Live-Action Star Wars Series

[Palanan]

According to this news release (http://www.starwars.com/news/jon-favreau-to-executive-produce-write-live-action-star-wars-series) from yesterday, Jon Favreau has signed on to write and direct a live-action Star Wars series, which will apparently be a flagship show for their streaming service. No release date yet.

We’ve been hearing about a possible live-action series for years upon years, but it seems Disney is finally going ahead with it. I’m personally hoping it takes place in some other era in the Star Wars timeline, but I’ll take more Incom T-65s if that’s what they give me. :smalltongue:

[Darth Credence]

I would actually love to see them take the better parts of the X-Wing novels and comics and make them into a series. But, that might be a bit budget heavy for a TV show.
After that, I would love to see a series set during the Hyperspace War, with Sith and Jedi battling it out across the galaxy. Again, though, might be hard on the budget.
My best choice that may not be hard on the budget would be a story about the underworld on Coruscant during the Dark Times.

[Cikomyr]

I would actually love to see them take the better parts of the X-Wing novels and comics and make them into a series. But, that might be a bit budget heavy for a TV show.
After that, I would love to see a series set during the Hyperspace War, with Sith and Jedi battling it out across the galaxy. Again, though, might be hard on the budget.
My best choice that may not be hard on the budget would be a story about the underworld on Coruscant during the Dark Times.

Do Tales of Nar Shadda, with crime bosses, corrupt Imperial authorities, infiltrated rebels, hiding Jedis, brave smugglers, etc..

[Darth Credence]

Sounds good to me, Cikomyr. I think you could absolutely do that on a streaming budget and make for an incredible show.

[Peelee]

Do Tales of Nar Shadda, with crime bosses, corrupt Imperial authorities, infiltrated rebels, hiding Jedis, brave smugglers, etc..

Oh man, if they did a series like the Coruscant Nights series, that would be fantastic!

[Cikomyr]

Sounds good to me, Cikomyr. I think you could absolutely do that on a streaming budget and make for an incredible show.


Oh man, if they did a series like the Coruscant Nights series, that would be fantastic!

I think using the Expanse as a model for layered scale storytelling would also be a good idea. You can afford to talk about the Grand Stories of Heroes, Generals and Knights, while also telling the story of the lowest of the low.

[Mechalich]

Favreau's a trustworthy name for this sort of thing. He's also highly experienced - most obviously for Jungle Book - with conducting all the action on a sound stage and filling out the rest with CGI. I suspect that will be the approach taken here, it's the only way to make the math work. You get 10 million per episode to make a high-budget high-production value TV show like Westworld or The Crown. You get 15 million per episode to make a later-season episode of Game of Thrones (but only a madman would bet on being a cultural phenomenon in that vein). So, space battles will necessarily be extremely limited and may not happen at all, but it's Star Wars so the show has to be combat focused. Lightsabers are expensive (both in terms of effects and because fight training and fight choreography for real actors as opposed to animated figures isn't cheap) so I'd imagine you'd want to keep Jedi (and Sith) to a minimum.

You also want this show to tie-in to the existing Star Wars TV fanbase. Star Wars Rebels is set shortly before the OT (and I guess Rogue One too). You could go even closer and fill in the origin of that time frame. Heck, if you wanted you could even use the very same guys who formed the Rogue Squad during Rogue One. A story of a group of rebel commandos - who would naturally rub shoulders with Bounty Hunters, weird aliens, leftover Jedi, etc. - seems like a logical place to go. That also allows the series to have an Imperial villain, which matters since pretty much all the good Star Wars villains have been part of an Empire.

Still, this is a challenging thing to push. A large portion of the fanbase wants crazy lightsaber battles - previous Star Wars TV has delivered plenty of animated ones - and unless you can find some way to deliver that on a budget you'd better have a great story and characters to draw an audience.

[Rakaydos]

Lightsabers are expensive (both in terms of effects and because fight training and fight choreography for real actors as opposed to animated figures isn't cheap) so I'd imagine you'd want to keep Jedi (and Sith) to a minimum.

Still, this is a challenging thing to push. A large portion of the fanbase wants crazy lightsaber battles - previous Star Wars TV has delivered plenty of animated ones - and unless you can find some way to deliver that on a budget you'd better have a great story and characters to draw an audience.

