Shooting has barely begun, yet already we are talking of endings. Reports are shooting for Episode 9 is expected to wrap up this February. This will wrap up the new trilogy and depending on what rumors you want to believe the Skywalker story itself.
A seven month shoot is a bit longer than normal for a major picture to shoot, but if they take time off for the holidays, that throws it right back into the average category. Large movies often have to deal with location changes, actor availabilities, and location availabilities when planning their shoot.
If you can track down an old book called Once Upon a Galaxy: A Journal of the Making of the Empire Strikes Back, it is a fascinating read that details all that went into making that movie. It is quite an incredible read. Better start scouring garage sales though. Unless you can find someone selling it not knowing what they have, you are gonna have to drop about $80 to buy it online. The tales of the Hoth scenes are incredible. For one scene in Norway, the blizzard was so intense they literally shot the scene with the actors mere feet outside the lodging’s doorway.
Of course now a days we get scenes shot for the Blu-Ray as special features, which can still be quite cool. It is always fun to take major motion picture projects and take a day to watch all of the making of featurettes. In some cases that can be better than the movie.
THE WORD NOT TO FEAR
One thing not to freak out about is WHEN we hear the word reshoots. Media has tried to turn this into a bad name that means a movie is in trouble, but that is rarely the case. If you write a story, or even coach a sports team, you always write a plan or draft. When the first draft is finished or the first couple games are in the books, there are things that need tweaking or reworked. Movies are no different. While some are bigger than others, reshoots are there to fix problems in how things are coming together, to either flush out a story point or fill a hole. Episode 9 will need reshoots. There is no need to get worked up over that and say here we go again.
The most interesting thing about the wrap of Episode 9 is how much will it actually wrap up? Will the Skywalker story end? Well, right now we only have two left alive, with one being dead in real life. If Kylo is redeemed it will be a cheap cop-out. Maybe that means Kylo, while evil will live through this last film. If not, and they do wrap up the Skywalker saga what does that mean for Rey, Poe, and Finn? We have these great new actors and characters. Are they thrown away because we can’t do chapter movies anymore because we are out of Skywalkers? That would seem to defeat the whole point of relaunching this series where it was if all these new faces are going to be abandoned.