J.J. Abrams Won’t Direct ‘Star Wars: Episode 9,’ Luke Skywalker Drew Him To ‘The Force Awakens’
A slew of new goodies fromStar Wars: The Force Awakenshas hit the web today, fromnew photos of our new heroes and villains, to juicy new details onAdam Driver’sFirst Order bad guy Kylo Ren. Now some details about the future of the newStar Warstrilogy have surfaced.
J.J. Abramshas confirmed that he will not come back to directStar Wars: Episode IX, though as we know from an earlier interview, he will beexecutive producing the second and thirdinstallments of this new trilogy. In addition, the director revealed what finally convinced him to directStar Wars: The Force Awakens,after initially turning down the job.
Who Will Direct Episode IX?
First up, whenEntertainment Weeklyasked Abrams if he would come back forEpisode IX, he flatly stated, “No, I’m not going to directEpisode IX, as much as I am deeply envious of anyone who gets to work with this group of people on the future movies.”
While Abrams previously denied that he would directThe Force Awakensbefore ultimately taking the job, it doesn’t sound like this is something that will change as time goes on. Hearing about JJ Abrams not directingStar Wars Episode IXisn’t all that shocking, mainly because we already heard rumblings thatJurassic Worldhelmer Colin Trevorrow isbeing sought to directEpisode IX. Clearly, Lucasfilm is figuring out who they want behind the camera, even though the movie is still 4 years away.
Speaking of which, here’s what Abrams toldEmpireback when he wasn’t involved withThe Force Awakens, seemingly not wanting to direct the film because of his status as a fan:
“I quickly said that because of my loyalty to Star Trek, and also just being a fan, I wouldn’t even want to be involved in the next version of those things. I declined any involvement very early on. I’d rather be in the audience not knowing what was coming, rather than being involved in the minutiae of making them.”
Who Is Luke Skywalker?
But as we know now, Lucasfilm was able to convince Abrams to take the job. So what changed? Lucasfilm PresidentKathleen Kennedyexplained:
“In the context of talking about story and laying out what we were thinking, I said one thing to him: ‘WhoisLuke Skywalker?’ He said, ‘Oh my God, I just got the chills. I’m in.’ I mean, it really was almost that quickly.”
Indeed, more than almost anything else in the movie, fans are very curious as to where we find Luke Skywalker inThe Force Awakens. There are a lot of rumors out there as to just how much screentimeMark Hamillwill get in the sequel, and what state of mind Luke Skywalker is in, and there’s even some contention as to whether he’s still a good guy or a bad guy. But we really don’t know anything about the original trilogy’s hero in the new trilogy, and that’s extremely exciting. (Stop reading now if you don’t want to know any of the plot details revealed in Entertainment Weekly’s cover story)
What we do know is that Luke’s old lightsaber (which previously belonged to Darth Vader/Anakin Skywalker) fromThe Empire Strikes Backis a catalyst for the events that unfold inThe Force Awakensas it falls into the hands of Finn (John Boyega) and Rey (Daisy Ridley) and they set off to get it back to its rightful owner, which leads them to Princess Leia. But since we just learned Kylo Ren is a Darth Vader obsessed villain, I’m betting he wants that lightsaber for himself.
Anyway, there’s 127 days untilStar Wars: The Force Awakens, and we’re bound to find out plenty more about the new trilogy soon, so stay tuned.
Who do you think should directStar Wars: Episode IX? Where do you think we find Luke Skywalker?
[sandbox image byBob Thiele]
