ForceFour – Expansion on Todd’s Anthology Film Ideas, Part One

So yeah, Joe and I launched the ForceFour, a recurring feature on the podcast in which we list and discuss four ideas from the Star Wars universe. The inaugural ForceFour challenge was for us both to come up with four Anthology films we want to see made. Because we are always on a time constraint (and let’s face it, we would totally lose the non-hardcore SW audience if we get too geeky) we don’t always get to expound on what we discuss. So I’m going to of into greater detail here on my ForceFour Anthology film ideas. And yes, I know I cheated, but I do that. From time to time.

#4 – Anakin Gets Knighted, Ventress Slices His Face, He Obtains a Padawan — directed by Kathryn Bigelow

This is a story that has yet to be told in the SW universe, well in the new canon at least…. I’m gonna go ahead and say how frustrated I am with how Lucasfilm is running away from any prequel related ideas and storylines. Who knows, maybe they’ll soften on this once they feel like the audience is fully engaged (but look at the numbers… the audience was engaged during the prequels… it’s Star Wars for Vader’s sake). Anyway, let’s look at this realistically. First off, Ewan and Hayden still look age appropriate enough to pull this off, as does Natalie. My version of this story would take place about a year into the Clone Wars, when Anakin’s true power is starting to show through. Although this would be an original script, I would incorporate part of the original (non-canon) Clone Wars story and the Darkhorse Republic comic series (also non-canon at this point) in regards to Asajj Ventress’ introduction and her subsequent fight with Anakin that resulted in his scar. The story would end on Christophsis with Yoda sending Ahsoka to be Anakin’s padawan learner. This would be an amazing opportunity to right some perceived wrongs of Lucas and his direction of the prequels, and give Hayden a chance to shine as Anakin (finally…). This story would also expound on how Anakin got his scar (duh), lost his braid and became a Jedi Knight, and how he obtained Artoo from Padme in addition to providing a brilliant live-action lead-in toThe Clone Wars cartoon, which is of course fully canon. As for directors, I’d love to see someone like Kathryn Bigelow tackle this story.

(wishful thinking) Canon Casting:: Hayden, Ewan, and Natalie would of course return, along with the other actors from the prequels, including Temuera Morrison as the Clones, namely Rex and Cody. The only new characters to the cast would be a Ahsoka Tano and Asajj Ventress, and I choose…….

#3 – Rule of Two Trilogy — directed by Zach Snyder

***UPDATED 2/16/17 to reflect Alexandra Daddario at Githany, removing Rosario Dawson*** Yeah, I know I’m cheating here with three films, but this story needs to be told properly. Film one would be a fairly faithful adaptation of the Darth Bane novel, Path of Destruction. In the film we learn that the Sith have stopped the infighting and banded together to form the Brotherhood of Darkness to combat the Jedi and the Army of Light in the Great Ruusan War. The film would more or less be a Bane origin story, with the major change being to find a way to incorporate Zannah earlier in the story and be older in age. In the end, Bane and Zannah destroy both the entire Brotherhood of Darkness (which is essentially ending the Sith as we know it) and the Jedi from the Army of Light that are taking part in the War (not all Jedi believe this war to be worthwhile). Two key figures that factors into every one of these films are Darth Revan (or Revan, depending on your point of view) and Darth Malak. The backbone of the entire trilogy would lie in the knowledge of Sith holocrons, created by Revan and Malak, that are found by Bane and passed down all the way through Sidious, who destroys them in glorious fashion after killing his master, Darth Plagueis.

Canon Casting::

Film two in the series is really up in the air as even in Legends we don’t have a fully fleshed out story during this period. If I had my druthers, and I do since this is my post, I would run with the storyline from the Darth Gravid and Darth Gean, whose story was briefly mentioned in the Darth Plagueis novel. Two reasons for picking this story: 1 – it is set almost directly in the middle of Darth Bane’s origin of the Rule of Two and the rise of Darth Sidious, making it a perfect point in the timeline. 2 – Darth Gravid falls to the light, thinking this is the path to achieve the end goal of the Grand Plan, and is eventually killed by Darth Gean for this. Why this storyline? It would be a great middle chapter and showing a Sith lord wavering on their love of the Dark Side, thinking the Dark and the Light is the path to achieve their endgame would rhyme well with Darth Vader’s struggle and ultimate redemption in Return of the Jedi. It also could potentially show a different side of Revan (via holocron, of course), adding to the internal conflict and resolve that Gravid is enduring. If I have time after I finish my Prequel trilogy rewrites treatments, I’ll work up an outline for this story.

***UPDATED 2/16/17 to reflect James McAvoy as young Sheev Palpatine, replacing Tom Huddleston*** Film three – the Darth Plagueis / Darth Sidious story. Yes, this is THE story that needs to be told. Well, it’s already been told in magnificent fashion by James Luceno in the Darth Plagueis novel. And when I say magnificent, that may be an understatement. Wow, this novel is so good and really fleshes out the entire backbone of the Prequels and enhances them in many ways. However, let me throw it out there that this novel is really for hardcore SW fans in my opinion. Lots of characters, lots of planets, lots and lots of organizations, and lots of minute details that while may be boring to the vanilla fan, are exhilarating to the hardcore fan. There are a few changes I might make to make the story a little more appealing. First, I would either change the appearance of Muun’s (might be hard to do since San Hill is a canon character from AoTC and RoTS), but given a Muun is such a huge character in this story it may be prudent to either change their appearance as mentioned above or cast Plagueis as a human (*** ducks ***). I know this would piss off a lot of hardcore SW fans, but we have to tell the story. And…. if we could reel in Ian McKellan (as noted in the Canon Casting below) I don’t think anyone would complain. Well, some would, but who cares. Other than that, read the novel – it’s a perfect story and the story we need.

Canon Casting::

Stay tuned for part two of my ForceFour expounding, including a deeper look into Ahsoka’s story and the hunt for a tattooed Zabrak……..