Empire Strikes Back: planned or unplanned?

My geeky friends and I were hanging out together, we were discussing Sequelitis, and I brought up that Empire Strikes Back was actually one of the best unplanned sequels (in comparison to its original) in film history, because A New Hope was originally intended to be one film just called "Star Wars".

Friend A was like, "uh, no, Lucas planned a trilogy straight from the beginning, he was going for an application of Campbell's story archetype, The Hero's Journey."

I don't know, I'm still positive that Lucas made A New Hope, he only had the one film in mind and didn't expect it to be a success. Then it did, so he made had Irvin Kershner make a sequel in response to said success.

Maybe the whole Campbell Hero's Journey thing came in during the writing of Empire Strikes Back, but I highly doubt it did while writing A New Hope.

What do you all think?

He did have plans for sequels from the beginning. He just had to go the typical franchise launcher method- make one film and see if it is a success, then make your sequel and now be sure you can set things up for a trilogy.

Obi-Wan's death, for instance, I find to be total Sequel Bait.

Bosh! If anything in Episode IV should be viewed as sequel baiting, it's Darth Vader's survival after the assault on the Death Star—not Obi Wan's death.

edited 20th Mar '11 11:48:24 AM by SeanMurrayI

In Lucas' original plans for the Star Wars trilogy, the Death Star was only in the third movie. However, it had to be moved into the first movie so that one could be standalone in case he couldn't afford to make sequels.

(Source: The Empire of Dreams documentary that came with the Original Trilogy DVD boxset.)

No, one could accept Vader's fate as just being too bad to die or being a seemingly horrible fate (lost in the void) or even just a reference to the tradition of "I'll get you next time , [Hero's name]!". Even if not, you can just say "Yep, that's the villain's fate, makes sense, does its thing in the story".

Obi-Wan just goes "I'm going to let you kill me as part of a plan I'll take advantage of only in the sequels", it's incredibly stark.

I'm just using this point as a segue to pimping out the Sequel bait ykttw.

edited 20th Mar '11 3:37:55 PM by SomeSortOfTroper

The thing is with Vader, there were three options available for his role during the Death Star battle: he could've stayed aboard the station, in which case he would've been standing around with Tarkin doing nothing (not only does this mean he's doing nothing for 10-20 minutes, it also means he'd most likely die); he could've been killed during the battle (which would again obviously remove him from sequels) or he could've been sent off into space as a sequel hook, as seen in the final movie. The option that they went with makes the most sense.

There's a lot of different versions of the story, but George Lucas said it was originally meant to be one movie taking up 2 1/2 years of his life and then he would be on to something else. That concept ballooned into an expansive universe that one movie could not contain.

Supposedly that one movie involved everything, with Luke becoming a Jedi, joining the rebellion and defeating the empire along with their super-weapon. Deciding to break it down into a more manageable film, the first act was expanded into A New Hope and to make the final confrontation as exciting as possible they included the destruction of the Death Star. I think the original ending of A New Hope was something closer to the ground battle on Endor in Return Of The Jedi, a low-tech species (the Wookies) providing support for the good guys.

Long story short, the first film was made to stand alone but they were certainly hopeful and prepared for sequels.

But the best unplanned sequels for me are undoubtably Back To The Future. They aren't as good as the original, but still plenty of imaginative moments and heart to the characters to make them great.

Fandom is weird.

You're giving Obi Wan too much credit for what was ultimately Luke Skywalker's quest. Darth Vader surviving the Rebel Alliance's victory at the Battle of Yavin is the only thing resembling a major plot line about the story as a whole being left open (In this case, the biggest bad guy in the film surviving at the end).

The ultimate fate of a secondary character who exists strictly as a wise guide to the protagonist is not a major plot line to serve as much of a Sequel Hook, and in the case where he's seen sacrificing himself, it doesn't really matter.

edited 20th Mar '11 6:08:51 PM by SeanMurrayI

The Godfather Part II was technically unplanned. The book had already been written but Paramount didn't buy the rights until the first was a huge hit. Coppola only agreed to direct if Paramount also financed The Conversation. As a result, Coppola got two masterpieces, two Best Picture nominees and a few Oscars in the same year.