Something Star Wars hasnt really explored, though... a single actor with a consistent fighting style over more than 5 hours of screentime (cough AotC/RotS) might save on fight training, especially if you chose the actor for already being a swordsman in the first place.

Having one guy be "the lightsaber guy" and a reccuring nemisis that you cant kill because you'd need to train a new actor to swordfight might be an interesting dynamic.

Especially if it's a taipani noble who isnt actually a force user.

[hamishspence]

Having one guy be "the lightsaber guy" and a reccuring nemisis that you cant kill because you'd need to train a new actor to swordfight might be an interesting dynamic.

Especially if it's a taipani noble who isnt actually a force user.

There's been a strong theme of "You need the Force to assemble a lightsaber that will work" in the newcanon - with the implication that they can't just be mass-produced in factories.

That said, weapons that fill a similar niche, capable even of parrying lightsabers, do seem to exist, that weren't build by Jedi - staffs used by Grievous's bodyguard droids, for example.

And those energy weapons used as traps in the TCW episode The Box, look very much like orange lightsabers covered in lightning.

So, if there's "non-Force User energy sword wielders" in the newcanon, they might use those rather than "true" lightsabers, if they want to recanonize the saber rakes of the Tapani Sector.

[Bohandas]

According to this news release (http://www.starwars.com/news/jon-favreau-to-executive-produce-write-live-action-star-wars-series) from yesterday, Jon Favreau has signed on to write and direct a live-action Star Wars series, which will apparently be a flagship show for their streaming service. No release date yet.

I like the idea of a live action Star Wars series but honestly I'd rather see Disney's streaming service fail than this succeed, so I'm not going to be subscribing to watch it.

[Hopeless]

I wonder if they'll restrict it to their streaming service like cbs did to star trek discovery?
So maybe 13 episode season or less?
Will they do a Clone wars style movie pilot to encourage interest?

Tapani?

It's been a long time since that's been mentioned!😮

Be a good idea instead of having Jedi popping up everywhere!

[Cikomyr]

I like the idea of a live action Star Wars series but honestly I'd rather see Disney's streaming service fail than this succeed, so I'm not going to be subscribing to watch it.

Eh. If the show is good enough... CBS managed to prove that people will subscribe.

If the show is good enough. DIS was right off the bat, so they managed to hsve a material number of subscription.

[Peelee]

There's been a strong theme of "You need the Force to assemble a lightsaber that will work" in the newcanon - with the implication that they can't just be mass-produced in factories.

That said, weapons that fill a similar niche, capable even of parrying lightsabers, do seem to exist, that weren't build by Jedi - staffs used by Grievous's bodyguard droids, for example.

And those energy weapons used as traps in the TCW episode The Box, look very much like orange lightsabers covered in lightning.

So, if there's "non-Force User energy sword wielders" in the newcanon, they might use those rather than "true" lightsabers, if they want to recanonize the saber rakes of the Tapani Sector.
Ya know, you make a good point... Why have lightsabers be this special and locked away thing when the universe offers up "basically lightsabers" anyway? Imean, back in the Old Republic, it made sense. KOTOR needed a reason for your weapon to not go through everything. But when there's one Jedi and two lightsabers around, it seems more than a bit silly to say, "only super special characters can have these weapons. Everyone else can have weapons that function anywhere from similarly to exactly like them, but they can't have specifically those weapons."

Eh. If the show is good enough... CBS managed to prove that people will subscribe.

Yes, I will certainly.... subscribe.

[Darth Ultron]

The thing is, for a TV show, you need it to be about ''something'' and it needs to be a lot less Epic then the movies.

The basic idea of Star Wars:Firefly would work. The basic idea of a group of misfits flying around the galaxy in a ship looking for credits and fun. You have the beyond obvious characters:

*Ham Salad-A young, likeable rogue captain
*Morg-half man, half dog, Ham's best friend(and his own best friend)
*Princess Buttercup-a pretty young princess on the run
*Techy-a likeable, but awkward tech person
*Mr. Robot-he is a robot
*Darkman-his skin is darker then the others.

Course you might also want to have: The Last girl (secret) Jedi, the wise janitor, Beat Box 1999, Ice Pirate McFlurry, and Dr. Smith(the secret Imperial Spy).

