Disney Sells Star Wars
Breaking News - Disney has sold STAR WARS
It has been a tumultuous 13 years for Star Wars fans after George Lucas sold his beloved franchise to Disney. We all went from believing we'd never see another episode on the big screen to wondering what direction Disney would take the franchise and how they would execute the story for the newly announced sequel trilogy.
We've got to give Disney some credit as they did start out strong with the Rebels animated series led by Lucas apprentice Dave Filoni who had worked with George on the successful Clone Wars and longtime Lucas partner/producer Kathleen Kennedy heading Lucasfilm itself. She had been a longtime fixture in Hollywood as she had a hand in nearly every iconic Lucasfilm and Speilberg project from Indiana Jones to Jurassic Park.
Although films such as The Force Awakens, Rogue One, and The Last Jedi were financially successful, fans were quick to point out the glaring story issues and lack of originality. The troubled development and backlash of The Last Jedi led to the failure of Solo. On top of Carrie Fisher’s death, the studio had lost faith in Jurassic World Director Colin Treverow’s ability to finish the story in a monetarily satisfying way. Which led to Kathleen reuniting The Force Awakens Director JJ Abrams to finish the sequel trilogy by including Carrie Fisher with unused Force Awakens footage.
While financially successful, 2019’s The Rise of Skywalker was heavily criticized for it’s unpopular story choices having fans deem it the worst film yet. While many film projects were announced afterwards, Star Wars wouldn’t continue until the Mandalorian tv show on Disney plus. Fans gravitated to the short form storytelling and there seemed to be a light at the end of the tunnel. Instead, fans were treated to even more bastardization of their favorite franchise with the release of spin-offs such as The Book of Boba Fett, Obi-wan Kenobi and the much hated Acolyte. Shows that proved Disney and Lucasfilm had cared more about inserting identity politics than creating compellingly entertaining stories in the universe. This perversion did not stop at Star Wars. Other Lucasfilm projects such as Willow and Indiana Jones were criticized for its treatment of legacy characters and story elements leading to commercial failure. Any goodwill was drained from fans as shows that embodied George Lucas’s original intent such as Andor, Ahsoka, and Skeleton Crew were passed by fans.
With the continuing financial burden placed on Disney by Kathleen Kennedy’s gross mismanagement of Lucasfilm. Disney has finally decided to sell all rights back to George Lucas at a discounted rate of 2 Billion dollars. While full creative control may be back to where it’s intended, some fans are concerned we may never see Star Wars again due to George’s age. While others are just happy they won’t have to witness any further abuse to their beloved franchise.
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