I know it's a Cracked article, but they do decent research, so this might actually be useful the stuff about Star Wars is entry six, so just a little from the top.

"Obi-Wan just goes "I'm going to let you kill me as part of a plan I'll take advantage of only in the sequels", it's incredibly stark."

You mean being able to turn into a force spirit to give Luke the guidance he needs to destroy the Death Star isn't enough?

The problem is that Lucas just keeps on changing his opinion about the whole thing.

As far as I know, Lucas planned six movies and reduced them to three. He planned to kill Han Solo, let the other one either take up the sword or fight along a Luke and many other stuff I don't remember right now.

GIANT CAMEL ROBOTS WITH LASER CANNONS.

Lucas has flip-flopped on this stuff a zillion times. There were supposed to be nine films; there were supposed to be six films; there were supposed to be unlimited films; Vader was not originally Luke's father; Han was supposed to die; Leia was not originally going to be Luke's sister, as his sister was going to be introduced in some later movie; and so on.

I get the impression that Lucas probably was hoping for sequels at the time A New Hope was made, but it was still made to be a standalone film, especially since the consensus was that it would most likely flop.

"As far as I know, Lucas planned six movies and reduced them to three. He planned to kill Han Solo, let the other one either take up the sword or fight along a Luke and many other stuff I don't remember right now."

I thought it was Harrison Ford himself that wanted Han Solo to die in Episode V, or are you referring to Episode VI?

The Star Wars story itself, I mean Episode IV, went through so many revisions, I'm sure there could have been any number of possibilities with how the movies could have went. Mace Windu was intended to be the main character at some point, or at least would have had the Obi Wan role.

This. As open-ended as A New Hope was, it was far more self contained than the others in the series, particularly V and VI. It seems more like the movie was predicted to be a stand alone, so it has a rising / falling action and such, and then when sequels became evident the world was fleshed out more and the latter movies became more dependent on each other.

Pirates Of The Caribbean did the same thing.

^ Two-Part Trilogy

If there was going to a sequel to Star Wars, it was going to be Splinter of the Mind's Eye. With a story largely taking place on one planet with Solo and Chewbacca nowhere in sight, its a film that could have been made with a moderate/low budget, which Lucas probably thought was he was going to get if Star Wars was able to be a modest hit.

A sequel to Star Wars as we know it wasn't really thought of until unparalleled success of the first film.

There were originally going to be nine - at some point during the planning. However, all the relevant story within those nine was included in the six they actually made. There are not 3 missing sequels that come after ROTJ that were part of Lucas' orginal plan.

You can find statements by Lucas back in summer 1977 suggesting as much as twelve films, with him suggesting they could be like James Bond, each with a different director and story set in the Star Wars universe. Around the making of ESB, the statement was a trilogy of trilogies making nine films total; prequels about Obi-Wan's adventures with Luke's father, and sequels about another Jedi possibly "The other" mentioned by Yoda. The latter would supposedly feature an older Luke as a Obi-Wan type mentor.

It wasn't until the making of Empire proved to be a complete nightmare and Lucas' crumbling marriage that made him decide to ditch the sequels and put the prequels on the backburner. ROTJ is rife with tying up loose ends to give the series a definitive end.

The interviews I recall hearing back when the very first one came out was that it was going to be three trilogies: The Rebellion, the Prequel to the Rebellion, and the Aftermath of the Rebellion. Lucas has flip-flopped so much over the years that you can probably find an interview with him somewhere supporting just about any number you want to champion.

The overwhelming evidence is that Lucas had The Empire Strikes Back planned from the beginning, but for financial reasons had to make A New Hope as a stand alone movie first.

No one really thought it'd be successful except Lucas.

Also, The Hero's Journey is evident right from the start in A New Hope

edited 11th Oct '11 7:35:16 AM by Sackett

I think Lucas was hoping for a sequel if Star Wars did well enough but again, Splinter of the Mind's Eye was being set up as that more than any plot close to ESB. It wasn't until the huge success of the first film (which surprised even George) that had him scrapping the low budget sequel idea and doing a huge follow up with someone else writing the script (initially Leigh Brackett, then Lawrence Kasdan).

edited 12th Oct '11 3:44:26 AM by BorneAgain