The latest ForceCast celebrated Star Wars Reads Day with a big slate of interviews.
The Pablo Hidalgo and Leland Chee interview starts at 0:46. They discuss what they’re reading, their first Star Wars reads, how they started at Lucasfilm, the evolution of their jobs and killing Yaddle.
There’s an interesting bit at about the hour part on the Holocron, where Leland admits that the biggest misconception about the Holocron continuity database is that “People overemphasize the importance of the canon levels.” You don’t say.
But for anyone curious about what’s going on with the ‘Story Group,’ the discussion begins at about 1:05. It began as an initiative from Kathleen Kennedy, Pablo says, as it’s her philosophy that “creativity leads.” They declined to out some of the other members – folks who might not be familiar to us yet, apparently.
They won’t say anything about Episode VII, naturally, but Pablo does say that the story group is meant as a “bridge” to the “all-new storytelling going forward.” What’s coming up will be more interconnected than what we’ve seen previously.
As for tie-in literature for the new movies: “That’s definitely part of it,” Leland says. “Everything, every new fiction is going to be part of it,” he says, going on to mention video games and books.
“All these forms of story going forward, each one of them can be an entry point” for new fans, says Pablo, so it’s their goal to make them meaningful.
Also: 1:15: Lucasfilm, why are you not jumping on Mary’s Bar Guide? MARY’S BAR GUIDE. Damn it.
Timothy Zahn appears at 1:17 and talks about his ideas for ‘the Maestro trilogy’ that ties up a few of his own lose ends and a transition novel from the EU to the sequel trilogy.
And Aaron Allston shows up at 1:48 to talk about his experiences on the X-Wing, New Jedi Order, Legacy of the Force and Fate of the Jedi novels plus his idea for an X-Wing TV series. He also speaks out for keeping the EU going as a parallel universe.
So the story group (which definitely needs a cool name like Team Terifiction or The Universe Expanders or Ms. Kennedy and the Story Boarders) is actually creating a story master plan for virtually everything? That’s radical. And innovative. And really intriguing.
I wonder if Simon Kinberg, Lawrence Kasdan, Michael Arndt, Filoni, Weisman, etc. are part of the team… Huh… :-)
Thanks for the summary. This sounds worth a listen…
The only people I know who care about a fictional setting’s canon policy are those who engage in verses debates, or try to analyze the setting’s technology. Without a clear way to deal with contradictions you quickly run into problems, and there are massive contradictions, but they usually have little to do with the story/plot.