Why Did Lucas Make the STAR WARS Prequels?

Well I like the prequels but the other three are magnificent (apart from the Ewoks which pissed me off at the time). The more recent bunch were fun but weak in comparison.

 

Financial gain and ego.

 

I'm at page 1 yet and just wanted to say that I'm sure it wasn't a late afterthought of him doing prequels.
If I'm not wrong The Empire Strikes Back already was numbered as being Episode V,
so Lucas already had the idea of making pre-stories obviously while making Empire.

 

I worked with John and director Jerry Kramer on Fogerty's 1985 All-Stars concert for Showtime, and he was very nice, soft-spoken, and down-to-earth. And he was definitely not a fancy dresser. Sang like a million bucks. He laughed when I made a pun about Saul Zaentz, but I can't remember what I said (something stupid like "Zaentz has no pantz").

I'm not sure I would say that George Lucas is egotistical, but he is very secure in what he wants and he's not happy about compromising. I also don't think he's looking to hang out with a bunch of people who argue with him and tell him he's wrong (even when they're filmmakers at his level). I truly believe he made the prequels was because he had more stories to tell, and if he didn't do it then (1998-2005), he'd be too old to pull it off later.

I do think part of the reason why he sold Lucasfilm in 2012 was because he took such a beating from internet critics over the prequels. I don't think that was all of it, but even when you're a billionaire and very successful, it's got to hurt when people yell "hey! Phantom Menace sucks!" when you're coming out of a coffee shop. Maybe the first 50 times you can shrug it off, but after thousands of times, it's got to sting.

I got to have lunch with Alan Dean Foster a couple of times in Santa Monica in the late 1970s, and he told me that before he wrote the Star Wars novels for Lucas, George had let him peek at all nine outlines for entire film series. But Foster said that most of them were just very rough notes written in pencil on yellow legal pads, not more than a couple of paragraphs. Only Empire and Jedi were fleshed out, and the others were just vague building-block ideas. Don't forget that even Darth Vader being Anakin Skywalker was a last-minute addition to the script, so a lot of this boiled down "let's through some crap at the wall and see what sticks." There was never a big master plan for Star Wars -- he was always flying by the seat of his pants.

I also think the movies he made in the late 1990s were far different from what he had first imagined 20 years earlier. Again, the Secret History book goes into what was planned vs. what was filmed, and they provide as many details as they could get their hands on. The original Leigh Brackett script for Empire is out there, and there's a ton of stuff in there not in the final film (almost completely rewritten by Lawrence Kasdan). And in that case, the film was 9000% better. Still, I'd be very surprised if the word "midichlorian" appeared in his 1970s notes.

 

Publicly, he's said (even on camera in interviews) that he had to direct the films himself because nobody he contacted was willing to do it. And that includes Kasdan, Spielberg, and Ron Howard, each of whom was capable of doing the job. I think none of them wanted to accept because a) they were busy and b) they were very aware of the possibility of failure. And a possible third reason might have been because they knew Lucas was a control freak and there'd be the danger of being second-guessed (though I'm positive Spielberg would never have agreed to that).

I was surprised to find out in J.W. Rinzler's excellent Making of Empire Strikes Back that Lucas did not blame Kershner for the cost overruns on that film, and he mainly was angry at producer Gary Kurtz. When the film went more than $10 million over budget, it drove Lucas to the brink of financial ruin, and only at the last minute was Kurtz able to get a bail-out loan from a Boston bank. Lucas had initially gone to Fox for an advance on expected income, but was incensed when they demanded all the merchandising rights in return, which he refused to do. He was very bitter for many years that Fox had "kicked him when he was down," after all the hundreds of millions they had made on the first film.

I was also very surprised that he allowed Kershner to completely finish Empire, and Kersh was in on the editing and the final mix all the way up to the week of release. And contrary to popular belief, Lucas asked Kershner if he'd like to direct Return of the Jedi (then called Revenge). Kershner shook his head and said he was exhausted from the events of the previous two years and needed some time off, so Lucas went with Richard Marquand instead. And I do agree with you that Marquand was more of a puppet than Kershner was.

I think Lucas is a brilliant guy in many ways who profoundly changed the way films are made and also changed the kinds of films that have been made over the past 40 years. But while I think he's brilliant as an editor, as a VFX supervisor, he has great timing and great instincts, I think he's a ****ty screenwriter and absolutely awful at dialogue, particularly involving human emotion. I also don't think he took enough time looking at pacing and structure, and that's a big reason why those films are a bit all over the place. (Let me again say I'm trying to be objective here, and I think Lucas is an absolute genius and an amazing person. Also very nice to me personally. And I think he is a much deeper, more thoughtful person than most people give him credit for.)

I also think a lot of his characters come off as kind of cold and empty, and it took other writers with great skill and humanity to give them more emotion and more human shadings. We can only guess how different the prequels could have been if he'd just hired a room full of writers to throw around ideas and put the script together, which is how Raiders, Temple of Doom, and Last Crusade had been written.

