Once Rian Johnson’s upcoming ‘whodunit’ film Knives Out hits the big screen later this year, he’ll once again focus his attention on the galaxy far far away. Yes, despite what haters might have you believe — that Rian Johnson isn’t attached to the initially reported Star Wars projects anymore after The Last Jedi drove a wedge through the fanbase — the director of The Last Jedi is indeed still signed on to spearhead a brand new Star Wars trilogy. (Note: Johnson may not actually direct all the movies in this trilogy. Think of him as a showrunner of TV series.)
The project has been kept hush-hush and neither Johnson nor Lucasfilm have even given the slightest hint as to what the story is going to be about. All we know is that it will not be centred around legacy Star Wars characters like the Skywalkers and the Solos. However, in an interview with Observer, Rian Johnson did provide some insight as to how he’s approaching these films. The critically acclaimed director mentioned that he’s trying to figure out what the “essence” of Star Wars means to him.
“I think that the fun and challenging part of it is to dive in, figure out what’s exciting and then figure out what it’s going to be. We’re doing something that steps beyond the legacy characters. What does that look like? To me, the blue sky element of it is what was most striking about it. I know the way that I’m coming at it and what’s fun about it for everyone in George Lucas’ films is figuring out, ‘what’s the next step?’ It really makes you think and figure out what the essence of Star Wars is for me and what that will look like moving forward.”
It’s difficult to say what exactly Rian Johnson means. The folks at Slashfilm seem to speculate that he will be drawing inspirations from the original trilogy. I think Johnson might be trying to further understand the intricate philosophies of Star Wars and apply it to his new films.
I’m a huge fan of The Last Jedi and wholeheartedly disagree with those who claim that the film was very un-Star-Wars-like. While it goes in directions none of us expected it to, it still explores the philosophies of Star Wars perhaps better than any other film. I cannot wait for Rian Johnson’s new trilogy.
