Dark Horse to adapt George Lucas' original Star Wars screenplay

[Chris3123]

No, ignore the date on the calendar. This story is actually legit.

From the official press release:

APRIL 1, MILWAUKIE, OR–It’s no April Fools’ prank! Dark Horse is honored to announce a dream project: working with J.W. Rinzler, executive editor at LucasBooks, and artist Mike Mayhew (Avengers) to adapt the rough-draft original screenplay which spawned the biggest franchise in film history!

Three years before his 1977 film, George Lucas put down on paper his first story set in a galaxy far, far away—a tale of fantastic adventures, daring escapes, “lazer swords,” romance, and monsters. A story of Jedi Annikin Starkiller and General Luke Skywalker, an alien named Han Solo, and evil Sith Knights. The screenplay was titled The Star Wars!

“I’m not sure where I first read about The Star Wars—it was years and years ago—but the idea of Luke Skywalker being an older Jedi General, and Han Solo being a six-foot-tall lizard, turned my Star Wars fan brain on its side,” said longtime Star Wars editor Randy Stradley. “I always assumed this would be one of those stories that would be ‘lost to history,’ so getting to work on bringing it to life is kinda like a dream come true.”

“While researching in the Lucasfilm Archives I’ve found many treasures—but one which truly astounded me was George’s rough draft for The Star Wars. His first complete imaginings were hallucinating to read—mind blowing,” said writer J.W. Rinzler. “While working with George on another book project, I once asked if we could adapt his rough draft. He was hesitant. Years later, with Dark Horse’s invaluable help, we showed him a few drawn and colored pages of what it might look like. He gave us the okay.”

TheForce.net

And here's some sample art from the comic:

Those familiar with Ralph McQuarrie's concept art for the first movie will notice some familiar imagery.

I'm not much a comic buyer myself, but I'm seriously considering getting this.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

That actually looks pretty cool.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Excellent, if true.

 

[J.T.B.]

I hope it's heavy on the "adapt," because those early drafts... The characters and dialogue are pretty rough, and a lot of the less-popular aspects of the PT movies (awkward exposition, needlessly convoluted politics...) are there in embryonic form.

The art looks a lot like how I'd pictured it in my mind, though. I'm going to put that down as a "buy."

 

[Skywalker]

It's things like this that make me hope Dark Horse doesn't lose their license to produce Star Wars tie-ins now that Disney (who own Marvel) now controls the property. This looks very promising.

 

[C.E. Evans]

I've read a synopsis of the first screenplay draft before--the story was simply too big and epic in scope to fit into just one movie.

I think a lot of the fun will be seeing how certain things (particularly characters) were originally supposed to be like and how parts of the original story wound up being inserted into different movies.

 

[JD]

This has the potentially to be really cool. It'll definitely be interesting to compare it to what we ended up getting.

 

[Admiral_Young]

This is true, this was announced at the Dark Horse Wonder Con panel on Sunday. Most likely Dark Horse going out in a blaze of glory before the rights revert back to Disney/Marvel. I'm very excited about this.

 

[Mysterion]

How freakin' cool is that! I want it now, damnit.

 

[C.E. Evans]

Most likely Dark Horse going out in a blaze of glory before the rights revert back to Disney/Marvel.

Or the rights stays with Dark Horse and they're just putting forth new titles to replace earlier ones that are no longer in production (Invasion is over--perhaps for an obvious reason now--and I think Knight Errant is wrapped up or on indefinite hiatus).

 

[Toxteth O´Grady]

This sounds great!

I love the early Ralph McQuarrie paintings that were done before George Lucas finished his shooting script. Hopefully a lot of the artwork will be derived from that.

 

[Mr. Adventure]

Oh sure, put this out but he shits on the original movies.

Seriously though, it looks like a neat project.

 

[theenglish]

This sounds great!

I love the early Ralph McQuarrie paintings that were done before George Lucas finished his shooting script. Hopefully a lot of the artwork will be derived from that.

Is that the work from A New Hope with the 3PO Prototype or is there other work out there? I would love a link if there is.

 

[sidious618]

Sounds awesome. Will definitely be picking this up.

 

[J.T.B.]

This sounds great!

I love the early Ralph McQuarrie paintings that were done before George Lucas finished his shooting script. Hopefully a lot of the artwork will be derived from that.

Is that the work from A New Hope with the 3PO Prototype or is there other work out there? I would love a link if there is.