And each episode would just a a stand alone 'wacky adventure'. You could start them on a well known place like Tattonne, and then have them blast off into the black of the rest of the galaxy. And you could keep it ''generic'' enough to be ''any time''. Though you most likely want to do it between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope.

You likely want to avoid having the show locked into one location. So Corsacount CSI woun't work, nor would Dagoboth Swamp People.

[Peelee]

The thing is, for a TV show, you need it to be about ''something'' and it needs to be a lot less Epic then the movies.

The basic idea of Star Wars:Firefly would work. The basic idea of a group of misfits flying around the galaxy in a ship looking for credits and fun. You have the beyond obvious characters:

*Ham Salad-A young, likeable rogue captain
*Morg-half man, half dog, Ham's best friend(and his own best friend)
*Princess Buttercup-a pretty young princess on the run
I, too, enjoyed Spaceballs.

[Mando Knight]

There's been a strong theme of "You need the Force to assemble a lightsaber that will work" in the newcanon - with the implication that they can't just be mass-produced in factories.
You need the Force to make a lightsaber, but anyone can learn to wield it (see Grievous, as well as the various Mandalorians that have wielded the Darksaber).

You likely want to avoid having the show locked into one location. So Corsacount CSI woun't work, nor would Dagoboth Swamp People.
Sets are extremely expensive to build. If the cast will be doing a lot of traveling, expect them to spend a lot of time in re-used sets, whether pulled from the movies or purpose-built for the show's long-term use.

[Jayngfet]

Counterpoint: Props, costumes, and green screen had gone a long way. Legends of Tomorrow is shot all in one city but the show is a different location basically every episode. While a lot of those sets amount to "vague hilly forest" Disney can and does do a lot with that same budget in that same city.

A basic effect like a lightsaber won't actually set a show back by that much and half the episode will be on a spaceship anyway. By this point the actual practicals of DOING Star Wars on a tv budget are decades proven. While the formats limitations must no doubt be considered, a lot of it will come down to basic ideas and concepts.

[Mechalich]

Counterpoint: Props, costumes, and green screen had gone a long way. Legends of Tomorrow is shot all in one city but the show is a different location basically every episode. While a lot of those sets amount to "vague hilly forest" Disney can and does do a lot with that same budget in that same city.

I would expect the lion's share of Star Wars live action to be shot on a soundstage with CGI backdrops in some district that has significant tax incentives (like British Columbia). GoT spends a huge pile of cash hauling a massive cast and crew around various places in Europe to help promote a sense of gritty realism that is totally unnecessary for Star Wars.


A basic effect like a lightsaber won't actually set a show back by that much and half the episode will be on a spaceship anyway. By this point the actual practicals of DOING Star Wars on a tv budget are decades proven. While the formats limitations must no doubt be considered, a lot of it will come down to basic ideas and concepts.

I wouldn't say they're as proven as you think. Most science fiction/space fantasy shows of the past have either taken major budget-reducing steps or had real problems sustaining themselves in the face of budget. Even highly popular shows like Firefly, Farscape, and most recently Dark Matter have been canceled. Star Trek Discovery is the biggest point of comparison, and we simply don't have enough data to say how viable that really will be yet, especially since CBS is clearly using the show as a loss-leader for their subscription service.

Lightsabers themselves aren't expensive. Lightsaber combat on the other hand is. Doing lightsaber combat means training the crew and your leaders to fight with those weird carbon-fiber rods they use and then doing a lot of high-end combat choreography including serious stunts because force-users. It can be done on a TV budget: Into the Badlands has exactly the fight know-how that a Star Wars series would need, but there are limitations. That show has a Hong Kong stunt crew, specifically chose actors who can do the stunts, and seems to spend pretty much all its money on fights since pretty much everything else about the show is ridiculous. So it's a matter of where you want to spend you money.

One highly effective trick that Star Wars TV can deploy is the use of concealing armor. If all your lightsaber-using characters (and just melee combatants generally if you want to break out the vibroswords and electrostaffs) wear helmets or masks you can switch the actors out for dedicated stunt performers and save a huge amount of time and money. Several members of the Inquisitorious - the ideal lightsaber wielding villain - wore helmets in Rebels, so that's a good option.


