Star Wars: Underworld
Saw an article recently that reveals some details about the long rumored Star Wars live action TV show. Some highlights:
- Set between Episode 3 and 4
- Focuses on the dark underbelly (hence the name Underworld)
- Has a “complex, dark, adult” tone
- Each episode is budgeted for $5 million
- There are 50 scripts already created
The main hang up seems to be distribution. George Lucas doesn’t want to concede any creative control (can sympathize there) and just 2 millions views a week is not enough for it to be worth it (that’s a little stupid). That means the only current method that would meet those requirements would be broadcast networks, but because those have a tendency to cancel a show for stupid reasons, George ain’t willing to do it.
It says something when STAR WARS can’t come to broadcast tv because of the way the networks work. It’s a legitimate fear that they would get canceled if the networks voodoo numbers don’t line up. But it’s Star Wars, people will be watching. I think the explanation for not going to the cable networks is a little wonky though, Clone Wars is on Cartoon Network and doing well as far as I can tell, though I’ve never seen it, and suppose they might have a smaller threshold of success for what is effectively a kids show.
This is one of those cases where George should just do online distribution. Do Netflix, iTunes, Amazon, direct view from website, etc. Star Wars fans will pay. How many of you have bought ever re-release of the movies on VHS, DVD and Blu-Ray? (Surprisingly, I am not one of those, I have the DVD’s from when they first came out, a set of VHS from before DVD and no Blu-Rays). But I would buy live action episodes.
$1 per episode (assuming that’s what George gets after fees to the distributors) means only 5 million people need to view it. Since this is Star Wars, there’s a reasonable chance of that happening. And we’ll all probably buy it again when the super deluxe Blu-ray 2.0 set comes out after season 1. And then again for the full series. And again with the special commentary and cut scenes are added to the Direct-to-your-mind set comes out in 20years.
