Tag: simon kinberg

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The Art of Star Wars Rebels arrives in October

This has been bouncing around fandom for a few days, but here it is, officially: The Art of Star Wars Rebels is coming out in October. The hardcover is written by Dan Wallace and “will chronicle the making of the show over its four-season run, complete with never-before-seen concept art and process pieces.” It will include commentary from Dave Filoni, Simon Kinberg, Carrie Beck and others, and is already up for preorder.

For the time being, there’s plenty of behind the scenes content in the series guide on StarWars.com, including the above, a lighting concept by Molly Denmark for the series finale.

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Rebels S2 Finale: Q&A with Dave Filoni, Ashley Eckstein, and more

Star Wars Rebels Season Two Finale Q&A with Dave Filoni, Simon Kinberg, Ashley Eckstein, Taylor Gray

Now that you’ve seen ‘Twilight of the Apprentice’, the final episode of season two of Star Wars Rebels, dive into a question and answers session with the cast and crew. Held after the finale screening at Walt Disney Studios in Burbank on Monday, March 28, the Q&A features executive producer & supervising director Dave Filoni, producer Simon Kinberg, and voice actors Ashley Eckstein (Ahsoka Tano) and Taylor Gray (Ezra Bridger). Moderated by Amy Ratcliffe, the cast and crew discuss the hour-long final episode and how it came to be. Plus references to Donkey Kong, Gandalf, and more! Yes, it contains spoilers, so be sure you’ve seen the season finale before viewing!

There’s also a few audience questions, including one about the Grand Inquisitor’s role as a Temple Guard: he was one of the guards in The Clone Wars that arrested Ahsoka and later escorted Barriss Offee into the courtroom. And of course, someone had to ask about bringing Thrawn into the show.

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Rebels S2 ends tonight with ‘Twilight of the Apprentice’

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Rebels wraps up their second season tonight – and deals with some old Clone Wars business – with tonight’s one-hour ‘Twilight of the Apprentice’. IGN has an interview with Dave Filoni, Simon Kinberg and Ashley Eckstein where they address the return (again) of Darth Maul, Darth Vader and Ahsoka. Eckstein also chats on StarWars.com.


Fans who don’t want to be spoiled on Twitter should probably mute the hashtag #StarWarsRebels.

Rebels begins at 9:00 p.m. Eastern/Pacific on Disney XD. And yes, there will be a season three, probably beginning in the fall.

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X-Men: Apocalypse trailer will be on The Force Awakens

X-Men: Apocalypse

The first trailer for X-Men: Apocalypse will debut on The Force Awakens, co-writer/producer Simon Kinberg told Collider. ” It’s our first thing out there so it is somewhat of a teaser but it’s certainly longer than a minute and it has a ton of cool stuff in it,” he told them.

In addition to Kinberg and his Star Wars connections, Apocalypse also stars TFA’s Oscar Isaac in the title role.

Rumor – and basic common sense – has it that Captain America: Civil War will also debut on Star Wars, but that has yet to be confirmed. Although the X-Men movies are based on Marvel comics, the films are produced by 20th Century Fox, in a deal that long predates both Marvel Studios and Disney’s 2009 acquisition of the company.

X-Men: Apocalypse takes place 10 years after the timeline-resetting X-Men: Days of Future Past, in the prime X-Men era of the ’80s. It’s again directed by Bryan Singer and also stars Hugh Jackman, James McAvoy, Jennifer Lawrence, Michael Fassbender and Game of Thrones’ Sophie Turner.

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Did The Force Awakens merchandise just reveal a plot secret, or is it only marketing synergy?

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Start prepping your theories, because according to Jedi Temples Archives an unexpected original trilogy figure will be a part of The Force Awakens action figure line. Now, it’s not someone so unexpected that I think one really needs a complicated theory, but fandoms gonna fandom. Still, ‘Qui-Gon’s Noble End’ this isn’t.

→ Since today marks exactly one month until Force Friday, we’re seeing a few bits about the toy launches. Making Star Wars has some fuzzy Walmart signage pics, and Toys R Us put up a press release – though with no direct mention of The Force Awakens. (Expect that shoe to drop closer to September.)

→ Even Del Rey got in the spirit, with pics of Aftermath book covers being printed.

→ And finally, Simon Kinberg talked a little about the Story Group – apparently the very early days, as Michael Arndt is mentioned – to Entertainment Weekly.

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Josh Trank on his Star Wars exit

josh-trankIn the L.A. Times, director Josh Trank addresses why he dropped out of the second Star Wars Anthology film.

“I want to do something original after [Fantastic Four] because I’ve been living under public scrutiny, as you’ve seen, for the last four years of my life,” he said. “And it’s not healthy for me right now in my life. I want to do something that’s below the radar.”

“I have a great relationship with everyone at Lucasfilm and with Kari Hart,” he continued. “And they all understood it because this whole experience for me has been very psychologically hard.”

Simon Kinberg, also present at the interview, called the rumors that followed Trank’s departure “particularly cruel.”

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Report: Why Whitta left the first Star Wars spinoff

rumors-swirl-sw-yavinCinelinx says they know why screenwriter Gary Whitta is off Gareth Edwards’ Star Wars film: Because, as many of us guessed, that’s exactly what he was hired to do. They also maintain that Simon Kinberg is coming on.

And, for the record, none of this is particularly unusual:

This isn’t a new thing, by any stretch of the imagination, as studios have long used this model to develop their films, bringing in writers to finish a script from the basic draft, and we hear about it all the time. The reason this seems like such a big deal is that it’s freaking STAR WARS, and people seemed to want to sensationalize the news.

Their source has also heard that Whitta’s script was too expensive for the film’s budget. (Budget? Star Wars? Well, yeah: It’s still a business, and if anyone is getting a blank check here it’s certainly not a standalone.) That’s likely to be one of the things that Kinberg deals with.

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Rumor: Kinberg taking over for Whitta on Spinoff #1?

kinbergWe know that Gary Whitta is done with his part on Gareth Edwards’ Star Wars spinoff, but could Simon Kinberg be stepping in? That’s what /Film has heard. Kinberg is already firmly entrenched in the franchise, and was even originally announced as the writer of an eventual standalone, though he hasn’t been officially attached to any of the films as of yet.

In other words, he’s the perfect person to tweak and polish Whitta’s script – perhaps that was the plan all along?