The internet is a great thing. Full of exciting news, great art, amazing music, and chalk full of rumors. Since it’s announcement, Star Wars VII has been a giant forum for “what if…” and “wouldn’t it be cool…” or “they should do…” – but so much of that has been taken and claimed to be confirmed as truth or inside information, with little attention payed to the fact that none of it has been confirmed by anyone official. Well leave it to Luke Skywalker to give us that “real talk”. Let’s get educated, shall we?
Enjoy!
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Star Wars: Episode VII
Definitive Joker voice actor Mark Hamill — who also apparently has some connection to Star Wars — says that nobody, including Harrison Ford, has actually signed on to appear in J.J. Abrams’s Star Wars movie:
“They’re talking to us. George [Lucas] wanted to know whether we’d be interested. He did say that if we didn’t want to do it, they wouldn’t cast another actor in our parts – they would write us out. … I can tell you right away that we haven’t signed any contracts. We’re in the stage where they want us to go in and meet with Michael Arndt, who is the writer, and Kathleen Kennedy, who is going to run Lucasfilm. Both have had meetings set that were postponed — on their end, not mine. They’re more busy than I am.”
He also says he thinks it’s likely the new Star Wars movie will focus on the next generation of the Skywalker clan — something that’s been rumored a few times, but still shouldn’t be considered official:
“I’m assuming, because I haven’t talked to the writers, that these movies would be about our offspring — like my character would be sort of in the Obi-Wan range [as] an influential character. … When I found out [while making the original trilogy] that ultimate good news/bad news joke – the good news is there’s a real attractive, hot girl in the universe; the bad news is she’s your sister – I thought, ‘Well, I’m going to wind up like Sir Alec [Guinness]. I’m going to be a lonely old hermit living out in some kind of desert igloo with a couple of robots.'”
Finally, he discusses his hopes for the new movie’s tone and feel, which includes a return to the original trilogy’s use of practical effects:
“I said to George that I wanted to go back to the way it was, in the sense that ours was much more carefree and lighthearted and humorous – in my opinion, anyway. And another thing I’d want to make sure of is are we going to have the whole gang back? Is Carrie and Harrison and Billy Dee and Tony Daniels, everybody that’s around from the original [returning]? I want to make sure that everybody’s on board here, rather than just one…
I hope they find the right balance of CGI with practical effects. I love props, I love models, miniatures, matte paintings — I’m sort of old school. I think if you go too far in the direction of CGI it winds up looking like just a giant a video game, and that’s unfortunate. … If they listen to me at all, it’ll be, ‘Lighten up and go retro with the way it looks.'”
