Nice! The thought of a genuinely solid, competent screenwriter writing Star Wars movie is exciting! Here's the original source: http://www.vulture.com/2012/11/star...ave-found-its-writer.html?mid=twitter_vulture Pretty interesting stuff when it goes into the original Star Wars' screenplay structure:
It's very good news, IMHO. Arndt knows what he's doing, and if he based his mammoth treatment on Lucas' story, this could be truly superb--we're talking Empire/Raiders-level greatness.
He's also writting the script for the second Hunger Games movie, Catching Fire. So if this is true he'll have gotten to write for two of the biggest franchise of the last couple decades. EDIT: Or 3 if you want to count Toy Story.
Re: the above extensive quotes, it's a good sign that the guy understands the structure of a solid story so well that he can look at a story and see its skeleton. Ultimately the problem with the prequels was that the leg bone wasn't connected to the hip bone and the head bone was missing altogether.
Two directors that WON't be involved... Zach Synder is not interested. Actually, despite his misgivings I bet that he could have done the movie justice. Quentin Tarantino is not interested. This is a good thing because, A-- He wasn't going to asked anyway, and B-- as much of a Tarantino fan as I am, I wouldn't want him within a light-year of a Star Wars movie.
Tarantino exercises too much autonomy to ever get involved with a project like this. Snyder's visual aesthetic would totally jar with the one Lucas established in the first six films of the series; it's unlikely that Disney would want someone with his reputation to be involved with the series. Better to get a competent director who won't divert attention from the series itself.
Although interestingly Leia doesn't appear to count as a central character. You can start your rumours now that the director of Jason Stratham movies and The Expendables 2 is up for Star Wars. And ask why exactly West is Tarantino's go-to example for what he thinks a Disneyfied Star Wars entails.