 

Not necessarily, I recall it being inspired by his enjoyment of Kurosawa films. He didn't understand the culture or the environment and the politics but the story and the characters kept him hooked. He liked the idea of the audience being dumped in this foreign environment and being left to fend for themselves. He did toy around with the idea of prequels and sequels because he had the notion that Star Wars would be a serial but I don't think prequels were his motivation for calling it Episode 4, 5 and 6.

 

I think the main reason George wanted to make the prequels is,that aside from the obvious financial reasons, is he simply wanted to say he finished the main story and then, eventually, let Star Wars pass into other hands and see what they came up with.

Back in the early 80s when George was going back and forth on whether the saga was going to be six, nine or twelve chapters ,he always said the game plan was to make the first three episodes focusing on the back story and he was going to make those next. So that's what he did,although a decade later than he originally intended.

 

BTW, this article just popped up and it adds some more answers (and a lot of questions) to the entire discussion of the Star Wars prequels...

Do the 'Star Wars' Prequels Reveal That Anakin Has Daddy Issues?

I regret not asking Lucas when I had the chance, "we saw who Anakin Skywalker's mother was, but who was his father?" I'm not buying into the immaculate conception thing, either.

 

Wonder if that had anything to do with Lucas selling up to Disney instead of FOX eight years ago, ya think George still held a grudge? And would the Mouse still have wed the Fox (!!!) if the former hadn't owned Lucasfilm at the time and had all but the 1977 film within their grasp?

Agree with all of that unequivocally; I've never had the honor of meeting George but he's one of the very, very few major film players I would go out of my way to shake hands with if given the opportunity, he always struck me as a very personable, laid-back, easygoing, humble guy with little to no airs or graces (much like Peter Jackson)...

With regards to writing the prequels, I've said here ad nauseum that the story being told in that trilogy absolutely needed planning out in advance, mostly because of already-established plot and character beats and a predetermined destination; but George made those films largely like they were a low-budget independent production... writing them on the fly, using the script as a mere guide, shooting lots of footage as quickly as possible, 'finding' the movie in the edit, and having additional filming to fill in blanks and accommodate new ideas he subsequently came up with to shape and mold the film until he had to turn it over... an interesting strategy if you are a director who produces their best work under a singular vision... but George is not such a filmmaker; he needs active collaborators to take his ideas and to give them more focus and precision and humanity than he's capable of as a writer, and the films that were released reflected that shortcoming, alas...

Like I said though (and this is just conjecture on my part), I think George took on writing/directing duties himself on that trilogy because of the emotional attachment he had to the story, it was something only he could do because it was in his head and his heart... although he half-jokingly lamented about "getting my life back" when he was done with them. Despite the grief he received from some quarters over those films, I'd probably say they're a point of pride for him that a) he made them as he said he would, b) he made them as he wanted without interference, c) he finished what he started all the way back in 1973, and d) he revolutionized the industry a second time... only in the digital realm this time.

God bless 'im for that... wish I had that kind of vision, work ethic, and focus... but apparently the Good Lord invented alcohol so us Irish wouldn't rule the world, so what can ya do...?

Cheers...

 

Why Did Lucas Make the STAR WARS Prequels?

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tons of it.

 

I don't care what his motivations were for making them. I just wish they had been better.

 

I've seen the Phantom menace probably 20 times, because when I played all 6 of them for my kids, that was my son's favorite and he asked to watch it over and over again.

I've read a bunch of the books and enjoyed the Clone Wars and Rebels cartoons series since then, so the prequels are kind of indispensable pillars of all that material at this point.

I certainly see some of their technical flaws (ie dialogue, plot, etc.) but I'm glad they were made. The universe and back story he created with them are greater than their flaws as films, IMO.

 

good article. i think it points up one of many missed opportunities in Phantom Menace. Adding a scene that established that Anakin was starting to look up to Qui-Gon Jinn as a potential father figure, and another scene where Anakin flies into a tantrum on learning of Qui Gon Jinn's death would have added another level of depth to Anakin's character, and, imo, improved the movie.

 

I can't argue with that. The Prequels were really underwhelming. Again, if you haven't watched it, go check out the documentary The People vs. George Lucas, which gets into a lot of this stuff. And to Lucas' credit, he allowed the film to be made and gave them permission to use clips from his films.

 

I saw that film a few years ago. It was really good and that, coupled with Red Letter Media's Plinkett reviews, helped to solidify the criticisms of the prequels and Lucas' shortcomings.

I've always admired Lucas, and he seems like a nice guy, but he's much better at concepts and ideas than he is at execution. The prequels have their moments (and can even be pretty fun at times) but there's so much that drags them down that could have been eliminated with more competent directors/writers/designers.

 

He turns 76 today.

George Lucas - IMDb

 

For me there's an incredible irony reading these stories that make the current Disney films -- which are utterly bereft of any creativity or artistic impulse whatsoever -- out to be a "worthwhile cinematic endeavor" while trashing Lucas' prequels.

Not all of the prequels worked -- I think ATTACK OF THE CLONES is pretty awful -- but THE PHANTOM MENACE is a beautiful looking film with a bunch of terrific set-pieces and one of John Williams' best scores for the entire series. REVENGE OF THE SITH also has some great moments. It's uneven but I'd still prefer to watch it over any of the Disney films.

