Star Wars: Where Now?

This is not an illusion....

Griff Williams, the newest operative to join the geekzine’s ongoing crusade, applies his literary scalpel to the latest Disney shopping binge….

If you’ve ever been to one of the Disney theme parks, chances are you’ll have at least seen, and more than likely ridden, Star Tours. For those not in the know, Star Tours is a motion simulator that takes guests on a trip through the Star Wars universe. It’s a slightly tongue in cheek, comical affair that takes one or two liberties with A New Hope, but the sheer attention to detail and love for the source material is typical of Disney’s creative team. Star Tours isn’t a pointless tie-in to hoodwink gullible tourists like myself into sitting in an air-conditioned room for ten minutes and getting shaken around. It’s an honest-to-goodness attempt to recreate the magic of the original Star Wars trilogy.

I think that’s why Disney’s buy-out of the Lucas Empire (no pun intended) didn’t fill me with the same deep feeling of dread it did with many others. Or, at least, not for the same reasons. Disney has a pretty solid track record with the Star Wars IP. Sure, there have been some… questionable choices, like a promotional dance-off between Darth Vader and Boba Fett, or the insistence of foisting Mickey, Goofy et al. into the merchandise. But all in all, I personally still think they’ve treated the material with more respect than Lucas has. Darth Vader dancing to Smooth Criminal isn’t nearly as heinous as Revenge of the Sith’s (everyone say it with me) NNNNNNOOOOOOOOO!!!1!, and I’d sooner let Mickey and Goofy into the franchise than Ewan McGregor any day of the week.

So no, I don’t think that Disney’s acquisition and announcement of Star Wars 7 is the death knell for Star Wars. Partially because The Clone Wars film and series rang that bell years ago, so technically what we’re talking about here is franchise-necromancy, and partially because – for all people may like to bash Disney as the smiling mouse-face of ultra-conservative, uber-Christian America – Disney knows what it’s doing. Pixar and Marvel have already shown that assimilation into the Disney collective doesn’t result in a quality nose-dive. If anything, I think there are a great many people out there who might want Disney to assume a more direct control over the Star Wars franchise and hope that Lucas’ new role of ‘creative consultant’ is nothing more than a rubber-stamper.

This isn’t what bothers me about the revivication of the Star Wars films. No, what worries me is a very simple question: where now? Or, perhaps more accurate: what’s left?

Let’s put aside value judgements about the House of the Mouse versus George ‘I can’t believe it’s not better’ Lucas. Let’s focus on simple facts. What is left in the Star Wars universe to devote one movie, let alone a wholly new trilogy, to? The franchise achieved critical mass a long time ago, transcending from various spin-off products into its own expanded universe. As a result, pretty much everything has been covered already. Seriously, if you haven’t already, go check out Wookieepedia. Everything post-original trilogy and pre-prequel trilogy has been done, sometimes more than once. The discovery of the force, the creation of the Jedi and Sith, a few dozen galactic wars, the resurrection of the Emperor, some funky invaders from beyond the galaxy. Done, done, done.

Take a look at the Star Wars MMO for instance. Bioware finally realises the thwarted dream of fans everywhere – to create a fully inhabitable Star Wars setting – and what do they decide to go with? Oh, just another attempt by the Sith Empire to overthrow the Jedi and Senate, rule the galaxy as father and son, you get the picture. They turned up to Star Wars’ idea well way too late and found it bone dry.

Now, this isn’t to say that Star Wars’ expanded universe should die off. The success of Black Library and the Warhammer franchises clearly shows that you can focus on smaller stories and make great works of fiction until the Banthas come home. But while Warhammer is clinically allergic to any major developments in the setting that weren’t established years ago, the Star Wars films have always focussed on massive, galaxy-changing events (specifically, the rise and fall of the only truly galactic Sith Empire). And when it comes to big stories in the Star Wars universe, there really only seem to be two options for Star Wars 7: retcon, or far-flung. Either they declare some section of the existing expanded universe non-canon and build a film trilogy in its place, or they set their films so far in the universe’s past or future that it ceases to bear any major resemblance to Star Wars at all. To borrow a quote from Arthur C. Clarke, both are equally terrifying.

I’ll reiterate. Star Wars shouldn’t be left to die out. But it should be left to mature. It has ceased to be a purely film franchise, or even remotely a film franchise. Indeed, it has evolved to the point where a new film would seemingly struggle to find a place amidst the novels, games, comics and so on. That is what Star Wars should be forevermore: not the fevered, increasingly-hazy vision of a single man, but the product of a collective formed from those who love the IP and want to explore it in the minutia. Less an Empire, more a Republic.

Of course, I’ll still be there opening night with fingers crossed.

Griff ‘Starkiller’ Williams