Support NeoGAF

[GreyHorace]

Making A STAR WARS Film Is Difficult Due To A Lack Of Comics And Novels Says Lucasfilm President

"There’s no source material. We don’t have comic books. We don’t have 800-page novels," says Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy when asked about the difficulties that come with making a Star Wars movie.

Right. My mistake. Obviously she can't make a good Star Wars film because there's no source material to fall back on.

Oh wait a minute...

But what do I know right? Obviously I don't know shit compared to big shot movie producer. Just to be clear, I do acknowledge the criticisms of the Expanded Universe and will trust the judgement of the fans that a lot of it is crap. I've only read the Heir to the Empire trilogy by Timothy Zahn and played the Jedi Knight games starring Kyle Katarn.

But to say that the fictional universe she took charge in has no wealth of source material is laughable. I know they declared the EU non-canon but that didn't stop them from putting Grand Admiral Thrawn in Star Wars Rebels. Perhaps she's making excuses until her eventual dismissal as Lucasfilm president. Here's hoping.

 

[Schrödinger's cat]

Use The Force, Kathleen.

 

[Rentahamster]

Even if it were true that there's no source material to work with . . . all you have to do is hire a creative team that has, you know, talent.

 

[Tesseract]

 

[switchback27]

OK, actually read the article to make sure the quote wasn't taken out of context, so let me say this......

You're telling me that you threw away the EU to maximize freedom for creativity (an understandable, although not universally accepted, decision), and now when it comes to it, you claim it's hard because there's no source material?
If I throw away my gun to maximize the creative juices I have in order to catch a deer, and I find that my handmade traps don't do shit, am I now going to claim that there are no tools to help me hunt?

Does this idiot actually think before she speaks?

 

[Unknown Soldier]

This explains why the Disney Star Wars era has been an absolute trainwreck.

I actually feel kind of bad for George Lucas these days. He did nothing wrong. Neither did all the myriad authors and writers who contributed to the old EU that they just straight up threw in the trash and replaced with the total shitpile that is the Disney continuity.

 

[Tesseract]

lucas at least had a pretty distinct vision and gods did he create a meme machine outta that prequel trilogy

 

[Slings and Arrows]

Oh man, KOTOR was so freakin good.

 

[Jesus Carbomb]

Rise of Skywalker pulled straight outta Kathleen Kennedy's ass confirmed.


See you at the theaters December 20, 2019

 

[eot]

Oh man, KOTOR was so freakin good.

KotOR II you mean yeah

 

[Porcile]

This franchise is going nowhere.

 

[KingGhidorah]

omg!!!

 

[royox]

KATARN, A STAR WARS STORY

IT'S
NOT
THAT
FUCKING
HARD

 

[sol_bad]

OK, actually read the article to make sure the quote wasn't taken out of context, so let me say this......

You're telling me that you threw away the EU to maximize freedom for creativity (an understandable, although not universally accepted, decision), and now when it comes to it, you claim it's hard because there's no source material?
If I throw away my gun to maximize the creative juices I have in order to catch a deer, and I find that my handmade traps don't do shit, am I now going to claim that there are no tools to help me hunt?

Does this idiot actually think before she speaks?

It's an extremely dumb comment from Kennedy, but c'mon, even George 100% disregarded the EU/Legends. He didn't give a shit about any of it.

And hell yeah to a Katarn movie.

 

[royox]

And hell yeah to a Katarn movie.

I don't see that happening. They Literally killed him in Rogue One (He got the Death Star plans in EU) and also in the new Disney Trilogy (Kylo Ren killed everybody at the new Jedi temple except Luke. That means Kyle is r.i.p if he was there as jedi master).

Still have faith in some Mara Jade rumours tho.

 

[sol_bad]

I don't see that happening. They Literally killed him in Rogue One (He got the Death Star plans in EU) and also in the new Disney Trilogy (Kylo Ren killed everybody at the new Jedi temple except Luke. That means Kyle is r.i.p if he was there as jedi master).

