Star Wars: Episode VII
Let me get this straight right away I honestly think Star Trek > Star Wars. Now get yourselves together and hear me out.
Star Wars is for 14 Year old boys or adults that live in their parent’s basement! That maybe a sweeping statement but it has some truth to it. Who can remember the outcry of rage from the 30 year old “Grown Ups” when the first of the prequel movies was released to varying degrees of poor reviews and apathy? They seemed to ignore the simple fact that George Lucas wrote them for teenage boys not grown me so of course they fell short of the mammoth expectations.
Forward many years and we now have Star Wars 3.0 this time with the every reliable Disney Corporation throwing huge amounts of money at the franchise. We still have the same core elements including the Millennium Falcon, the Force and the perennial fight between the forces of Good and Evil. Mixed with the subtle tones of racism, inbreeding and you have the plot for the next 3 movies.
Sounds great doesn’t it?
The only thing about Star Wars that is at all interesting to me is the appointment of JJ Abrams to direct Star Wars Episode 7: The Force Awakens. That and the fact it’s moved away from the increasingly terrible Lucas Arts that is now devoid of any creative nous or skill. I’m struggling to make sense of Abrams approach to the casting of the movie especially his insistence to using as many of the original team as possible even down to those responsible for the art work attached to the original movies. I get that he loves the Franchise dearly and wants to do it justice but how can he when it’s a series hamstrung by its legacy. I keep coming back to the same question Why will the 3rd run of movies be any better than the disastrous 2nd batch that so tarnished the Star Wars name?
From where I’m sitting I don’t see how even a director of Abrams skill and vast experience can alter the downward trajectory of the Star Wars Franchise. Whether it’s been via the Movies, Books, Cartoon series or shockingly poor video games Star Wars is nothing more than a lucrative cash cow and the change to Disney will do little to alter that. The first film will no doubt set the tone for the subsequent 2 movies of which there will be decreasing degrees of interest from the cinema going public and critics will widely pan the movies. Or I could be totally wrong and they will be movie masterpieces. I hope I’m wrong I really do but I can’t see anything other than 3 dull, overcomplicated movies wrapped in their own hype.
The only good Star Wars movie so far was Return of the Jedi and that was brilliant because it wasn’t aware of how important it was, there wasn’t a massive weight of expectation hanging from its neck. It was at its core a simple story of Good Vs Evil set in a vividly portrayed universe whereas the subsequent films were crap, over complicated and folded under the weight of expectation and the ego of George Lucas. Even without the all-powerful George Lucas shaping and controlling the future of the Star Wars franchise it will take something amazing for it to reclaim its place amongst the premier entertainment franchises.
