Prior to the release of Star Wars: The Last Jedi it was announced that director Rian Johnson would be hanging around the galaxy far, far away to spearhead a brand new trilogy. Now he's spoken about how that came about. While one might have thought that Johnson had some sort of fantastic idea for a brand new trilogy that wow'd the executives at Disney, it turns out that's not really the case. The director says he simply pitched Kathleen Kennedy on the idea of a new trilogy that dealt with a new story. That was it. According to Johnson...
My entire pitch to Kathleen Kennedy and Disney was, 'Let's tell a new Star Wars story. Let's tell one story over three movies, where we go new places and meet new people. It's a brand new story that feels like a great Star Wars story.' That was the extent of it. I didn't pitch an idea or a time or anything like that. It was just bright blue sky to tell a new story in, and they were so excited about it. Honestly, I've been the rigamarole of releasing this movie so I'm just starting to form clusters of ideas for the trilogy, but really the most exciting thing right now is the potential of it.
We knew that there would be a lot more Star Wars coming after this first trilogy, but beyond a couple of spinoffs, that became Rogue One and Solo, we haven't had any idea what's actually happening. As it turns out, we still don't, as Rian Johnson tells Wired he didn't actually have an idea for a new Star Wars trilogy, he just wanted to make one.
Without any specific idea or plan, one assumes that Disney decided to move forward with the idea based simply on the fact that they were happy with Star Wars: The Last Jedi and wanted to continue working with Rian Johnson. So far, that faith appears to have been well placed, as The Last Jedi has been receiving overwhelmingly positive reviews and had the second best box office opening of all time.
With no plan in place for the new trilogy, literally any idea is possible right now. Rian Johnson says he's just starting to come up with ideas that might eventually form the basis of the new trilogy. We could see a story that takes place during the events of an existing Star Wars movie, but has no actual connection to them. We could see something set in the far past or future. It could be a movie about Jedi or it could be a movie that doesn't even mention them.
While we're always looking for interesting rumors that might pan out, it seems that in this case there won't be any for a while, as even the guy in charge doesn't know what these movies will be. We'll certainly be watching this new trilogy as it develops.
