George Lucas's "Star Wars", released in May 1977, was an unexpected box office success and quickly became a pop-culture phenomenon. Lucas, who did not expect the success, stopped doing publicity after a while because it became too overwhelming, and had flown to Hawaii with friend Steven Spielberg to begin conceptualising their next blockbuster franchise, "Indiana Jones". The success of "Star Wars" and its licensing opportunities meant that a sequel was inevitable. Sequels were generally not well regarded at the time and Lucas was not ready to commit, as the production of the original film "had been a four-year horrific seat-of-the-pants experience"—one that Lucas never wanted to experience again. However, the film did not represent what he had envisioned, and he knew that a sequel would allow him to finish the story. Additionally, Lucas had already established the "Star Wars" universe, so he figured a sequel would provide an opportunity to introduce more ideas and adventures. "I always felt if I could go back to those environments using the same characters, I could make a helluva better movie," he said. Lucas hired Alan Dean Foster, the ghostwriter of the , to write the sequel novel "Splinter of the Mind's Eye" so it could be adapted as a low-budget film if "Star Wars" was a box-office failure, but by August 1977 "Star Wars" was still the number-one film in cinemas, motivating Lucas to continue the saga.