Still have faith in some Mara Jade rumours tho.

His story in the new movies doesn't have to follow the EU story.

 

[ThatStupidLion]

I get that source material is helpful and all...but its not like movies havent, ya know, been created through sheer imagination before

They just need source material because its easier to adapt to their formulaic malarky and can take the blame when the adaptation turns out shitty.... it wasnt rian johnsons fault! It was the source material’s

 

[EekTheKat]

The thing is - Star Wars at its core is a very simple good vs evil story. It's the heart and love of the craft that's put into the films that makes them stand out.

Where Disney/KK/Lucasfilm went wrong is they felt as if it's absolutely necessary to subvert fan expectations at all costs - even if it sacrifices long term plans or doesn't make a lick of sense. The old guard cared much more for world building and telling an actual good story than the current helms that are steering the Star Wars ship.

 

[Virex]

 

[MisterHero]

There's many ways to write Star Wars.

1. Follow the rules of good storytelling where characters go through arcs and have logical, satisfactory conclusions.

2. Do whatever makes the fans happy, but not without playing with their expectations. And by play, I mean DON'T COMPLETELY FUCKING DESTROY their expectations.

3. Sheer spectacle and an amazing audio-visual experience (not unlike the original Star Wars).

 

[ZehDon]

I mean, I question if she even understands what writers actually are, at this point. Where does she think those mythical "source materials" come from? Does Kathleen perceive an infinitely recursive set of source materials, where each is just an adaptation of source materials from before it, on and on, further and further back, just ever more source materials that each authour adapts... or does she actually understand that she's the head honcho of a forty year old, multi-billion dollar film franchise that has never had source materials at any point in its eight film series? "Hey, this is hard" is no excuse for dropping the ball off the edge of the grand canyon, Kathleen.

 

[Hudo]

What reason was there for Lucas to choose her as head of Lucasfilm? I have not heard one statement from her that sounded like she knows where to take Star Warsor that she actually really cares about Star Wars. I would actually go so far as to question whether she knows what her job is. Disney is usually fairly quick to fire people, so what's the hold up here? She's obivously unfit for her position.

 

[Lanrutcon]

I saw this on social media and I thought it was a joke someone had put together.

How many effing Star Wars novels are there at this point?

 

[BlackOlivesMatter]

The force is female you bigots

 

[KorbinDallas]

And this is why the sequels absolutely suck. They lack the one thing which would've made even a mediocre SW film an honest representation of the series:

Coherency​

​

This last batch of sequels didn't tell a faithful story of the Skywalker family. It would've been fairly easy to just use George Lucas's film treatments, add CGI, and Skywalker lineage, and there would've been good response. Instead we got CurrentCultureYear() inserted into the fictional universe.

 

[#Phonepunk#]

Most idiotic thing she has said yet. She is such a horrible liar. They had literally the most source material any franchise ever had.

I mean ffs George Lucas gave them outlines specifically for new movies and they threw them out. Zero sympathy here.

What reason was there for Lucas to choose her as head of Lucasfilm? I have not heard one statement from her that sounded like she knows where to take Star Warsor that she actually really cares about Star Wars. I would actually go so far as to question whether she knows what her job is. Disney is usually fairly quick to fire people, so what's the hold up here? She's obivously unfit for her position.

Iirc she was a diversity hire due to Di$ney getting flack for not having enough women in leadership roles. There is no way they would fire her (tho blaming the ST on her might happen).

 

[Hudo]

Most idiotic thing she has said yet. She is such a horrible liar. They had literally the most source material any franchise ever had.

I mean ffs George Lucas gave them outlines specifically for new movies and they threw them out. Zero sympathy here.

Iirc she was a diversity hire due to Di$ney getting flack for not having enough women in leadership roles. There is no way they would fire her (tho blaming the ST on her might happen).

