Disney will produce new ‘Star Wars’ films

LOS ANGELES – A decade since George Lucas said “Star Wars” was finished on the big screen, a new trilogy under new ownership is destined for theaters after The Walt Disney Co. announced Tuesday that it was buying Lucasfilm Ltd. from him for $4.05 billion.

The seventh movie, with a working title of “Episode 7,” is set for release in 2015. Episodes 8 and 9 will follow. The trilogy will continue the story of Luke Skywalker, Han Solo and Princess Leia beyond “Return of the Jedi,” the third film released and the sixth in the saga. After that, Disney plans a new “Star Wars” movie every two or three years. Lucas will serve as creative consultant in the new movies.

“I’m doing this so that the films will have a longer life,” Lucas, the 68-year-old creator of the series and sole owner of Lucasfilm, said in an interview posted on YouTube. “I get to be a fan now … I sort of look forward to it.”

Disney CEO Bob Iger said Lucasfilm had already developed an extensive storyline on the next trilogy, and Episode 7 was now in early-stage development.

“The last ‘Star Wars’ movie release was 2005’s ‘Revenge of the Sith’ – and we believe there’s substantial pent-up demand,” Iger said.

The deal includes Lucasfilm’s prized high-tech production companies, Industrial Light & Magic and Skywalker Sound, as well as rights to the “Indiana Jones” franchise.

The deal brings Lucasfilm under the Disney banner with other brands including Pixar, the Muppets, Marvel, ESPN and ABC, all companies that Disney has acquired over the years.

Twitter went wild with the news as fans speculated on mash-up titles for future movies, using the hashtag “DisneyStarWars.” Among the amusing attempts were “When You Wish Upon a Death Star” and “Bambi Wan Kenobi.”

Fan club co-founder Ming Pan, a graphic designer in San Francisco, said he was glad audiences would get another “Star Wars” movie but worried whether the franchise would thrive after Lucas passes the torch.

“It’s something that I thought may happen down the line, but I just didn’t expect it to happen while Lucas was still alive because he has always expressed such a tight control over the ‘Star Wars’ license,” Pan said.

Lucas was hailed as a cinematic visionary when the original “Star Wars” came out in 1977. But he had become an object of often-vicious ridicule by the time he released 3-D versions of all six films in the franchise earlier this year.

Die-hard fans had been vilifying Lucas for years, convinced that he had become a commercial sell-out and had compounded his sins by desecrating the heroic tale that he originally sought to tell.

They railed against him for adding grating characters such as Jar Jar Binks to the prequel trilogy, which Lucas directed and which came out from 1999 to 2005. They attacked him for tinkering with the original trilogy that spanned 1977 to 1983, too.

The criticism grated on Lucas, who vowed never to make another “Star Wars” movie.

“Why would I make any more when everybody yells at you all the time and says what a terrible person you are?” Lucas told the New York Times earlier this year.

Kathleen Kennedy, the current co-chairman of Lucasfilm, will become the division’s president. She will serve as executive producer for the new movies. Directors for the new movies have not yet been announced, but they are destined to be live action, not animated, Iger said.

In the YouTube video, Lucas said the decision to continue with the saga wasn’t inconsistent with past statements.

“I always said I wasn’t going to do any more and that’s true, because I’m not going to do any more, but that doesn’t mean I’m unwilling to turn it over to Kathy to do more,” Lucas said.

He said he has given Kennedy his storylines and other ideas, “and I have complete confidence that she’s going to take them and make great movies.”