A broader question here, I think, is how you want the new show to relate to Rebels. For instance, do you want to use any of those characters? Expand on any unfinished plots? Or do you want to make a series that is wholly disassociated from that one, and TCW, and takes place in a completely new timeframe? I imagine Favreau wants to do his own thing, but his Marvel experience seems to indicate that he plays well with others and with larger integrated franchises so I could seem him wanting to pull in something existing if it seemed likely to goose interest.

[Clertar]

I would just say: use miniatures. The flying cars and spaceships in The Fifth Element look sooo much better than the CGI crap in Attack of the Clones.

[Jayngfet]

A broader question here, I think, is how you want the new show to relate to Rebels. For instance, do you want to use any of those characters? Expand on any unfinished plots? Or do you want to make a series that is wholly disassociated from that one, and TCW, and takes place in a completely new timeframe? I imagine Favreau wants to do his own thing, but his Marvel experience seems to indicate that he plays well with others and with larger integrated franchises so I could seem him wanting to pull in something existing if it seemed likely to goose interest.

I'm gonna say they'll be mostly unrelated. Hera is essentially spoken for until the civil war ends now and after that point is otherwise occupied by dealing with Jacen. Sabine likewise has her own stuff to attend to in the epilogue. You could maybe do Zeb but he'd translate awfully to live action. Expect maybe a cameo or one guest appearance and that's it. Even then Filoni strikes me as the kind of man who likes to keep track of his own threads. The only real character he never did much with in Rebels was Zaire Leonis, who was built to be handed off anyway. The only TCW characters getting a lot of play outside his works are the ones created by Lucas or Tartakovsky that he just worked with.

Rebels is low budget and low ratings. There just is not that much meat on the bone left. It has a limited cast and limited episode count.

[Anonymouswizard]

You're all missing the simple solution.

Ewoks reboot! Nerd rage incoming in 3, 2, 1...,

[Cikomyr]

You're all missing the simple solution.

Ewoks reboot! Nerd rage incoming in 3, 2, 1...,

The R-rated violent series we all have been waiting for

The story of the Imperial Contingent left trapped on Endor, slowly being tracked and violently murdered by the pintsize cannibald

[Clertar]

I'd like to see them try to out-klingon Discovery's klingons with the ewoks.

[Peelee]

I'd like to see them try to out-klingon Discovery's klingons with the ewoks.
Samesies!!

http://www.reactiongifs.com/r/2013/11/yump.gif

[Darth Ultron]

Sets are extremely expensive to build. If the cast will be doing a lot of traveling, expect them to spend a lot of time in re-used sets, whether pulled from the movies or purpose-built for the show's long-term use.

This is really true of most TV shows.

In general, for a TV show, you want to cut down on the super fancy and expensive special effects. So even if you have a main cast Jedi character, you'd only want them flashing around the lightsaber every couple of episodes. And the same is true for lots of flashy high tech stuff.

In a general sense, classic Star Wars at least, goes for more the subtle effects. Things like Shields are unseen, as opposed to say Star Trek that has all sorts of Shield pyrotechnics.


A broader question here, I think, is how you want the new show to relate to Rebels. For instance, do you want to use any of those characters? Expand on any unfinished plots? Or do you want to make a series that is wholly disassociated from that one, and TCW, and takes place in a completely new timeframe? I imagine Favreau wants to do his own thing, but his Marvel experience seems to indicate that he plays well with others and with larger integrated franchises so I could seem him wanting to pull in something existing if it seemed likely to goose interest.

Lets hope they just ignore the Kidz Rebel cartoon. Chances are they will want the live action TV show to at least be ''TV14", so they have have typical teen drama stuff like the Star Wars WB. And they won't want to ''force'' people to watch the cartoon. And you sure don't want to use them characters and plots.

And in general, most people when making a show want to do their own things and not just copy/barrow stuff from others.


Other then Star Wars Firefly, the other obvious show would be Star Wars Rebellion. You would focus on a small squad of a-team rebels, ''Rogue Two'', or maybe even go all the way to the ''new'' timeline and have the rebels there(so they would be Rogue One 2.0).

