Disney’s Ambition: Three ‘Star Wars’ Films Every Year [Report]

Very little is set in stone regarding Disney’s ambitious plans for the Star Wars franchise. All we can say for certain is that a lot of ideas are being thrown out there, and some have pretty huge implications. For instance, how would you feel about two to three new Star Wars films every year?

Disney’s plan to revive the Star Wars franchise could include just that. The entertainment conglomerate isn’t just planning a new trilogy, they’re planning on new trilogies to roll out every year, according to The Guardian.

Fans have long been expecting another trilogy of Star Wars films, and following Disney’s $4 billion acquisition of the property, those same fans reacted to the assumed guarantee of more films with hesitancy. Still, a new trilogy isn’t completely bad news no matter who’s in control. We were willing to give it a chance. However, it seems that Disney’s plan is far more aggressive than that.

Lucasfilm chief executive Kathleen Kennedy tells Entertainment Weekly that Disney wants “two or three films” a year. Further, we got what amounts to the most solid confirmation regarding Episode VII, which is due in 2015.

“Lucasfilm’s co-chairman and soon-to-be president, Kathleen Kennedy, has told employees she wants the company to produce two or three films a year (it’s averaged fewer than four per decade), and first up is Star Wars: Episode VII for 2015, which will pick up sometime after Darth Vader gave his life to overthrow (figuratively and literally) the Emperor and save Luke in 1983’s Episode VI— Return of the Jedi. Yes, the plan is to return to the characters in the first trilogy (1977–83). Whether the original actors will have significant roles or merely be on hand to pass the baton to a new generation of actors—something Lucasfilm tried with mixed success with Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and Disney with TRON: Legacy—is unclear.”

Our advice to the Star Wars crew under Disney’s management? Start “small” with familiar characters, introduce well-known expanded universe personalities and story points, spin them off into their own trilogies, and reunite everyone once in a while for an Avengers–style team movie.

I might be the only one on the internet saying so, but man am I excited about more Star Wars!