Tag: bob iger

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George Lucas: Hamill, Ford and Fisher are all but certain for Episode VII

disney-swIn a great story on the Lucasfilm acqusition by Disney in Bloomberg Businessweek, George Lucas more or less admits that Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher are returning for the new movies:

Asked whether members of the original Star Wars cast will appear in Episode VII and if he called them before the deal closed to keep them informed, Lucas says, “We had already signed Mark and Carrie and Harrison—or we were pretty much in final stages of negotiation. So I called them to say, ‘Look, this is what’s going on.’ ” He pauses. “Maybe I’m not supposed to say that. I think they want to announce that with some big whoop-de-do, but we were negotiating with them.” Then he adds: “I won’t say whether the negotiations were successful or not.”

That may be the big news out of this, but the article itself is a must-read on the process, with extensive input from Lucas and Bob Iger.

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Disney CEO confirms standalone Star Wars films

Disney CEO Bob Iger dropped a couple of bombs on us this afternoon regarding future Star Wars movies.

Lucasfilm is working on ‘a few’ standalone films featuring existing characters – but not part of the overall saga. Lawrence Kasdan and Simon Kinberg are working on them – thus confirming the second half of an older rumor.

Iger said that Disney and Lucasfilm hope to make Episodes VII-IX over “a six-year period.” They’re still aiming for a 2015 release, but “a few other films” will be released “in that period of time.” Bryan Young speculates that this likely means we’ll be getting a Star Wars film on a yearly basis, which is in line with sister studio Pixar’s outputiger-cnbc

UPDATE: StarWars.com adds that Kasdan and Kinberg are working on two films separately, each focusing “on a specific character,” and that they’re both expected to come out after Episode VII.

Iger declined to name any specific characters, so the Yoda film still remains strictly a rumor – but certainly a far more likely one now. I’d also place bets on Boba Fett getting his own movie – but if it keeps him (and his director fanboys) out of further Episodes, that’s a price I will (grudgingly) pay.