After that....well, there are stories, but if you get too ''focused'' it won't feel like ''Star Wars'' to some.

Like you could do a Bounty Hunter show: with a likeable rogue mostly good bounty hunter. Or you could do a hiding Jedi; or even a 'new' force user that hides their power.

It might be fun to do an Empire Star Wars show...but that would really need to be rated R and not for the kidz, so it's unlikely to get made.

A drioid based show could be fun: the 'life' of Droid WD-40. and the fun bit with a droid main character is they can be around for like 200 years. So WD-40 can have fought in the Clone Wars, the battle of Hoth, and that red sand planet in Star Wars 8.

[Jayngfet]

This is really true of most TV shows.

In general, for a TV show, you want to cut down on the super fancy and expensive special effects. So even if you have a main cast Jedi character, you'd only want them flashing around the lightsaber every couple of episodes. And the same is true for lots of flashy high tech stuff.

In a general sense, classic Star Wars at least, goes for more the subtle effects. Things like Shields are unseen, as opposed to say Star Trek that has all sorts of Shield pyrotechnics.


I'll see that and refer you back to an average CW superhero show. Those budgets and formats are pretty typical for a show of their genre and they usually have VFX driven hero fights multiple times and episode. Some of them will be a bit slower or less elaborate, but they'll be there. For the centrepiece of their new platform, Lucasfilm and Disney will spare absolutely no expense for the first season, especially since the first season is typically when producers tend to have more financial control of where money goes due to union rules requiring people be paid more as seasons go by.

For their big sexy frontrunner I fully expect they'll throw in Star Destroyers, Lightsabers, X-Wings, and the whole nine yards. The actual planets will no doubt mostly look like a backlot on the west coast, but they won't skimp out on the action simply because their entire business model is oriented around this whole thing. They'll instead orient it around a few actors they can reliably do stunts for and have a handful of episodes be a bit slower paced, but you can fully expect a shootout or a duel in most, if not all of the first season episodes.

[FilipePassosCoe]

Star Wars Ragtag, as Live-Action. pick up the game project that Visceral and Amy Hennig left and make that the whole deal. AND NO JEDI! We could do with a more mature Altered-Carbon vibe of a show, with bounty hunters, detectives, rogue traders, the scum and villainy we love (through in some nods to the 1313 project as well).

[Anonymouswizard]

Star Wars Ragtag, as Live-Action. pick up the game project that Visceral and Amy Hennig left and make that the whole deal. AND NO JEDI! We could do with a more mature Altered-Carbon vibe of a show, with bounty hunters, detectives, rogue traders, the scum and villainy we love (through in some nods to the 1313 project as well).

So.... you want the main character to have a complete 180 degree turn from their views in the original media? Isn't that The Last Jedi? By the way, no hyphen, both the book and the series are Altered Carbon.

I mean, I'm still 100% planning on watching Altered Carbon once I get Netflix access, but from everything I've heard about what was done with Kovacs I'm going to loathe new version of the character, whereas the book version is somebody I could both love and despise.

I mean, if you want a good cyberpunk-style series, there's lots of potential in the world for that. Take Neuromancer, Snow Crash, and Altered Carbon, throw in a blender, season to taste, and spread over 12 episodes. You could do a really cool story based on a cyberheist (as in Neuromancer), or a corporate executive trying to do something too illegal, or the government trying to enforce intellectual property laws. To the point where if they tried to do a Star Wars story like that I'd get annoyed because it's holding back the cyberpunk.

[Darth Ultron]

I'd love to watch Star Wars:Scoundrels.

A dark, mature, hard core Star Wars show rated R/X/MA, on HBO, Starz or Cinemax. One little kidz under 18 could ever, ever, ever watch. Spartacus or Banshee are good examples of the type of show it could be.

Ah, well, I can dream....

[Peelee]

New theory: Darth Ultron is a kid under 18.

[Anonymouswizard]

I'd love to watch Star Wars:Scoundrels.

A dark, mature, hard core Star Wars show rated R/X/MA, on HBO, Starz or Cinemax. One little kidz under 18 could ever, ever, ever watch. Spartacus or Banshee are good examples of the type of show it could be.

Ah, well, I can dream....

Such a project would probably flop, because many people wouldn't see it as Star Wars.


