From the Ranch...

George apparently talked to the press yesterday. Not much we haven't heard before, but knowing Indy 5 is a possibility for now, and that there's an intentional girl-centric focus going on in Clone Wars... well, they're just nice reminders. Both from SciFi Wire:

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12:00 AM, 05-AUGUST-08
	Lucas: Indy V Research In Works George Lucas told SCI FI Wire that preliminary research has begun on a story for a possible fifth Indiana Jones movie, but added that such a film is one of dozens of potential projects currently crowding his schedule. "It sits on the shelf there as one of 50 projects that I have to deal with," Lucas said in an interview on Aug. 4 at his Big Rock Ranch in San Rafael, Calif., where he was promoting the upcoming computer-animated feature film Star Wars: The Clone Wars. "And if I can come up with a story ..." But, Lucas added, "it's very hard to come up with stories for that thing. You know, It's really impossible. Because it has to be real. It has to be something that actually happened. It has to be something people know about. It has to be supernatural. It's a really difficult research project. Which they're researching now. You know, and last time it took 14 years. So ... " Lucas was referring to this summer's fourth Indiana Jones film, subtitled The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, which was in development for more than a decade before the pieces finally came together. In recent press interviews, Lucas has said that the three principals--himself, director Steven Spielberg and star Harrison Ford--all have to agree on the idea for a fifth film in order to move forward. He has also said that Spielberg is more amenable to the idea of a further installment than he was last time around. Star Wars: The Clone Wars opens Aug. 15. --Patrick Lee, News Editor

12:00 AM, 05-AUGUST-08
	Clone Wars' New Girls In Town George Lucas, executive producer of the upcoming animated Star Wars: The Clone Wars movie, told reporters that the film features two female characters new to the movie franchise: Ahsoka Tano, the new padawan learner of Anakin Skywalker, and Asajj Ventress, a dark sorceress and apprentice to the nefarious Count Dooku. "I wanted to develop a character that would help Anakin settle down," Lucas said about Ahsoka in a news conference at his Big Rock Ranch in San Rafael, Calif., on Aug. 4. Lucas added: "At the end of Episode II, [Anakin's] kind of a wild child, and he and Obi-Wan don't get along. So the idea was to see how they become friends, how they become partners, how they become a team. And ... one of the ways to do that ... Because when you become a parent, when you become a teacher, you have to sort of become more responsible. You know, it forces you into this adulthood thing. So what I wanted to do was take Anakin and force him into this kind of, 'now I have to teach somebody. Now I have to be slightly more responsible.'" Ahsoka is a teenage orange-skinned Togruta girl who is assigned by Yoda to serve under Anakin as the Clone Wars worsen. The story is set between the events of Star Wars: Episode II--Attack of the Clones and Episode III--Revenge of the Sith. Lucas said he looked to his own experience as a father in coming up with Ahsoka's storyline. "I happen to have a couple daughters, so I have a lot of experience with that particular situation," Lucas said. "And I said, 'Rather than making it another guy, why don't we make her a girl? Because that's fun, and I have a lot of girls, and they're just as hard to deal with when they're teenagers as boys are.'" Dave Filoni, director of The Clone Wars, added that Ventress was a character originally conceived for Episode II who has existed for a while in the Star Wars expanded universe. "There was the idea that maybe the Sith apprenticed a new one after Darth Maul, [and that she] would be a girl," Filoni said in the same news conference. "That got abandoned eventually in favor of Count Dooku and Christopher Lee's character. But the concept art existed. And the comic books and novels on the Clone Wars before had utilized that character, that concept art, and created this new character, Asajj Ventress. So when it came time to develop the idea of The Clone Wars as a series, we thought, 'Well, that's a big fan favorite character. Let's draw her out.'" Filoni added that the two characters balance each other out in the new movie. "It just so happens that we introduced Ahsoka at the same time," he said. "So here you had these two new girls coming into this story at the same time, which was actually, there's kind of an advantage to it, because you had one that's the apprentice of Anakin Skywalker trying to be trained in the traditional ways of a Jedi, and you had one that's the hidden apprentice of Count Dooku, who was the evil opposite end, so that actually works really nicely for the stories we're trying to tell." Star Wars: The Clone Wars opens Aug. 15. --Patrick Lee, News Editor

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Also on starwars.com

and BBC (with video)

George Lucas on Charlie Rose 9/9/04

Not sure if I've posted this ever before here, but it's well worth posting again. A classic conversation between two beautiful minds; Charlie Rose talks to George Lucas (58 minutes).

On "Red Tails"

George has been talking about this for a long time, and over at Yahoo News we get a little glimpse at what may be up and coming:

"Producer Rick McCallum said both elements are addressed in a script by John Ridley that "balances difficult and painful issues with what is, at its heart, the story of men with a dream to fly and serve their country."

Lucas hopes to begin shooting by year's end or early 2009, McCallum said. The movie's title refers to the color of their fighter planes' tails, which were distinctive and allowed U.S. bomber crews to know they were being escorted by the aggressive Tuskegee Airmen.

"It is a story of incredible adventure and enormous courage," said the producer, who's scouting locations for "Red Tails" in Prague, Czech Republic, and Italy. "I think the story will speak to anyone who has ever wanted to succeed at something others told them was impossible.""

