George Lucas skipped out onThe Rise of SkywalkerWorld Premiere earlier this week. The movie marks the end of the line for the sequel trilogy and the Skywalker Saga as a whole. One would think that Lucas might have wanted to see how J.J. Abrams ended what he started over 40 years ago, but that apparently wasn’t the case this time around. Abrams did meet with Lucas before work started on the latest movie to gain some perspective on the Force, though it’s unclear if he took any of theStar Warsarchitect’s advice.
The Rise of Skywalkerworld premiere featured the cast of the movie, including Mark Hamill, Billy Dee Williams, Harrison Ford, Daisy Ridley, Oscar Isaac, John Boyega, and more. However,George Lucasdid not attend and we do not have a reason for his absence, as of this writing. He may have been feeling under the weather, though it seems like something he may have wanted to see with his old buddy Steven Spielberg who was also in attendance.
George Lucas has famously been outspoken about hisdisappointment in Disneyditching his ideas when they purchased Lucasfilm back in 2012. The original deal had Lucas' sequel trilogy included, even though it was evident that the studio had no intentions at all of using his story. This apparently angered Lucas and soured him on the new sequel trilogy that Disney pumped out over the past four years.
While George Lucas may have had some disagreements with the way things were handled, he has come on board as a consultant more than once sinceDisneytook over and even helped Ron Howard with a particular scene inSolo. One of the more obvious things that may have angered Lucas inThe Rise of Skywalkeris the fact that J.J. Abrams brought back Emperor Palpatine. Ian McDiarmid recalled a talk that he had with the director a handful of years ago where he confirmed Palpatine was indeed dead. Bringing the villain back may have been a bad idea in Lucas' eyes and it may have been something that Abrams asked him about in their first meeting.
The Rise of Skywalkeris currently in theaters andStar Warsfans, for the most part, seem to be enjoying it, which isa lot different from the critic reviews. It’s beginning to look like the exact opposite of the wayThe Last Jediwas accepted, which is pretty interesting to look at, two years after the fact. Without giving anything away, J.J. Abrams seemed to go out of his way to retcon Rian Johnson’s movie, though he claimed that wouldn’t be the case when he was making the movie. Regardless, a lot has changed in the franchise over the past few years. The officialofficial StarWars.com websitehas ticketing and showtime information forThe Rise of Skywalker.
