One of the consequences of George Lucas selling Lucasfilm to Disney is that he, in effect, gave his blessing for the studio to do whatever they want to his beloved “Star Wars” franchise. However, another consequence to this decision is that fans will never truly know what Lucas had planned for the oft-rumored sequel trilogy that he may or may not have made.
One of the people who has a good idea of the direction of Lucas’ potential sequel trilogy is Mark Hamill, aka Luke Skywalker. And since the actor has been very vocal about his, um, differences of opinion with writer-director Rian Johnson about “Star Wars: The Last Jedi,” Hamill is beginning to spill the beans about what could have been with Lucas sequels.
Speaking to IGN, the actor had this to say about Luke’s ultimate fate in the supposed Lucas sequels, “I happen to know that George didn’t kill Luke until the end of ‘[Episode] 9’, after he trained Leia. Which is another thread that was never played upon [in ‘The Last Jedi’].”
READ MORE: ‘Star Wars: The Last Jedi’s’ Mark Hamill Has A Lot To Say [Interview]
While this doesn’t tell us much about the overall plot of any George Lucas-written sequels, it does give us an idea of a little bit of what Lucas had in mind. Clearly, if Hamill is to be believed, Lucas wanted the sequel trilogy to still focus on the Skywalker siblings, and their adventures post-‘Return of the Jedi.’ Obviously, with the amount of time that passed between when Lucas would have made this trilogy, and the eventual sequels that Disney produced, it wouldn’t have been logical to use this treatment. Luke and Leia are well into middle-age when the current sequels take place, so seeing Luke train Leia would have been a little…silly.
But Hamill wasn’t done comparing this new sequel trilogy to a hypothetical George Lucas trilogy. “George had an overall arc – if he didn’t have all the details, he had sort of an overall feel for where the [sequel trilogy was] going – but this one’s more like a relay race. You run and hand the torch off to the next guy, he picks it up and goes,” says the actor.
He continued, “Rian didn’t write what happens in ‘9’ – he was going to hand it off to, originally, Colin Trevorrow and now J.J. [Abrams]… an ever-evolving, living, breathing thing. Whoever’s onboard gets to play with the life-size action figures that we all are.”
One can’t help but read this as Hamill being a just a wee bit displeased with how Disney is handling the new films. Invoking the holy name of George Lucas is always a quick way to ignite the ‘Star Wars’ fandom into a fury, and comparing him directly to Rian Johnson, who Hamill has made no qualms about publicly disagreeing with, it could be said that Hamill is well-aware that he is aiming ‘Star War’s fandom anger at Johnson and Disney.
No matter what Hamill thinks about Luke’s fate, Lucas’ sequels, or Disney’s handling of the franchise moving forward, that ship has sailed. Now, all eyes are on Abrams and ‘Episode IX.’