No news is still no news. Lucas' live-action not so active atm...

Every once in awhile we get a little nip of info about the Star Wars TV shows. Slowly but surely, Clone Wars is coming along, and the live action show is creeping in behind it. It's just so painful to think that it will probably be several or more years until the live-action show comes to our TV screens - but then again, when it finally gets here, perhaps because so much time will have passed since the last Star Wars film, we will feel a similar nostalgia for the prequels as we have/had for the original trilogy.

Here's the lates nip of info, from the LA Times. Snifters optional (I prefer straight out of the bottle meself):

George Lucas planning 'Star Wars' TV series

"Filmmaker George Lucas said Tuesday that he has "just begun work" on a live-action television series rooted in the "Star Wars" universe, which is huge news not just for fans of the science-fiction epic but also for networks looking for a piece of the Lucas magic that has grossed $4.3 billion in theaters worldwide...

... That model (the upcoming animated Clone Wars series) may also be used for the live-action show, although producer Rick McCallum said Tuesday that it's too early to say. McCallum is interviewing writers for the live-action series.

Lucas is confident he can find a home for his droids and Jedi, but he also knows the projects are unorthodox enough to give network executives pause."

- By Geoff Boucher, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
October 17, 2007


That's why I think us fans need to encourage George to create his own gorram television network. Are ya with me?


Yeah, I borrowed this pic from the article. Love it!



A couple more niblets for your giblets, thanks to Club Jade:

EW.com from Oct. 12 reports on Lucas search for writers

and...
This awesome insideskywalkerranch.com link <--- so amazing I had to borrow a yodacon from starwars.com! (hey - that rhymes)

Double Star Wars whammy!

Sure, there's always something going on in Star Wars news, but a few recent news items are of particular interest... at least to me.


Interviews with George Lucas: Clone Wars and Star Wars TV

Posted on TV Guide.com yesterday, September 18, 2007, this interview with George has some Indy IV news tidbits, Fog City Mavericks stuff, and promises a continuing interview with the Maker for Thursday (yeay!):

George Lucas shares an in-depth update on the two upcoming Star Wars TV series and laments the loss of one of his favorite TV programs.

Details from the rest of the interview are already out (see video at end of this post). Due to air by the fall of 2008, The Clone Wars series already has 40 completed episodes, but because of its adult content and action the show still doesn't have a network behind it. Lucas says "Clone Wars has to air after 9pm and it can't be on a kids channel".

Script writing for the live action show will begin next month (still planned to air by fall 2009 supposedly). We'll be seeing stormtroopers but no Jedi, as well as little or no Vader and Sid.

BUT - Word has been scrambling around the web that Disney was picking up the Clone Wars scent: The Mouse Courts George Lucas - Looks like the adult content may not make the Disney cut though. *fans self*

The Force Unleashed

Remember the hype a few months ago about that nagging issue of when we were gonna get a lightsaber game for the Wii? Well, Lucasfilm teased us with word that they were thinking about it, and they themselves have already played it. Hmph! Turns out, it was for Force Unleashed! The PC gamers are a little miffed that there is no word on a release for that platform. Maybe with news of the new rumble PS3 remote, they'll make saber wand remotes just for this game! Pweeze? Either that, or I'll have to break down and try and get a Wii :(

Weird. At the time of writing this entry, I have G4's X-Play on in the background (way to multi-task!) and they just now came on with their special all Star Wars tribute episode featuring Morgan in Jedi robes and Adam as Lando with a battalion of stormies, and a talk with Hayden Blackman - project leader for TFU. Yep... KOTOR is still the best ever. That is, until TFU rears it's ugly head. If I find a video cast of this X-Play episode, I'll be posting it! It's a rerun from march '07, and you can see a lot of the video clips if you go to the site and surf for Star Wars video.

Ah - check out the G4 news from The Feed below for a report on most of the above mentioned news by the lovely Kristin Holt - includes word about the new Mass Effect game too (Star Wars relevance = Drew Karpyshyn of KOTOR and Darth Bane fame is a lead writer for BioWare and the Mass Effect game)



And speaking of Drew K, here's a nice little update from the man himself about progress on the Bane sequel, tentatively titled "Rule of Two", to be released this December... we hope :)

I live in San Fransisco. I'm not part of the film industry.

George Lucas speaks! I actually posted the highlights from this up-close and personal with George this spring, highlights which pertained mostly to his discussion of the new digital technology being developed for next-next gen gaming for Lucasarts. This was all a product of George's appearance at The Wall Street Journal's D: All things Digital annual tech and media conference for 2007.

*clicky* Now, that appearance is available to view in all it's glorious 54 minutes, as archived by the D website *clicky*.

George talks about much more than his recent digital revolution. This one is long but really, really, really, really worth the view. Heck, some of the other attendees of the conference are prolly worth a watch too (Jobs and Gates together for example), but I'm still busy absorbing George's words :)

There's no embed function for that video - you'll have to watch via the provided link, so instead I bring you a fat cat playing Jabba, who can't spell wookiee

BTW - This is some random internet cat and it ain't mine. If it were, my wookiee, Thunder, would've taken care of it long ago :p

Digital Molecular Matter by Pixelux

Too cool...(original article)