Leaks that Disney is cancelling all Star Wars projects, start again

[Flint]

A rumor site posted this:

There was a call, a secret conference call with all the top Star Wars brass in attendance, the kind of call where, apparently, security guards stand outside the different conference room doors and makes sure that no one eavesdrops. But here's the kicker. Top brass at not only Star Wars, but also Marvel and Pixar, were also in on the call, but listening only, likely at the request of Bob Iger, who wants their advice on how to fix this shitshow. And yes, he does know it's a shitshow. Evidence? The word that he wants Kathleen Kennedy out. He actually does, but, nobody will take her job. Several have been approached, but turned down, including J.J. Abrams, who turned it down flat and didn't even hesitate. Why does nobody wanna run Star Wars? Well, it's probably pretty obvious for many of you, but let me spell it out for you. And that's in risk-averse Hollywood, nobody wants to run a house divided, which apparently is what Kathleen Kennedy has created. It's divided between her loyalists, which she brought in and wear those "Force is Female" t-shirts, and the loyalists to the brand itself that were there before Kathleen."​

 

[Xgm3]

The Last Jedi must have really pissed some people off.

 

[Deacon]

Regardless of the flap. I'm pretty sure a multi-billion dollar cultural icon is not gonna be shelved cause a bunch of people can't get along...

 

[Flint]

Regardless of the flap. I'm pretty sure a multi-billion dollar cultural icon is gonna be shelved cause a bunch of people can't get along...

The story is they are not killing the franchise, just killing all current projects and trying to find a way to reset everything and start over.

 

[Deacon]

Oh, well in that case it just sounds like normal proceedings.

 

[MakeMineVinyl]

With the huge investments in Star Wars Lands in both Disneyland and Magic Kingdom which open next year there is no fucking way they're not going to have a new movie done in time for that. Personally, having worked for Disney for years on and off over my life, I despise the tack they have taken with literally everything based on IP.

 

[Huey]

I'm surprised there has been this much fallout from the last two movies. Solo wasn't even that bad of a movie, although not once did I think I was watching a young Han Solo, but I was entertained none the least. I saw this a couple of weeks ago, and thought it was funny.

 

[Batman]

I call BS as far as the quote above is concerned. I read that they’re only considering halting some projects outside of the main saga. I can’t imagine they hit the reset button entirely. I think it’s a little premature to panic based on the performance of Solo. Not every story is going to resonate and bring in 1-1.5B.

 

[Haywood]

I read that they are continuing along with the main story arch, but pushing the pause button on the anthology "Star Wars Story" movies.

 

[Akula]

I call BS as far as the quote above is concerned. I read that they’re only considering halting some projects outside of the main saga. I can’t imagine they hit the reset button entirely. I think it’s a little premature to panic based on the performance of Solo. Not every story is going to resonate and bring in 1-1.5B.

Yeah, I think they probably need to let stuff rest, let everybody calm down, and then get back to work in a few years. They'll finish Episode 9 and release it next year, then they can rethink things from there. Even if they give it 3-4 years and then start playing the reboot game. I think this would look like:

1) Remake Ep 1-3. Fact is, none of the fandom really likes them. If they'd say "Hey, we're redoing this" and start from scratch on the story with some folks who really GET the feel of a SW movie (IMO, that's been the real issue with the Disney SW flicks- they don't really feel all that much like SW movies), I think they could rebuild some love from the fan base.

2) Leave 7-9 alone once finished. Carrie Fisher isn't coming back, Mark Hamill and Harrison Ford aren't getting any younger. Project out another 30-40 years and start anew on some Jedi/Sith stories. They won't be able to undo those movies, but they can just say "well, we're moving on."

3) Make the movies consistent within the universe. IMO, the biggest problems with TFA and TLJ had to do with this- they started throwing out the rules that already existed in the universe. I still found the flicks entertaining, but since when did we worry about fuel loads in spaceships before now? Hire somebody who actually knows the rules of the universe and can enforce them on the directors. Star Wars isn't hard sci fi, it's barely soft sci fi, but it does have its own rules.

4) Quit going to war with the fans. It seems like some of the folks running the movies prefer scoring points off of dissatisfied fans on Twitter more than building the Star Wars universe.

IMO, they can reboot this. They keep doing it with Marvel or other comic movies, and if they can do a decent job of it, the fans will return.

 

[Flint]

So, the insider rumors are that the entire decision making staff of the franchise is seen as the problem starting with Kathleen Kennedy who heads the division. They are the ones who, according to die hard fans and the long-time Star Wars staffers, decided to take advantage of this amazingly well-loved and successful franchise and use it to as a platform to "change society" into what they consider a "better world." It doesn't help that a not insignificant number of decades long Star Wars staffers where very publicly discussing the flaws in the leadership's goals, but they were smart enough to keep it offline (or potentially lose their jobs and even get sued). Their complaints were often repeated until they became folklore in the industry and bled over into the fan-base. Little changes to the universe, or small efforts to over-promote "woman power" (as with their "The Force is Female" internal messaging) was seen as bastardization of the franchise to turn it into propaganda and by association of principles into a political campaign for the values of a specific party. This was all something the original storyline mostly avoided other than the age-old mythological battle between "good" freedom seeking people versus totalitarianism through strength - a storyline that predates written language.