To explain my view, the easiest way to explain it is to use The Last Jedi, and the Prequel Trilogy. To me Star Wars is old school space opera, with grand heroes and epic plots. It's not that I dislike dark or adult science fiction, I praise the Night's Dawn trilogy like it's the perfect space opera a lot (it's not, there's a lot of problems), it's that when I think of Star Wars I'm thinking of something that even during it's dark moments is heroic and epic. The Prequel Trilogy might have changed a lot in the tone and universe, but it was still about these larger than life heroes and always gave the hope that it would be sorted out (ignoring the fact that we know the Empire rises, of course). TLJ abandoned the heroes being big epic heroes in favour of making one character's sideplot entirely pointless to the resolution of the story (and actually stopped the one epic hero moment that was going to happen), and despite it's attempts had an ending that comes off as completely hopeless (sure Poe, talk about burning the first order down with about twenty people on a starship).

Not that I couldn't take a serious Star Wars story, but it would have to be space opera. I don't see this desire to make Star Wars dark and gritty when we can just make new space operas, or heck adapt the Night's Dawn books into a TV series (writing the script for such a thing would probably be my dream project, even though I don't really have the skills for it). I mean, I'm considering rewriting a Space Opera novel I'm stuck with into a radio drama format, I honestly think it might fit better.

@Peelee: honestly wouldn't surprise me.

[Rogar Demonblud]

My honest opinion is that they'll use this series to fill in some gaps between the OT and the ST. Might as well support the new movies, right?

[Darth Ultron]

Such a project would probably flop, because many people wouldn't see it as Star Wars.

True, but it can also save the franchise.

They can keep the Star Wars for kidz, but also have the Star Wars Dark.

I agree classic Star Wars was all Epic old school space opera. And there is nothing wrong with that. But sadly ''old school space opera" has come to mean ''only kidz stuff". All the tons of like way below G science fiction for kidz has tainted the old school space opera...and that is still with us today.

And, well, you do need to let go of the Epic...even more so for a TV show. It's fine to have a Epic story once in a while....but to have a Epic story every day is just silly. And this really shows in Star Wars as the bad guys just keep doing the same super evil epic plot of : build a massive weapon of evil destruction(but bigger each time). So like what, Star Wars 13 or so will have the Death Galaxy, right? Maybe get to the Death Universe in Star Wars 20?

The Star Wars galaxy is full of stories, and they don't need to all be about ''Chosen ones" and "Super Weapons".

Rogue One, as poorly done as it was, was pretty close to Dark Star Wars.

[Cikomyr]

I still want to have Star Wars The West Wing The Coruscant Senate as a political thriller with Mon Mothma, fight against oppressional government, manipulated medias, etc..

Take us to the heart of the Empire. Show the corruption bare, and how the brave opposition tried to fight it legitimately.

[Anonymouswizard]

True, but it can also save the franchise.

**Stuffz**

True, but I kind of don't care if Star Wars lives and dies. I honestly don't care, such a project has about equal chance of killing or revitalising the franchies, except for the fact that my friends who don't read or watch space opera will be telling me to watch something stupid because it's Star Wars.

To bring up your points, old school space opera is kind of hit and miss. People assume it's for kids, unless it's X Y or Z, because for a long time Space Opera has been pushed as something for kids. Unless you're into space opera books, in which case the sheer variety of both classic and modern space opera (the divergence of the two genres is around the publication of Iain M. Banks's SF novels) means that the fact there's both adult's stuff and kids stuff is on display. Actually a ton more adult books in the genre, but that's a moot point.

'You can't do Epic for a TV show' is only true in episodic format. If we go for a proper serial format we can go epic while at the same time not breaking our Budget. Babylon 5 is a good example.

Also there isn't only one epic storyline. Empire was epic. The Thrawn Trilogy was epic. Epic is more about styling and stakes than about plot (although plot does feature).

Now you can be dark and epic. But if you're not epic than you can't be Star Wars.

If you're not epic then why aren't I just reading Foundation? It's a brilliant nonepic 'fall of an empire' story.


@Cikomyr: that sounds like an interesting idea. Relatively low budget, in an era people know about, adding complexity to the lore, and will be interesting in it's own right. A++, would consider again.