When the news broke that the next Star Wars film finally had a director, I thought it was April Fools Day joke for a moment, because the director in question had already publically claimed he turned it down.
In fact, his exact words were, “Look, Star Wars is one of my favorite movies of all time. I frankly feel that – I almost feel that, in a weird way, the opportunity for whoever it is to direct that movie, it comes with the burden of being that kind of iconic movie and series.”
This director also said, “I am looking forward more than anyone to the next iterations of Star Wars, but I believe I will be going as a paying moviegoer!”
So if you’ve been following the whole saga, you’ll know who this is from these quotes, but if you haven’t, the director of the next Star Wars film will be, drum roll please…
JJ Abrams.
We first saw the news break on Collider, and now it’s all over the Hollywood trade publications, including Variety, The Wrap, and more. So perhaps this was all a ruse from JJ, because everything with Star Wars has to be top secret, and everything with JJ is of course top secret as well.
According to the Hollywood Reporter, Abrams of course “said in October that he wasn’t interested in taking on tar Wars. But the director is said to have changed his mind about the project.”
The main rumor going around was that Matthew Vaughn (X-Men First Class) was the front-runner to direct, but TheWrap also tells us Ben Affleck was considered for it as well. As The Wrap reports, tells Abrams “has several producing jobs in front of him,” but he “had been uncommitted as a director. He will have to jump right into Star Wars, which Disney has slated for a 2015 release.”
So it looks like JJ is living every fan boy’s dream of helming both Star Trek, and the latest chapter of Star Wars. Can he reinvent Star Wars as well as he’s reinvented Trek? Should be very exciting to find out. (We’re also wondering how much lens flare is allowed in the Empire…)
