How Much Star Wars Is Too Much Star Wars?
Are we getting too much of a good thing?
Lucasfilm shocked everyone last night by announcing - completely out of the blue - that Game of Thrones creators David Benioff and D.B. Weiss were going from Westeros to a galaxy far, far away.
Benioff and Weiss will be creating a new film series in the franchise, though few other details are known about it at present. We don't even know how many films they're making, but seeing as the minimum number it could be is two, it means there's a whole lotta Star Wars on the way.
The first trailer for Solo: A Star Wars Story dropped earlier in the week, with the hype barely dying down before this announcement was made. That'll be here in May, then there's an eighteen-month gap before J.J. Abrams returns with Episode IX. After that, although no release date has been announced, we're getting THREE new films from Rian Johnson, and almost certainly Kenobi: A Star Wars Story in 2020. Add in at least two from D&D, and it amounts to eight Star Wars movies on the horizon, if not more - and that's before you factor in the potential for other Episodes with Rey et al.
For a saga that gave us 9 films in its first forty years, it's a big step-up, but is it too much? With the latest news, and even before then, some have been saying so, complaining that Disney and Lucasfilm were diluting the product, with the MCU being the obvious comparison.
The difference, though, is that Marvel are releasing three films every year, whereas Lucasfilm are only doing one as things stand, and even with a packed slate there's no sign of things changing on that front just yet. Since Disney bought Lucasfilm in late-2012, we've had three movies released, and eight or so more on the way. In that same time there have been 11 MCU movies, with another seven upcoming between now and 2020 and many more rumoured.
If they do keep it as one a year, be it May or December or whenever (though Christmas does feel right), then they can ensure that the Star Wars movies still feel like the event they should be, especially if the quality remains high too.
That idea works better when you consider these films will all be different: certainly in characters, cast, and crew, but hopefully tone as well. There's a real chance to mix things up outside the Skywalker saga, so you could have a darker epic from Benioff and Weiss, an old Western gunslinger type Kenobi film, and then whatever weirdness Johnson wants to create - still within the universe, but not all as obviously linked as, say, the MCU.
If Lucasfilm were to push things to a Marvel-style three a year schedule, or even two a year, then the case for it being an oversaturation would be a lot stronger, and with Disney overseeing things it's a possibility, but one that Lucasfilm will hopefully avoid. Until that happens, and for as long as they're making interesting movies with great creatives, telling different stories (and expanding the galaxy/moving past the Original Trilogy era, which the Johnson and D&D films need to do) and still making them feel special once a year events, then keep it coming. It's a big galaxy, with thousands of years of history and almost endless possibilities in terms of exploration going forwards, backwards, and sideways - there's room for plenty more Star Wars films yet.
Do you think we're getting too much Star Wars? Let us know down in the comments.