Irrespective of which manner you take a look at it, the “Star Wars” franchise has modified dramatically over the past 10 years, shifting from a sequence based totally round cinematic occasions to a primarily streaming-only tv enterprise. Whereas Disney and Lucasfilm are placing “Star Wars” again into the cinema with the upcoming “Starfighter” and “The Mandalorian and Grogu,” the previous remains to be an unknown amount, whereas the latter feels much less like an occasion and extra like a big-screen model of a small-screen present. Sadly, that is just about what now we have to work with, seeing as how the franchise has gone by means of an incredibly giant variety of false begins and near-misses to finish up at these two future options.
A kind of near-misses has simply been revealed due to Adam Driver’s interview with AP Information, and it is a doozy. In accordance with the actor, who portrayed Kylo Ren née Ben Solo within the Sequel Trilogy, he and Lucasfilm had been engaged on a solo movie entitled “The Hunt for Ben Solo,” and the director that they had lined up was none aside from Academy Award Winner Steven Soderbergh. Slightly than merely an idle pitch or kernel of an thought, it appears that evidently Soderbergh and Driver not solely had a accomplished script in hand but additionally the approval of Lucasfilm brass, together with Kathleen Kennedy. Nonetheless, once they introduced the undertaking to Disney CEO Bob Iger and co-chairman Alan Bergman, the executives turned down the concept outright for no higher purpose than “they did not see how Ben Solo was alive,” as Driver defined. That is, to place it mildly, a bizarrely pedantic purpose to cancel what seemingly would’ve been an interesting, probably even nice new “Star Wars” movie, and is a fairly good indication of why the franchise, because it stands, feels so creatively stagnant.
Driver and Soderbergh’s Ben Solo film had an thrilling crew connected
It is simple to know the sense of apathy many people have about franchises lately, because it looks like most new installments exist extra for the assured paychecks than any inventive ardour. But this was not the case with Driver:
“I at all times was inquisitive about doing one other ‘Star Wars.’ I had been speaking about doing one other one since 2021. […] I at all times stated: With a terrific director and a terrific story, I might be there in a second. I beloved that character and beloved taking part in him.”
In accordance with Driver, he took his idea for the movie to Soderbergh (whom he labored with in “Logan Fortunate”), who then outlined a narrative with Rebecca Blunt (a pseudonym which seemingly belongs to Soderbergh’s spouse, Jules Asner) earlier than handing script duties to collaborator Scott Z. Burns. The end result was invigorating, as Driver recalled:
“[It was] one of many coolest (expletive) scripts I had ever been part of. We introduced the script to Lucasfilm. They beloved the concept. They completely understood our angle and why we had been doing it. We took it to Bob Iger and Alan Bergman and so they stated no. […] And that was that.”
In an announcement given to AP Information, Soderbergh echoed Driver’s sentiments with a heavy dose of remorse:
“I actually loved making the film in my head. I am simply sorry the followers will not get to see it.”
It is a disgrace that the movie did not occur, particularly when Soderbergh has been on a sizzling streak just lately, as his movies “Kimi,” “Presence,” and “Black Bag” have been praised for being exceptionally intelligent style movies. Had the director been let unfastened on “Star Wars,” we might have had the primary really daring entry within the sequence since “The Final Jedi.”
The loss of life of the Ben Solo film is one more occasion of the problems with kowtowing to terrible followers
Divorced from the information of the final a number of years of “Star Wars” discourse, there are numerous situations of supposedly useless characters coming again to life inside “Star Wars” itself (Ben Kenobi’s Power Ghost, as an illustration). Sadly, considered one of essentially the most controversial examples is of Emperor Palpatine’s return in “The Rise of Skywalker.” Criticisms of Palpatine’s return have largely revolved across the idea’s ham-fisted manner of attempting to tie all three “Star Wars” trilogies collectively inside a single concluding chapter. But, due to the way in which discourse operates on social media — i.e., it turns into lowered to a single meme — it may very well be interpreted that almost all followers’ challenge with the resurrection of the character is that he was resurrected in any respect.
In different phrases, it is totally seemingly that Iger and Bergman had been petrified of one other “By some means, Palpatine returned” meme catching hearth in the event that they introduced the apparently useless Ben Solo again for a post-“Rise of Skywalker” movie. If that’s the case, then that is one more occasion of the “Star Wars” franchise meekly catering to the complaints of the loudest and most obnoxious followers, as seen within the case of “The Acolyte” and even “The Rise of Skywalker” itself. This, plus the lengthy record of cancelled initiatives with massive filmmakers, has turned “Star Wars” right into a depressingly risk-averse universe, with initiatives like “Andor” changing into the exception and never the norm. It is ironic, contemplating that George Lucas’ authentic 1977 movie was one of many greatest dangers in cinema historical past. Although it is comprehensible why firm homeowners would not need to rock any boats, these answerable for the galaxy far, distant would do nicely to be much less involved with pleasing a few of the folks all the time.