Anyway.... the rumor is that Disney wants to stop the bleeding as they are WAY behind on their business plan for the franchise and if they lose their audience the investment in the non-movie content (like theme parks and advertising - even a rumors stage production) will not result in the long-term income they expected. Imagine the Star Wars section of the theme parks being flat out avoided by all the guests other than those who just want to see what its about. That would suck. So, looking into the root source of the issue Iger has rumored to come to the conclusion it is Kennedy and her people who are threaded throughout the franchise and need to be replaced - which is not an easy task. Kennedy is famous for building extremely loyal teams who zealously believe in the bigger mission than mere entertainment, so rotting them out and replacing them will be extremely difficult.

But, Iger can cancel current productions (or at least those which have not reached the point of no return) and try to reboot the whole thing. According to the rumors, none of the top execs approached to simply take over with a clean slate are stupid enough to take the offer. No one wants to walk into such a huge organization to "save the day" and start by firing all the non-creative talent who might be loyal to Kennedy and could sabotage the franchise to get even for Kennedy's dismissal. The chaos that would create would be horrendous.

One theory being bandied about is to create a separate studio to start on a new series of movies from scratch using young writers, directors and production staffs and create storylines which coincide with the original films, but which take place with completely different characters, planets, and cultures which are watching and potentially struggling with taking sides in the civil war of the original 6 episodes. I find that intriguing.

Personally, I have hated every single damn movie they've made since the original trilogy. They seems weak, shallow, forced, and lacked any pull for me to really relate to the characters. They also seemed just a bit too polished where the special effects where a character of their own. Then the Disney movies, in my opinion, were blatantly trying to influence my current, real-life, American world-view, and that flat out pissed me off. I get preached at all the fucking time in life, I don't want it from entertainment I am paying to watch unless that is what I find entertaining, but then it won't be the world-view Disney was selling. I am sick of that shit.

So, I am interested more because of the commercial issues and the business drama which comes from realizing that choosing the wrong person to helm such a critical franchise and how that impacts so many different business models the corporation has invested deep in. How are they going to fix this? Who will survive and what will the future MBA students be studying from this period in Disney's corporate history. I think that is fascinating, and I intend to learn from it for my own career.

 

[Flint]

This is an example of how Kennedy and her close staffers made Star Wars a social justice propaganda campaign:

Most dyed in the wool Star Wars fans insist they never considered The Force to have any gender, so why bring it up at all? How does it advance the mythology, storylines, characters, and fandom to introduce a gender current social issue into a classic and timeless mythological storyline?

 

[Xgm3]

This is an example of how Kennedy and her close staffers made Star Wars a social justice propaganda campaign:

Most dyed in the wool Star Wars fans insist they never considered The Force to have any gender, so why bring it up at all? How does it advance the mythology, storylines, characters, and fandom to introduce a gender current social issue into a classic and timeless mythological storyline?

I had no idea about any of this. That lady on the left is pretty good looking though.

 

[Huey]

I hadn't really thought about if until you wrote about it Flint, but the four movies that they've put out, 3 out of the 4 have had a female lead, and one could argue that Emelia Clark was the heroine of Solo, or at least she was a bigger badass than Han. I have no problem with a female lead, but I'm getting a little tired of preached to by Hollywood. Heck, even in the latest Jurassic Park movie, the auctioneer was a charactiture of Trump, which they have admitted.

 

[Towen7]

I hadn't really thought about if until you wrote about it Flint, but the four movies that they've put out, 3 out of the 4 have had a female lead, and one could argue that Emelia Clark was the heroine of Solo, or at least she was a bigger badass than Han. I have no problem with a female lead, but I'm getting a little tired of preached to by Hollywood...

Respectfully, if the preaching wasn’t enough to make you even think about it, how can you be so tired of it?

 

[Huey]

Respectfully, if the preaching wasn’t enough to make you even think about it, how can you be so tired of it?

That wasn't so much about the Star Wars movies, that was about making political references in movies, usually in a demeaning way to someone.

 

[Haywood]

I have no problem with a female lead in the new trilogy, as Star Wars movies generally do focus on a single protagonist and there is no reason that protagonist cannot be female. The concern is when nearly every movie they make has a female lead. There are also too many overt "social justice" themes, as espoused by certain groups in our society. Star Wars movies should not be about pushing a social agenda.

 

[Akula]

Personally, I've liked the female characters they've involved. I think Rey is interesting as she tries to figure out what all this Force stuff might be. Rose has a better idea what she's fighting for than Finn and Poe. I think her character has taken a lot of unnecessary hate. What gets me is more is like I said- the creative team just can't quite manage to get the feel right. I did really enjoy Rogue One and it was probably the closest to how a SW flick ought to feel. Solo was fun but felt like it was missing something- the actors were great, the effects were great, but the story left me feeling like something wasn't quite done. And as I've said before, I can see why people have disliked TFA and TLJ, but personally I just disagree with them. They aren't as horribly flawed as the prequels, even if they just can't quite match the original trilogy.

And yeah, if the curators of the property are trying to use it to push a message (seems like it), then we found the problem. They need to go- any entertainment needs to be story FIRST. You can use entertainment to put in a message, but if you're putting the message first over things like universe, character development, dialogue, and so on, you're going to end up with a mediocre product at best.

 

[bmwuk]

Okay so Rey is one and Jyn Erso is two and there have been four films but Rey has been in half. I have yet to see Solo since I'll wait on home watching. That said, with daughters I am glad there are heroines for them and they seem to take more interest in Star Wars as a result. However hopefully not for agenda purposes.

And to add, I liked Rogue One quite a bit. Epidose VII for me was "at least they weren't the prequels" and VIII was okay. Not sure I loved it though.

 

[Haywood]

I think Rogue One is the best movie out of all the new Star Wars flicks.