George Lucas is starting development of a live-action Star Wars TV series. It’s going to be about “minor characters” in that galaxy of his own creation far, far away (Alright, let’s hear from Biggs! Wedge Antillies, your time is now! Mon Mothma, it’s all about you, sweetie! Jar Jar… We’ll call you). As Mr. Lucas said in the Los Angeles Times:

“It has nothing to do with Luke Skywalker or Darth Vader or any of those people. It’s completely different. But it’s a good idea, and it’s going to be a lot of fun to do.”

Lucas has also been toiling away at an animated series: “Star Wars: The Clone Wars.” He is self-producing both projects, then is going to find a network home for them. He seems to believe these projects are going to be a tough sell:

“They’re saying, ‘This doesn’t fit into our little square boxes,’ and I say, ‘Well, yeah, but it’s “Star Wars.” And “Star Wars” doesn’t fit into that box.’”

I would offer he doesn’t have all that much to worry about. The built-in fan base for his stuff is so huge and loyal I’m sure he can cut any sort of deal he wants. Then again, there was 1992’s “The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles,” which was a resounding, expensive failure.

So: More “Star Wars,” this time on TV. Gotta admit: Lucas is admirable for the extraordinary efforts he is taking to keep his franchise alive. I just wish he would think about doing something else. Which leads to one of my longest-standing rants: GEORGE LUCAS IS THE LUCKIEST GUY IN MOVIES. I’m hard-pressed to think of a fellow who has leveraged such a banquet of success from such a thin stew of original ideas.

George Lucas famously came from Modesto, California, born into a modest branch of the Lucas family. His better-off relations, at one time, owned most of Marin County. When he moved Skywalker Ranch into Lucas Valley after his Star Wars success it wasn’t just an expression of hubris: More like he was assuming the dominant role in his family.

He went to film school at USC, where he made a few films, but mostly he made connections, which is what the USC Film School actually teaches. He did make one notable short: “Electronic Labyrinth THX 1138 4EB.” It won an award, which hooked him up with Francis Coppola, who financed THX 1138, the feature-film version of his 15-minute short. It wasn’t all that successful, but it was a feature film, and he now had a chip in the game.
Coppola hit it big, big, big the very next year with The Godfather, a rising tide which also lifted Lucas’ boat. Riding that tide, and with Coppola’s help again, he made American Graffiti, an unabashedly autobiographical film depicting the fun times he had hot-rodding in Modesto– ten years previous.

(I always thought it rather telling that even though Graffiti was set in California’s Central Valley, he shot the whole thing in Marin County. I doubt he ever set foot in his old hometown after film school. I’m originally from Stockton, about 20 miles north of Modesto: I don’t blame him.)

Anyway, American Graffiti lined up perfectly with then-current Boomer sensibilities, hitting the front curve of 1970s nostalgia craze– and it was a massive hit. After that, George Lucas had carte blanche. His next project he plainly admitted came from things he drew in the margins of his high-school notebooks, sci-fi adventures full of robots and aliens and space dogfighting (Kapow! Whiz!) Add a plot lifted from one of the Samurai films in vogue during his Film School years (Kurosawa’s Kakushi-toride no san-akunin [The Hidden Fortress], 1958) and voila! Star Wars.

Of course, directing was never George Lucas’ true genius. His is producing: Organizing productions, collecting unique ideas, getting the right talent, developing the technology, and putting out tightly branded, all-encompassing multimedia entertainment. He may not have invented franchise filmmaking, but he certainly perfected it.

With the power and glory and money that is the George Lucas Film “Empire”, one would think he could be bankrolling new projects, starting new franchises, rather than servicing his 30-year-old, fully played-out one with TV-level offerings. The continuation of Lucas’ “Star Wars” output is, in my opinion, also continuing evidence of the limitations of his creative vision.

So George, ol’ neighbor of mine: If you’re reading this, and are hard-pressed for material I have some new ideas you need to look at. A lot of us do.

–Skot C.

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 18th, 2007 at 8:33 am and is filed under Ancilliaries, General, Long Tail, Marketing, Motion Pictures, Television. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.