That Sound You Just Heard Was Every Star Wars Fan Having a Nerdgasm

The big news of the day is still Hurricane/Superstorm Sandy, but this post has nothing to do with that craziness.

No, I'm going to talk about the news that just broke in the last half hour: Disney is buying LucasFilm.

Connected to this news is that Disney is fast-tracking Star Wars: Episode VII for a 2015 release.

But wait - there's more.  George Lucas will not be writing or directing any of these new films.

Ho. Lee. Smokes.

I've been a Star Wars fan for about as long as I've been a Star Trek fan, so I am definitely what you could call a nerd.  I make no bones about it, either.  The original trilogy is timeless, movies that are as cherished as The Wizard of Oz, Gone With the Wind, and The Sound of Music.  The prequels, not so much.

When this news broke, my first thought was, "Well who's gonna write and direct this new trilogy?"  Since Lucas will only produce these new films, the films won't be cut at the knees by blank stares, emotionless line-reading, and focusing on CGI.  They can tell an entirely new story, one that fans have dreamed about ever since Return of the Jedi had ended.

I'm so freaking giddy at this prospect.

Obviously, I have no say or stake in who will be involved in these movies, but if I were a betting man, I'd put money down on either Andrew Stanton or Brad Bird directing Episode VII.  Both men had directed Pixar movies distributed by Disney in the past, and they have both made the transition into live action since.  I wouldn't be surprised if Disney considered Gore Verbinski as a candidate too, since he had directed the first three Pirates of the Caribbean films for the studio as well.

What's most important here is the actual story of this new trilogy.  One of the major flaws in the prequels was its lack of a story being told, unlike the original trilogy.  The prequels were all exposition; this happened, then that happened, and this guy met that guy, and then they fought, and so on.  I didn't care about any characters at all, not even familiar faces like Yoda or Obi-Wan.  If Disney hires the right team of writers to scope out this new trilogy, they could make these films just as good if not better than the original trilogy.

I'm sure it's possible the new films could be similar in theme and style to the Timothy Zahn Trilogy from the early 90s.  Those books were excellent, and they told a fairly natural continuation from where Return of the Jedi had left off.  The prequels failed at being half as memorable as the original trilogy, but doing something similar to what Timothy Zahn had written could bring Star Wars back to winning over a whole new generation of fans.

The one part of Disney's action here that is being somewhat overlooked is that they had bought Marvel Comics last year, which means all the Marvel superhero movies are distributed by Disney as well (Yes, that means The Avengers and all the Avengers one-shot movies are part of this deal).  Now Disney owns the rights to Star Wars as well.  I'm blown away at how big Disney is becoming from all these business acquisitions, and I'm now wondering how other studios will compete with them going forward.