At this point, there have been plenty of films, cartoons, books, comics, and videogames which have taken place in a galaxy far, far away. However, Disney+’s ‘The Mandalorian’ has the honor of being the first live-action television series set in the “Star Wars” universe. While we’re only getting eight episodes in the first season this is still a big deal and executive producers Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni were asked about their experience in bringing “Star Wars” to life for the small screen.
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We all know Favreau from his work over at Marvel Studios helping bring ‘Iron Man’ to life, but he has also always been a huge “Star Wars” fan, so this has been the experience of a lifetime for the creator:
“For me, as somebody who grew up with Star Wars and really having been formed around what I experienced when I was little, with the first film, there was some aesthetic to it that I really gravitated to. My whole taste in movies was probably formed, in a big way, from seeing George Lucas’s original film. I learned about cinema through the lens of that film.”
As to how the serialized format of the show affected his take on putting it together:
“To come back and return to this with the freedom that this new platform affords, because there’s nothing to compare it to, nothing has been on TV, other than the holiday special, the idea of telling the story over more than just a couple of hours, told every few years, opens us up to this novelization of story and a return back to the roots, in many ways, of the Saturday afternoon serial films that my parent’s generation grew up with. Drawing from that type of style of storytelling lends itself really well to what we’re tackling here. It’s funny not to have a preciousness in the way that we’re telling the stories because we’re coming back to you next week with another one. To engage the audience, in the way that I enjoy being engaged, with a bigger budget and a lot of the qualities and aesthetics of a film, but the novelization of serialized storytelling is where it really opens up a lot of freedom and opportunity, where we don’t feel like we’re repeating or copying anything else that people have experienced with Star Wars.”
Filoni is a “Star Wars” veteran with his work on ‘Star Wars: The Clone Wars,’ ‘Star Wars: Rebels’, and ‘Star Wars: Resistance.’ All of that being said, this was still the director’s first foray into live-action.
“It’s exciting for me ’cause I get to be a part of it. As a kid, growing up, I would watch Star Wars every week. And as television got more and more genre, over the years, I remember when Star Trek: The Next Generation came out with the promise of better visual effects on television, and it took a big leaps. As somebody that’s always been into fantasy and science fiction, you were always waiting for a moment where you thought that the images on television were as good as what you were seeing in the theater, but there was a big separation, when I was a kid. Now, it’s gotten so close. We can make something like Star Wars because the technology has advanced. That’s one of the dreams that the George [Lucas] had. Even when I worked with him on Clone Wars, he would talk about the future being streaming, and the future being episodic, serialized Star Wars. So, it’s cool to get to help make it.”
Fans of Filoni’s work have all been thrilled about his involvement in the series and are dying to see if we’ll see any of his animated characters also end up being portrayed by an actor. I know that I fall into that category as well!
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Are you excited for ‘The Mandalorian’? Do you feel that this 8-episode series is going to be a gamechanger in how we get to visit this franchise set in a galaxy far, far away? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
‘The Mandalorian’ will be available when Disney+ launches on November 12th, 2019.
Source: Collider