Lucas wanted to make them because he felt he had a story to tell. That's his deal, I have no problem with it, and he needn't apologize for it. The most important thing to me is whatever you think of the prequels, he didn't merely recycle the original movies from a story perspective, which is all Disney has done in lowering the bar and producing a bunch of films that have already devalued the entire franchise into something that's now "just another IP" in their stable of purchased product.

The only thing I wished he had done is not sell the franchise off to Disney. I'm sure in hindsight he feels the same, no matter how much money he took in. He could've kept the series and let others take their own crack at it, while retaining some semblance of supervisory control -- if anything it could've enabled another director to REALLY have the freedom to make their own Star Wars movie, which as we've seen with every one of these Disney films and how they do business, hasn't happened and won't ever.

 

I don't think George would have sold off Lucasfilm yet if the loonies in the Fandom had left him alone and hadn't spent a decade browbeating him for dare making movies that didn't meet their specifications. In addition he got remarried for the second time in 2014 and he became a dad again shortly thereafter. Given that Star Wars basically led to his first marriage breaking up and he had just turned 70, he likely made the decision to step away on his own.

Also,don't quote me on it,but I remember reading that Lucasfilm may have been struggling a bit financially around the mid 2010s,which may have influenced his decision to not only do a sequel trilogy after insisting Episode 3 and clone Wars was it in terms of new Star Wars cinematic product, but to sell the company.

I think the original plan was for he to actually make Episode VII himself and then hand off things to other people for VIII and IX and that included possibility selling the company during that time.
I think people forget that even though Disney owns Lucasfilm, Lucasfilm ,much like Marvel, is mostly autonomous. It was George who hired Kathy to succeed him and began the process of stepping away up to a year before the Disney sale. 90 percent of the people that were at Lucasfilm before the sale are still at the company. All the projects that came out of this last cycle of Star Wars films,including the sequels,Solo and Rogue one all originated from the last days of George's tenure.

Plus,had George sold out to another company,like,say, Warners or Paramount, I doubt the sequels would have turned out any better or different. Everyone involved on the creative side of things aside from George himself agreed that whatever form the sequels would take,it was going to be a more back to basics old school Star Wars approach and a conscious distancing from the prequels. The only fault that can be laid at Disney's feet is the fast tracked release dates on the films which put Kennedy and everyone else at Lucasfilm under pressure to deliver the films on a unreasonable time table. However,I doubt the sequels would have been that different ultimately whomever bought Lucasfilm, as nearly all creative decisions good and bad were made by Kennedy,and it was George who hired her.

 

I don't think that the timetable was all that unreasonable, Rise of Skywalker being the exception to the rule. I think people forget that these things were relayed. They didn't wait for Rogue One to be finished for Ryan Johnson to start developing The Last Jedi. I think this is part of the reason they came up with their original 3 director plan so that you wouldn't need to wait for a director to finish 1 film to start working on the next one. They did a Harry Potter film almost every year from 2001 to 2011 and no one ever said those were rushed or pondered if people were getting sick of Harry Potter. I guess they could have just written them all at once and made small changes where necessary but what can you do apart from doing better when it comes time to make X, XI, and XII

 

George hiring Kennedy is one of the biggest mistakes he ever made. She's done nothing but run the franchise into the ground and tried to use Star Wars as a platform to push her social views. It's amazing that she continues to drive off fans and yet still has so much power. It's baffling.

 

This is just my opinion So can be taken with a pinch of salt.
I still think the first three Star Wars Films were the best.
Even the special effects were more believable back then compared to what’s come since with all the expensive digital technologies.
I’ve still got my memories and original yellow ticket for the first Star Wars film at the Dominion Tottenham Court Road.

 

Take a look at her IMDb credits page.

If you have a similar list of credits,please let us know.

Plus she still is a good friend of George and she has long time relationships within the company that date back to her days co producing the Indiana Jones films.

Oh, and Lucasfilm under her stewardship made 4 movies that made over a billion dollars each without the aid of China's tallies, which pretty much never happens. Yes,Solo bombed and Episode IX fell slightly below expectations, but in general the films have been very successful from a financial standpoint. No,that's not all that matters to us fans,but that's honestly all Disney cares about at the end of the day.

And The Mandalorian was a HUGE hit. Produced by her.

Taking all of that into consideration, it's not hard to see how she got the job and how she keeps the job in spite of upset fans,most of whom have no background in film making,writing or running a studio.

If Disney made their decisions based only on what Star Wars fans think ,they might as well close down and liquidate Lucasfilm right now and give up,because ultimately "the fans" have no concrete idea of what they really want. If George spent his life trying to please the fans, then Star Wars would have been dead decades ago.

 

As with the Star Trek franchise, a minority of "fans" have been trying to make everyone think the opposite of reality lately. Never mind that 60-70% agree with the "social views" that the franchises take, they'll just pretend that they are "ruining the franchises". Not saying that the Disney movies are perfect, far from it. But they are, as a whole, much better than George's prequels. Especially for the wider audience, who maybe aren't Star Wars fanatics.

 

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What social views might those be?