The Star Wars Saga - Past, Present and Future Researched by Richard Hewison Part Two - "Speculation on Chapter One" The Star Wars story chopped and changed so many times before it made it to the shooting script, that it's difficult to believe there were so many different versions. One draft had Luke Skywalker going to rescue his brother, and another started the story on the Wookie's home planet. A mother Wookie takes a book down from a shelf above, and begins to tell the story to her young infant cradled in her arms. 20th Century Fox responded by demanding to know why, according to the draft, Wookies didn't wear pants! Getting Star Wars written to satisfy everyone was obviously not going to be easy. It took George Lucas two and a half years to get the script written in the end. It's interesting to note all the names, places and situations that got discarded from the first movie only to see them reappear in the later ones. The trouble was, George Lucas had enough material for a whole collection of movies. He hated having to cut bits out, so he just postponed them into the next Chapter of the saga. The city in the clouds is one obvious example which was removed from "Star Wars" and ended up in "The Empire Strikes Back" instead (Bespin Cloud City, owned by Lando Calrissian). In one of the early drafts, the Wookies defeated the Empire on the Death Star using simple hand weapons against all the technological might of the Imperial Stormtroopers. This eventually became the Ewok battle on Endor as witnessed in the closing 30 minutes of "Return of the Jedi". (If you think about it, Ewok is an anagram of some of the letters that spell Wookie!). People in Holland might have guessed the 'Father' link between Luke and Darth Vader long before they ever saw "The Empire Strikes Back". I can't verify this as I don't have a Dutch dictionary, but apparently "Darth" means "Father" in Dutch! (Can anyone confirm this?). It's also interesting to see how George Lucas' plans have gradually changed over the years regarding the future "Star Wars" movies. Back in 1983, he was quoted as saying that the first trilogy will be about the young Ben Kenobi and the early life of Luke's Father when Luke was a little boy. This trilogy (Chapters 1, 2 and 3 of the saga) will be set roughly twenty years before the events seen in "Star Wars", with a year or two passing between each Chapter. The entire 9 Chapter saga covers a period of about 55 years. However, just last year (1994), George Lucas revealed his current plans for the new trilogy. The first movie (Chapter 1) will take place about 40 years before "Star Wars". It will still concentrate on a young Ben Kenobi and Annakin Skywalker (Luke's father, who became Darth Vader) and chronicle the rise to power of the then Senator Palpatine (who ultimately becomes the Emperor). Chapter 1 will be full be of "betrayal, with no one really knowing who the good guys or the bad guys are". George Lucas officially began writing the screenplay back in October '94. It will be interesting to learn how George Lucas resolves a few points left unanswered from the three movies already made. For example, according to the novelization of "Return of the Jedi", Luke's 'Uncle' was in fact Ben Kenobi's brother, who was asked by Ben to look after Luke shortly after he was born, with Leia being smuggled off the planet Tatooine altogether (to become the adopted daughter of the Senator of Alderaan). Another question relates to Yoda, the Jedi master who instructed Ben Kenobi in the ways of the Force. How come neither Darth Vader or the Emperor knew about Yoda? Ben tried to train Annakin as a Jedi before he fell into the clutches of the Emperor, so how come he never mentioned Yoda? No doubt there will be numerous new characters introduced in the new trilogy, whose roles are none less important than the key characters we already know about. How did Annakin Skywalker become so horribly disfigured? According to my research, George Lucas has confirmed that he fell into a volcano after a battle with Ben Kenobi. Whether this scene ever appears in any future movie we will just have to wait and see. Rumours regarding the Bounty Hunter Boba Fett suggest that the armour he wore in "The Empire Strikes Back" and briefly in "Return of the Jedi" was the official uniform for the troops employed by the Emperor and Darth Vader to hunt down and exterminate the Jedi Knights. No doubt this is part of the story that will unfold in the new movies. We are bound to meet other Jedi Knights, and witness the birth of the new Empire. It's fun to delve through all the throw away lines from the three movies already made and speculate on what we are likely to see in the new movie. Hot tip for Chapter 1's title is "The Clone Wars", although I'm not sure myself. Quite how Cloning comes into the "Star Wars" saga is not yet known either. Again, previous magazine articles suggest that Palpatine (the Emperor) gained a quick foot hold in power by cloning an army of storm troopers to act under his direct command. Most of the storm troopers seen in the three movies so far as supposed to be clones. It would certainly explain why none of them can shoot straight when it comes to blasting rebels! There's one final rumour I've heard that suggests that George Lucas has dropped plans to ever make the final trilogy (Chapters 7, 8 and 9) and so make the saga only 6 films instead of 9. This would explain why he has allowed a large number of spin off novels based after "Return of the Jedi" to appear in the last few years when previously he had refused anyone permission to continue the saga from that point. The End..? Not quite - In November 1994, Lucasfilm invited over 250 Licensees to assemble at the Skywalker Ranch in Marin County, California to discuss the future of "Star Wars" as a licensed product. To ensure continued interest in the saga before the release of "Chapter One" in May 1988, Lucasfilm have announced "Shadows of the Empire", a new series of stories and characters based around the smugglers, criminals and aliens and set in the time period between "The Empire Strikes Back" and "Return of the Jedi". It will deal with characters from Mos Eisley Spaceport and Jabba's Palace, as well as smugglers and their adventures in a galaxy ruled by the Empire. To achieve this, there will be story crossovers between Dark Horse comics, Bantam Books, and new Lucasarts computer games. Kenner toys are also working on a new range of toys for release in '95 which will include characters from "Shadows of the Empire". At the same meeting, the Licensees were told of the plans for the "Star Wars - Special Edition" and were shown a 35 second clip of the new computer generated footage of Jabba the Hutt meeting with Solo at Mos Eisley. (Originally it was a rather rotund Irish sounding actor who played the role. In the Marvel Comics adaptation and subsequent original stories, Jabba was a humanoid alien. Of course, in the end we know that Jabba turned out to be a huge slug when we finally got to see him in "Return of the Jedi"). (Book references include the Novelizations of "Star Wars", and "Return of the Jedi", "Skywalking - The Life and Films of George Lucas", "George Lucas - The Creative Impulse", "A Journal of the making of The Empire Strikes Back", and "The Making of Return of the Jedi". Magazine references include various issues of "Starlog" magazine as well as "Sci-Fi Universe"). - o -