There were twenty or so originally, you can see some here but I don't know of a site with them all in one place; you can probably Google them up here and there. There's the art deco 3PO in the desert, "Luke" in an air mask vs. Vader with lightsabers, the Y-wing above the Death Star, "Cloud City" in gray clouds which was originally supposed to be in the first movie, a showdown in the cantina, "Luke" overlooking Mos Eiseley from a cliff under two suns, stormtroopers with lightsabers and shields waiting around a corner near the docking bay, bow-angle blockade-runner-style Millennium Falcon in Imperial docking bay with clouds visible outside, the exterior of the Yavin temple, ground crews working on Y-wings with a planet filling the sky, blockade-runner-style Falcon in Imperial docking bay reverse angle (showing her engine tubes), the sandcrawler, "Luke" and "Leia" at the edge of the abyss, "Death Star" elevators at the edge of abyss, Falcon visible through entrance in Mos Eiseley docking bay (originally blockade-runner-style but changed), the sand people, X-wings going down the trench away from the viewer, X-wing pursued by a TIE above DS surface, TIE pilot from behind looking into targeting scope with DS visible outside, the throne room interior and a few more I'm forgetting.

 

[theenglish]

Thanks, there are several pieces there that I had not seen before.

 

[TREK_GOD_1]

No, ignore the date on the calendar. This story is actually legit.

From the official press release:

APRIL 1, MILWAUKIE, OR–It’s no April Fools’ prank! Dark Horse is honored to announce a dream project: working with J.W. Rinzler, executive editor at LucasBooks, and artist Mike Mayhew (Avengers) to adapt the rough-draft original screenplay which spawned the biggest franchise in film history!

Three years before his 1977 film, George Lucas put down on paper his first story set in a galaxy far, far away—a tale of fantastic adventures, daring escapes, “lazer swords,” romance, and monsters. A story of Jedi Annikin Starkiller and General Luke Skywalker, an alien named Han Solo, and evil Sith Knights. The screenplay was titled The Star Wars!

“I’m not sure where I first read about The Star Wars—it was years and years ago—but the idea of Luke Skywalker being an older Jedi General, and Han Solo being a six-foot-tall lizard, turned my Star Wars fan brain on its side,” said longtime Star Wars editor Randy Stradley. “I always assumed this would be one of those stories that would be ‘lost to history,’ so getting to work on bringing it to life is kinda like a dream come true.”

“While researching in the Lucasfilm Archives I’ve found many treasures—but one which truly astounded me was George’s rough draft for The Star Wars. His first complete imaginings were hallucinating to read—mind blowing,” said writer J.W. Rinzler. “While working with George on another book project, I once asked if we could adapt his rough draft. He was hesitant. Years later, with Dark Horse’s invaluable help, we showed him a few drawn and colored pages of what it might look like. He gave us the okay.”

TheForce.net

And here's some sample art from the comic:

Those familiar with Ralph McQuarrie's concept art for the first movie will notice some familiar imagery.

I'm not much a comic buyer myself, but I'm seriously considering getting this.

Very interesting choice. I think it will be worth picking up.

 

[Stevil2001]

Most likely Dark Horse going out in a blaze of glory before the rights revert back to Disney/Marvel.

Or the rights stays with Dark Horse and they're just putting forth new titles to replace earlier ones that are no longer in production (Invasion is over--perhaps for an obvious reason now--and I think Knight Errant is wrapped up or on indefinite hiatus).

Yeah, Knight Errant is done. I never even got around to reading it!

 

[PsychoPere]

It's things like this that make me hope Dark Horse doesn't lose their license to produce Star Wars tie-ins now that Disney (who own Marvel) now controls the property.

On that topic, Dark Horse VP of Publishing Randy Stradley said the following at WonderCon:

Well, as of two weeks ago I was told a bunch of Disney people were up at Lucasfilm discussing how the two companies would work together and move forward. At this juncture, not a single word has been said about changing the licenses. I have a lot of hope that when Disney bought Marvel they didn't come in and change everything; when they bought Pixar they didn't come in and change everything. I have a lot of hope that they're gonna let Lucasfilm be Lucasfilm. There's been no discussion about anything that would affect us yet, expect to maybe hear something some time [next] year. I'm not gonna worry about something that may not happen.

He also has some thoughts to offer on this miniseries, and the article covers the other projects that Dark Horse talked about at their panel this weekend.

 

[Sketcher]

Where is the "jumping up and down like a giddy schoolgirl" smiley??

I read Lucas' first draft when I was 15 and loved it, mostly for the "ah-ha" moments where you see elements that would make their way into the OT/PT. But the script also has a very epic space opera tone that I can't wait to see translated visually.