Empire Strikes Back cowriter joins Abrams on Star Wars: Episode VII script | Hacker News Reader

Empire Strikes Back cowriter joins Abrams on Star Wars: Episode VII script

arstechnica.com

takes incisive Hacker News hat off, puts on hyperventilating fanboy hat.

HOLY SHIT.

incisive Hacker News hat is put back on.

I had pretty high hopes for Episode VII already, but this gives me a pretty good degree of confidence that it might actually turn out to be, y'know, really good. Kasdan has written or cowritten some of my favorite films of all time, and—ewoks notwithstanding—is unlikely to insert patently offensive alien races into the next Star Wars film.

Your comment about the Ewoks sent me to Google because I can't believe that Ewoks were Kasdan's idea

I found this interesting story about Kasdan petitioning for an "evil Ewok": http://www.kinnemaniac.com/2012/04/01/no-evil-ewoks-the-stra...

Edit: and I just noticed the date of the story. Blah, why did Google have it as the first result for Kasdan and Ewoks?

I really hope you're right about them not being his idea.

> Kasdan has written or cowritten some of my favorite films of all time

Usually what people did in the past is a very poor indication of what they'll do in the future. Numerous examples in the art industry of people being very good at one point of their lives and then doing shit forever after.

Sorry, but where do you come up with "usually"? Is that based on some kind of statistic? What people did in the past seems to be a pretty decent indicator of what they might do in the future...whereas when it isn't -- for example, Samuel Jackson in Pulp Fiction versus Samuel Jackson in Star Wars -- we naturally remember those instances, because failed expectations are quite memorable. But just because we remember all the times that airplanes crash into the ground doesn't mean that airplanes "usually" do so

Well, I don't know what you will take for a valid measure or observation, but for most film directors, their best movies are often considered to be their first few. The few last movies from Ridley Scott are pure crap compared to his first one. Same for Spielberg, Milos Forman, and so many others. They did their best work when they were hungry, starving to make a place for themselves. And let's not mention George Lucas, no, let's not.

It's certainly very close to be a "rule". Have you ever heard of the concept "Art from Adversity" ? This idea says that people give their best when they are challenged by others and their environment. They day they "get there" and make it big, they become lazy and stop fighting and end up having their way no matter what crap they produce.

PS: As for Samuel Jackson, I don't really like the guy because he's just too much into money and wants to put his face on every movie possible out there, but he can play very well some types of characters, just like the one you mentioned in Pulp Fiction. He's great when shouting and swearing. It was just very poor casting to put S. Jackson as a Jedi Master because he certainly lacks all the composure to pass as a calm, wise Jedi.

> Well, I don't know what you will take for a valid measure or observation

I think it's clear he wants numbers from someone who's actually studied this rather than going off intuition and anecdotes. That's because we have numerous cases where study has shown intuition is wrong, and going by what is memorable can give vastly different results than going by what is common.

Um....Not trying to be negative or put the partnership down, but sort of logically, isn't this a guy who one one hand (co)wrote the best of the original trilogy, but didn't see the coming evil of the worst of the trilogy? Which a naughty person might suggest he was basically lucky?

Cheekiness aside, it has to be a good thing that Abrams is smart enough to included a creative flavor from the originals. Kind of ego-less as well.

Have to say, I personally really like what he did to Star Trek, I like what he does in movies, so Im very interested to see what he does with Star Wars.

> I personally really like what he did to Star Trek

You mean the new ST movies where people rush and run the whole time from one place to another ? Where there's no time for thinking, silence and reflexion ?

I much preferred when Star Trek movies gave us space to ponder such timeless philosophical conundrums as, "What does god need with a starship?"[1]

[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYW_lPlekiQ

Yes, those ST movies.

According to his IMDB bio, Kasdan was not involved in the prequels.

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001410/?ref_=nv_sr_1

So how does that mean that he "didn't see the coming evil of the worst of the trilogy?" Or do you mean he was responsible for the Ewoks in Return of the Jedi?

Given that Lucas went on to do the two Ewok follow ups, which don't seem to be artistic classics, and then the prequels...whereas Kasdan on his own did the classic Body Heat...I think Kasdan can reasonably claim that the bad parts of Star Wars are not on him

The thing that really is frustrating is the phenomenon of nostalgia that tends to unfairly poison reboots or even continuations of treasured classics. Admittedly, sometimes the film makers work hard to ruin it themselves (Jar-Jar, CG monkeys, etc.), but it's hard to make a movie that will feel as good as those originals on first run. I think a key will be big action, sparse drama/politics, and lots of 'fan service' in the form of old character cameos that will almost force a smile onto our faces. Those three things are what made the Star Trek reboot so sucsseful IMHO.

beyond star wars he also wrote raiders of the lost arc and body heat. the man can tell a story. the only worrying part is that he hasn't made anything good in over 20 years

> he hasn't made anything good in over 20 years

Then he's a good pair for JJ. But apparently everyone here who comments seem to be huge JJ fanboys.

Abrams: I love you. Kasdan: I know.

My first reaction to this news was: "there is one screenwriter who was involved in writing Raiders of the Lost Ark, Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi?"...and he's still alive? what the hell has he been doing all this time and how badly did he piss off George Lucas to not be involved in the most recent Star Wars and Indiana Jones movies? Both Raiders and ESB have such wild adventure and such respect for the audience's intelligence that watching them today is still a revelation, even after seeing them dozens of times. I recently watched Avengers for the first time and was shocked at just how such a dull movie could make so much money...are our standards just lower? Are special effects too relied on to gloss over poor imagination? Or am I just getting really old, even though the original Star Wars movies were before my time? I felt the same way during Avatar...I couldn't believe that the same guy who wrote the sparse but brilliantly quotable dialogue of "Aliens" was behind Avatar's groanworthy one liners.

I hope Kasdan brings back the magic and that the reason why we don't see movies like ESB and Raiders anymore is because their screenwriter simply stopped writing them.

I remember Lucas wanting complete freedom to do his own thing. Cowriters would hold Lucas down, perhaps. It's just my speculation.

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