It’s a new era in blockbusters and we’re all trying to find out just what manner of new school blockbuster appeals to us. Maybe you’re a Marvel fan, maybe Fast and Furious, maybe you liked the new Jurassic World, maybe a combination of what’s being offered or just maybe you shun it all. Either way, a new selection is on the way as not only a new trilogy of Star Wars movies begins this December with Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens as well as the beginning of a series of standalone films, starting with Star Wars Anthology: Rogue One, releasing next year and shooting this summer.
We traditionally know what to expect from the Star Wars films, but now that franchise creator George Lucas has taken a backseat and sold Lucasfilm to Disney for nine gajillion dollars we may be getting a whole new galaxy far, far away as a new report concerning Rogue One arrives. JoBlo has a few tonal descriptions of what we can expect saying the Gareth Edwards-directed feature will be “darker and grittier” than any other Star Wars film to date, aiming to be much like an old school war film, a la Hamburger Hill. There will be new droids and some of the film will be set in the jungle and various battlefield locations.
Personally, while I’ve never played any of the Star Wars video games, from what I’ve seen of them they always looked much darker and more sinister than their cinematic counterparts. Perhaps the films will now be allowed to go down those alleyways. Of course, the Star Wars bread and butter are the toys and other merchandising, so they will likely still have to be a little kid friendly, but then again Jurassic World featured a fair amount of mauling so maybe today’s kids are a little more used to the blood and violence today’s PG-13 films are delivering.
In other Star Wars news, the vacated director’s chair on the other Star Wars spin-off feature, this one thought to be the story of the bounty hunter Boba Fett is up for grabs. Josh Trank (Fantastic Four) exited the chair not too long ago and The Wrap.com’s Jeff Sneider is now reporting previous Wonder Woman director, Michelle MacLaren, has met with Disney to discuss taking the helm. That film isn’t expected until 2018 so I won’t be surprised if nothing comes of this chatter any time soon.