Ah ok, so she was hired by Disney after the deal? If so, I didn't know that. I thought Lucas hired her as part of preparing for the deal.

 

[Grinchy]

I feel like there are a ton of writers and directors out there who would love to let the creativity flow with that supposedly "blank slate."

Something tells me that even if they attempted to go in that direction, someone wearing a sports jacket, jeans, and a force is female t-shirt is going to approach them at some point to let them know they need to put in a Death Star and a furry animal to sell toys with.

 

[InterMusketeer]

They could've literally opened the Star Wars encyclopedia to a random page, and based a movie off of that. Probably would've turned out better than what we ultimately got.

 

[Screamer-RSA]

Seems she hasn't learned anything since her days of bring Spielberg coffee.

 

[Contica]

lucas at least had a pretty distinct vision and gods did he create a meme machine outta that prequel trilogy

Lucas is the only authority on Star Wars as far as I'm concerned. You can hand it over to whomever, but it'll never be more than fan fiction. Disney didn't make Star Wars, Lucas did. If I wanna know something about this universe, I'd ask Lucas, not whoever is in charge right now.

What's being made now isn't Star Wars to me, it's just a bunch of junk made to profit. Lucas might have sold it, but it's still his. He might have made some bad movies, but he's still the only one who can say aye or nay.

As for Kennedy. I wonder what the hell happened. She has been a part of some of the greatest movies ever made. Need I mention? Indiana Jones, E.T., Land before time, Roger Rabbit, Back to the future, Jurassic Park. the list goes on.

What the hell happened. How could she go from being a producer on some of the best cinema ever, heavily involved in almost every Spielberg film, to taking Star Wars, and driving it off a cliff?

I don't fucking get it. She's not a hack, she knows what she's doing. She's not some demographic hire, she knows movies inside out.

What the fuck happened?

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

Sounds like code for "we don't have good writers".

 

[ruvikx]

Even if it were true that there's no source material to work with . . . all you have to do is hire a creative team that has, you know, talent.

Indeed. It's called "inspiration" & it's something artists usually have. Kathleen Kennedy wouldn't know anything about actual creative work though because she's just a low IQ bean counter selling toys & political propaganda.

Meanwhile what was George Lucas's "source material" in the 1970's? Old fairy tales & real world history? Wow, how did he manage?

 

[DoctorEkkoUK]

The sooner they ditch Kennedy the better. I don't care if the lead on StarWars is a woman, it's not even about that, Kennedy is just a proven disaster for the franchise.

 

[drganon]

Kathleen Kennedy is the worst thing to happen to star wars.

 

[#Phonepunk#]

Ah ok, so she was hired by Disney after the deal? If so, I didn't know that. I thought Lucas hired her as part of preparing for the deal.

no, Lucas hired her, she was a longtime colleague of his at Lucasfilm. but i think the choice of her was specifically cos they had been getting flak in the press, it sweetened the deal to have a female executive.

 

[Starlight Lotice]

A woman who most likely watched Disney Films and used that as a base for new Star Wars claiming no source material by not looking.

Not to sound sexist by the way, but I feel that Disney hired her to make the series more kid friendly using the whole Disney Princess formula, which Rey is likely going to be included in when they release the new merchandise of the Disney Princesses. So they make Rey an Orphan who just happened to havr the Force in her.

 

[Silent Duck]

"There’s no source material. We don’t have comic books. We don’t have 800-page novels," says Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy when asked about the difficulties that come with making a Star Wars movie.”

Didn’t Marvel just end a 75+ issue comc run... this week?
Never read it, but I keep getting comic book related emails despite not reading the damn things for years.

 

[Hudo]

no, Lucas hired her, she was a longtime colleague of his at Lucasfilm. but i think the choice of her was specifically cos they had been getting flak in the press, it sweetened the deal to have a female executive.

Ah, thanks for clearing that up.

