], as it’s a canvas that’s so infinite. With the standalone films they can all have their own identity. Rogue One can be gritty, and like a war film… I’m assuming, I don’t know, but I would assume that Solo will be more comedic-ly oriented because he’s a rogue, a scoundrel, and a gambler, and a womanizer and all those things. So I think the advantage of the standalone films is that they don’t have to follow the formula of a trilogy, so they can establish their premise, get it on, get it done and get out leaving the audience wanting more. So there’s infinite possibilities.”
‘Star Wars’ may be transitioning from a franchise to its own sub-genre of science fiction. ‘Solo: A Star Wars Story’ will be released May 25th and ‘The Last Jedi’ is available now on your tv, phone, and maybe your refrigerator screen.
