Though there’s plenty to gripe about by fans about the Star Wars handling overall depending on where you come from with your introduction to the property, there’s no denying that there is now more potential and excitement for the franchise than ever before. And in a way, it’s kind of sad that we can only say that now that George Lucas has moved on from his creation. With the Hollywood machine working through various investor conference calls lately, the latest has come from Disney where CFO Jay Rasulo had a fair bit to say about Star Wars in general after some disappointing summer lack of news at various events, be it SDCC, D23 or the Star Wars Celebration in Germany. With Disney having paid out $4 billion for Lucasfilm and all that it entails, it’s no surprise that it will take time to get all the ducks in a row and create things that cross all aspects of their business. But Disney has done strikingly well with their Marvel acquisition and you can’t go into most stores these days without seeing some branded product and a long slate of theatrical features and TV shows, live action and animated.
So what did Rasulo have to say? Some key things to read between the lines on as they have a property that unlike Marvel, they don’t have to start on the ground floor of familiarization with. “This is not a new franchise for kids … The sky’s the limit … There’s incredible flexibility. It’s an unbelievable palette to create from.”
All roads start with the first feature that’s being directed by J.J. Abrams where they’ll determine the various integrations and spinoffs into other media, such as games, books and more. “We will lay the groundwork for that … and when the film comes out in 2015, we’ll be ready to blow it out,” saying that the overall strategy is “to put out a great film” first.
Rasulo also talked about the standalone films outside of the trilogy and what we can expect from this, saying, “One Star Wars trilogy film or “origin story film” would also appear on the release schedule each year, starting with the seventh installment in the “Star Wars” saga that J.J. Abrams will direct and Disney releases in 2015.”