In October, word broke that Disney had acquired LucasFilm, to much shock to the industry and onlookers. Disney and LucasFilm have had a very good working relationship for a long time, so the two merging made sense. With the announcement, we also learned that we would be getting ‘Star Wars: Episode VII’ in 2015. But there were many unknown variables to the deal, including what else we would be seeing now from the ‘Star Wars’ universe. One thing I kept wondering about was what had happened to the LucasFilm’s planned series, ‘Star Wars: Underworld‘, a series set between the two trilogies, dealing with much of the seedy underbelly of the universe, such as mobsters and bounty hunters, while leaving it open to have appearances from characters that we’d come to love from the films. Now it looks like the series could see a second life, thanks to ABC.
The talk of resurrecting the series comes from ABC President Paul Lee, who commented about the idea at the recent Television Critics Association press event. Lee first commented on the idea of working with LucasFilm in TV capacity:
We’d love to do something with Lucasfilm, we’re not sure what yet. We haven’t even sat down with them. We’re going to look at [the live-action series], we’re going to look at all of them, and see what’s right. We weren’t able to discuss this with them until [the acquisition] closed and it just closed. It’s definitely going to be part of the conversation.
He then went on to say that they’d be looking into the fifty written scripts that ‘Star Wars: Underworld’ already has, and decide where to go from there. The series, which was being spearheaded by Lucas and the prequel trilogy producer Rick McCallum, was well into pre-production, but the duo deemed the show too expensive to produce, costing somewhere around $5 million an episode. But that was originally with the idea that there would be licensing fees involved with whichever network the show would be made on. Now with their own network, the licensing fee no longer plays a part, which could bring the costs of episodes down considerably. In addition, ABC has been doing a lot of heavy CGI work with shows recently, such as ‘Once Upon a Time’, so they know how to use it to benefit a show, which could considerably help the series move to production. Nothing is official at this time, but it’s good to see the series could possibly take off again, and I’m really hoping we’ll see it go to series.
Entertainment Weekly also learned a bit about the series, and had this to share:
Sources say the live-action series centers on the story of rival families struggling over the control of the seedy underside of the Star Wars universe and the people who live within the subterranean level and air shafts of the metropolis planet Coruscant (the Empire’s urban-sprawl-covered home planet). A bounty hunter may be the main character. Set between the original Star Wars film trilogy and the prequels, the time period allows for all sorts of potential appearances from classic figures from the Star Wars universe.
Hopefully we’ll know more about the series, or if it’ll go forward at all, soon. I’m very hopeful for the idea of a ‘Star Wars’ live action series, and I think having it on ABC could work wonders. Are you interested in seeing ‘a ‘Star Wars’ TV series? Let me know in the comments below, only here at Chip and Company.
Related articles
- ABC is Looking into Making That STAR WARS TV Series (geektyrant.com)
- ABC to Consider Live-Action STAR WARS TV Series (collider.com)
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