Star Wars: George Lucas was disappointed in The Force Awakens
Were you disappointed in Star Wars: The Force Awakens? You’re not alone. George Lucas was too.
Star Wars: The Force Awakens being too much like A New Hope was a common complaint when the movie came out in 2015. Turns out, fans weren’t the only ones to think so.
George Lucas, the creator of Star Wars, “didn’t hide his disappointment” over the movie, according to Disney CEO Bob Iger.
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In his new book, The Ride of a Lifetime: Lessons Learned from 15 Years as CEO of the Walt Disney Company, Iger talks about Lucas’ feelings on The Force Awakens. The book came out on Monday and Comicbook.com captured the quotes from it.
Here’s what Iger wrote:
"“In each of the films in the original trilogy, it was important to him to present new worlds, new stories, new characters, and new technologies. In this one, he said, “There weren’t enough visual or technical leaps forward.” He wasn’t wrong, but he also wasn’t appreciating the pressure we were under to give ardent fans a film that felt quintessentially Star Wars.”X"
There are a few things notable in there. Obviously, the first is Lucas’s disappointment. It was the same feeling a lot of fans had after seeing the movie. It was certainly a topic of conversation for me afterward as well.
Everything felt as though we had seen it before and that’s because we did in A New Hope. But that didn’t stop many fans from enjoying the film and feeling excited for things to come.
I feel the more telling line is with Iger trying to justify Disney’s position.
He writes:
"“We’d intentionally created a world that was visually and tonally connected to the earlier films, to not stray too far from what people loved and expected, and George was criticizing us for the very thing we were trying to do.”"
The difference that Iger fails to connect with is Star Wars has been about these great new worlds, with fabulous new places and characters. It’s lets our imagination run wild with all that could happen in a galaxy far, far away. It’s about letting little kids dream big about princesses and scoundrels and everyone in between.
Trying too hard to connect those worlds is one of the biggest failings of the sequel trilogy. Rather than let imaginations run wild, it tried too hard to connect it with what came before that it felt too similar.
We love Star Wars for the newness of it, the bold and compelling stories. Not because it’s a rehash of what we’ve seen before.
I get Lucas’ disappointment. Any Star Wars can. That doesn’t mean you have to hate the sequel trilogy. I don’t. I do have some complaints and being too similar to the original trilogy is one of them.
Having said that, I’m still excited for The Rise of Skywalker. At this point, I’m invested in the characters and want to see how it all ends.
Next. The best parts of General Hux’s story aren’t in the movies. dark
What do you think of George Lucas’ disappointment of The Force Awakens?