In A Galaxy Far Far Away, In Three Years Time ..

As you might have heard, and indeed maybe even care, the Star Wars franchise has been sold to the Disney corporation, and almost immediately, plans for a further trilogy (or at least, an Episode VII) have been announced. Reaction from fanboys seems to be mixed, ranging from concern that the Death Star will now be run by the House Of Mouse - until very recently, they hadn't done The Muppets any favours - to cautious relief (George Lucas is only on as a 'creative consultant', which is as comestic a job description as anyone could hope for). I give it a week before some kids on YouTube provide us with some decent mash-ups where Lelia is singing Belle's song from Beauty And The Beast, while The Lion King's Scar can have a go at playing Vader.

What I have noticed is that people are already saying that it will only work if Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher and Harrison Ford are brought back to reprise their iconic roles. I can't help thinking that that would be a massive mistake, and a prime example of why you should never let the fanboys write their sci-fi, outside maybe Buffy slash fiction. Which obviously I know nothing about. Any future Star Wars movie that decides to concentrate on Han Solo and the gang is missing a massive trick. If Disney pull this off, they've got a franchise to match Bond for many years to come: the Star Wars mythos has the potential to be huge, infinite, even - countless planets, worlds, and even time - now that we've had three (admittedly poor) prequels, there's nothing to say that any of these films can't be set whenever or wherever in George Lucas' universe that you want. A new Star Wars film every four years or so can tangent off in many different directions, free of the constraints of having to follow the direct passage of the Skywalker saga. True, that might mean that you'd have to lose the iconic 'crawl' at the top of each film (the bit where you get a 'story so far' type of typeface), but that would be a small price to pay for the chance of creating a modern fairy story world of infinite adventures. And after the major bruising of Episodes 1, 2 and 3, it's a chance for fanboys to fall in love with Star Wars again.

I'm not the most rabid Star Wars fan in the world (I've only seen the movies), but I am aware that there's already a great deal of TV series and cartoons that already deal with the adventures of a multitude of characters and adventures that have nothing to do with the crew of the Falcon. I imagine that it's this approach that will serve the Disney Star Wars movies best. There's a chance, then, that each Star Wars movie can have an entirely different approach, director, location - and even cast. By sheer coincidence, about a hour before I heard the news, I was remembering that the trailer for Episode 1 attracted so much interest that it had to be shunted to after the films they were being screened with. It's great to think that - just possibly - the Star Wars films might finally be exciting again.

As long as they don't keep Jar Jar Binks.