Oh, well... at least we finally got a decent Star Wars game after the previous failed attempts, so that's something. And hey, I actually liked Rogue One, so I got at least one decent movie out of it. But it still hurts to see how she dropped the ball so hard.

 

[888]

This explains why the Disney Star Wars era has been an absolute trainwreck.

I actually feel kind of bad for George Lucas these days. He did nothing wrong. Neither did all the myriad authors and writers who contributed to the old EU that they just straight up threw in the trash and replaced with the total shitpile that is the Disney continuity.

He did do something wrong. He appointed her in charge before Disney even bought them.

 

[Contica]

A woman who most likely watched Disney Films and used that as a base for new Star Wars claiming no source material by not looking.

Not to sound sexist by the way, but I feel that Disney hired her to make the series more kid friendly using the whole Disney Princess formula, which Rey is likely going to be included in when they release the new merchandise of the Disney Princesses. So they make Rey an Orphan who just happened to havr the Force in her.

Check her imdb page and read up on her history if you don't want to sound like you have no idea what you're talking about. When I heard she was taking over, my first thoughts where that this was a perfect choice. She should have been a perfect choice.

 

[Kadayi]

I get it maybe she didn't want to feel constrained by all of the Extended universe stuff from the various novelisations etc (which I suspect even Lucas didn't always keep an eye on) but I dare say that there was probably plenty of meat to draw inspiration from amongst it all.

I think the ultimate conclusion is that she just presumed any old BS would fly as long as it had the SW name attached to it, and albeit for sure that may have worked initially with TFA I think since then people have become increasingly critical of the thin nature of what Disney has been putting out which just seems to bask in trading off references.

 

[#Phonepunk#]

One of her interviews she says “how we approached new Star Wars was basically the same as how we approach any large tent pole film” and me thinking, yeah, that’s the entire problem. It’s just another corporate property to pimp out to them.

 

[gatti-man]

JFC there are a million good stories to use in the fucking comics. Just kill me, dark days to be a Star Wars fan.

 

[Trojita]

No source material? lol. And when has that been a problem for a true creative?

Iirc she was a diversity hire due to Di$ney getting flack for not having enough women in leadership roles. There is no way they would fire her (tho blaming the ST on her might happen).

A woman who most likely watched Disney Films and used that as a base for new Star Wars claiming no source material by not looking.

Not to sound sexist by the way, but I feel that Disney hired her to make the series more kid friendly using the whole Disney Princess formula, which Rey is likely going to be included in when they release the new merchandise of the Disney Princesses. So they make Rey an Orphan who just happened to havr the Force in her.

These are pretty bad takes. She's been a producer for some of the most famous/well known films of the 80's and 90's.

Jurassic Park
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
Schindler's List
Poltergeist
Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
Gremlins
Gremlins 2: The New Batch
The Goonies
Back to the Future
Back to the Future Part II
Back to the Future Part III
The Color Purple
An American Tail
An American Tail: Fievel Goes West
Who Framed Roger Rabbit
The Land Before Time

 

[Ichabod]

The force is female fucked.

 

[ExpandKong]

Why is she still allowed to talk

 

[Weiji]

I really don’t understand how this lady hasn’t been fired like ten times by now.

Is she sleeping with Iger or something?

 

[Revolutionary]

No source material? lol. And when has that been a problem for a true creative?




These are pretty bad takes. She's been a producer for some of the most famous/well known films of the 80's and 90's.

Jurassic Park
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
Schindler's List
Poltergeist
Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
Gremlins
Gremlins 2: The New Batch
The Goonies
Back to the Future
Back to the Future Part II
Back to the Future Part III
The Color Purple
An American Tail
An American Tail: Fievel Goes West
Who Framed Roger Rabbit
The Land Before Time

It's an ongoing joke in Hollywood that most producers do nothing.

 

[Paltheos]

Woof. A swing and two misses.