http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/star-wars-episode-ix-sets-release-date-997230 It'll be weird seeing a Star Wars movie released in May again. -edit- I just remembered that the Han Solo movie also comes out in May 2018 so it won't be so weird for me then.
So Episode 8 is going to be the last Star Wars Christmas movie?? It's cool that Solo comes earlier but I was really starting to get used to a new Star Wars film every holiday season. Back to Bea Arthur and the Star Wars Holiday special, then...
Yeah, this is a surprise. Even if the anthology movies were more spread out, I figured they'd at least save the Saga movies for December.
I seem to recall that they had tried for a May release for Rogue One and that stalled pushing it to December. It is like they are trying to rush the productions to get the release dates to May since that was when they older films came out, but they've been so far being forced to December, cause these films take a lot of stuff in post to get done.
It depends on what they decide to do after Episode IX. The third Anthology film is as of yet, unknown subject matter, only that they intend to do it for 2020. After that is entirely unknown territory. But with Star Wars Land in the works, and more Cartoons and other projects over the next few years, one can imagine they have a plan to push forwards. Rumors of a fourth trilogy abound. A mix of speculative character film projects (Boba Fett, Yoda, or Kenobi have been mentioned). Old Republic era material has been suggested from all the Jedi and Sith of the past stuff they keep bringing up of late. There is always the development hell live action TV series that never seemed to go anywhere after The Clone Wars got going. Plus there is the aborted (but seemingly finished) Star Wars Detours comedy series in storage.
I figured once they announced the anthology series, we'd be getting one saga and one anthology movie a year, but I realize now with how complicated these are that there's no way they could pump them out that fast. I was thinking that Marvel and DC put out multiple movies a year, but they also have multiple casts and are usually filming more than one at a time, and often have at least one in post during that time too.
The numbered Episodes will likely stay a biennial thing, but once the anthology movies start getting sequels of their own it's bound to get more crowded. For obvious reasons it was never possible for Rogue One to have a sequel, but if Han Solo is as big of a hit there will probably be Han Solo 2, and then the Untitled Anthology Movie(2020) might get an Untitled Anthology Movie Sequel (202?), and so on...
What I'd like to know is, what's gonna happen to the main series after Episode 9? Will there be a fourth trilogy, or will they just stick to the Anthology series?
I'd be totally ok with a anthology movie a year. I don't believe in too much of a good thing in movie franchises as a general rule (people always claim the MCU does too much, but it certainly hasn't hurt them financially, critically or, in my opinion, creatively) so a SW anthology movie a year and a numbered movie every two years would be fine with me.
At which point they will start making less money. Hopefully the quality of Rogue One wasn't a fluke. Apparently The Last Jedi is very "different" (according to the small number of investors that have seen the rough cut) so it sounds like they are ready to push the envelope of what Star Wars is. If they do release two releases in one year, chances are they both won't take in 1B each. The fourth trilogy is apparently a thing but they will be waiting another decade or so before getting into it, which is probably very smart. They want to hit every generation as they grow up so that would do it (maybe closer to 2030?) Anyway, it's been suggested by Iger and Kennedy more films would materialize past episode 9 but they've been very careful to commit to it outright. Really, the anthology thing is brilliant because not every story needs to be a three movie saga. I'm really looking forward to the one-offs. Imagine in a few years they might start visiting radically different points in the Star Wars timeline... could be really awesome to see a KOTOR era film.
Leaving a bit of time between Saga trilogies is a good idea. I was worried we'd get Episode X in 2021 with mid-20s Daisy Ridley in age makeup to look 30 years older.
They could do some of the old EU style stories to follow Rey and company foradventures like they did for the Heroes of Yavin. Daisy be the right age for a five years later film since these seem back to back the same year.
Well, other than reviving Han Solo, I don't much care what they do. Just as long as they reverse that stupid death. As much as I'd like to see Ford come back (fat chance), I'd accept a CGI Han in this case. Just reverse that insipid, pointless Ford-ass-kissing death.
I'd rather they not resurrect Han, I thought his death served a nice purpose in the story and I'd hate to see them undo that. The new trilogies are really Rey, Finn, and Poe's story, so I don't think they'd need Han. I don't know if that would be true, we've been getting multiple Marvel movies in one year and it hasn't hurt them any. If anything I'd say SW is even bigger than Marvel, so if Marvel can do it, Star Wars definitely can.
Other than to sell movie tickets I don't think it contributed much in the way of story. But then again Han overall wasn't really that necessary other than as a draw for people who wanted to see the old characters back. But screwing Han, Leia and Luke over to sell the Sequel Trilogy was offensive to some of us.
It isn't screwing over characters to show that happy endings are nearly always short-lived. Han was never going to quietly die in his sleep at a ripe old age surrounded by family. Even the softer version of Han at the end of the trilogy was far from domesticated. Honestly, it was probably either kill him off or leave him out of the sequel trilogy entirely.
And he was the mentor character, taking on the role of Obi-Wan, and providing a little bit of earthy wisdom for the inexperienced Rey and Finn. I'm annoyed by his death in that he and Luke will (likely) not have another scene together, but I enjoyed a lot of his scenes, with the exception of the Rathtars, because that felt a bit dumb.
They could easily have spared at least Jyn and Cassian at least, and really everyone except for the Force monk guy, if they'd wanted to - none of that crew was so important that future viewings of the OT would have been plagued by questions of where they were, with the predominant answer of "oh, they're there, but just offscreen." Hell, Disney could even have filmed shots of them on Hoth and Endor, and snuck them onto future OT releases - it's not as though Lucas himself didn't make bigger and sillier edits.