Lucasfilm Story Group

Randy_Flagg

Well-known member
Attila the Professor said:
And how would they even shoehorn the Indiana Jones name in there? <I>The Jones Legacy</I>?

The could do it like they're doing with the Star Wars spin-off films:

"The Joe Schmoe Adventure: An Indiana Jones Story (Without Indiana Jones)"

Notice I managed to cram "Indiana Jones" in there TWICE. I ought to be in marketing, seriously.

More seriously, I guess I could see them calling it "Raiders Of The ______", using the familiar iconic font so we know it's related to Indiana Jones. But, overall, I agree with you that a spin-off focusing on a different character in a different time period would be pretty pointless.
 

Attila the Professor

Moderator
Staff member
Randy_Flagg said:
More seriously, I guess I could see them calling it "Raiders Of The ______", using the familiar iconic font so we know it's related to Indiana Jones. But, overall, I agree with you that a spin-off focusing on a different character in a different time period would be pretty pointless.

Yeah, <I>Raiders...</I> as a title is conceivable.

There are certainly characters in the Harrison Ford era who could merit their own story, Belloq foremost among them. But unless they're going to be cutesy about it, that could still entail recasting Indy.
 

Duaner

New member
You don't necessarily need the Indiana Jones name in the title of the spin-off. The idea would be that the new character would be recognizable enough that when the spin-off were released people would say, "Oh, that's the guy from the Indy movie!" Maybe it would not be a character from Indy 5. Maybe the spin-off character would come from the first Indy prequel that we all assume is coming after Indy 5. That would place the film back into the original Indy years. You would just need the character to be an adventurer of a different sort than Indy- maybe an explorer, pilot, soldier-for-hire, etc. Who knows? Either way, they are pitching this idea of the cinematic universe, so you have to entertain all possibilities.
 

Violet

Moderator Emeritus
Rather than looking to the future for spin off possibilities- what about the past? Part of the charm to me, is the old world vibe. Its possible to do films about say Abner Ravenwood or even Henry Snr prior to Indy's existence. Beyond say maybe the early 60s, the decades after seem to lose that charm- Indy isn't meant to have all that much tech, design wise it's meant to be the opposite of Star Wars. I'm still however all for younger Indy films set in the 20s and early 30s when he first starts out.
 

Randy_Flagg

Well-known member
Violet said:
Rather than looking to the future for spin off possibilities- what about the past? Part of the charm to me, is the old world vibe. Its possible to do films about say Abner Ravenwood

Abner Ravenwood has a great name for a title. "Abner Ravenwood And The Lost City," or something like that, has a nice ring to it. It's certainly better than "Mutt And The Lost City."
 

Attila the Professor

Moderator
Staff member
Randy_Flagg said:
Abner Ravenwood has a great name for a title. "Abner Ravenwood And The Lost City," or something like that, has a nice ring to it. It's certainly better than "Mutt And The Lost City."

Abner Ravenwood and the Snows of Oblivion.
 

Pale Horse

Moderator
Staff member
Attila the Professor said:

My cheeky reply was merely a ruse to cover-up the fact that we've been down this road before.

I hate extended universes, especially as a ploy to create content, but honestly if you're going to have one, character studies make the best kind.

But no one's mentioned my abs or bellies. Hmmmm.
 

Attila the Professor

Moderator
Staff member
Pale Horse said:
My cheeky reply was merely a ruse to cover-up the fact that we've been down this road before.

You may be more right than you recall.

Pale Horse said:
I hate extended universes, especially as a ploy to create content, but honestly if you're going to have one, character studies make the best kind.

Indy's buddies down the hall have the glimmer of a good idea, if they stick with the genre study thing, but that's only followed in fits and starts at Marvel's haunts across the lot. (Speaking metaphorically; I don't care where their offices are.)

Indy spinoffs would only work if they basically ignored his existence, and were stand alone stories about whichever characters offer some potential. I'll port over some stuff we mentioned in April below.

An Indiana Jones-style world could be rendered on television, but you need an HBO budget, along the lines of the multinational filming approach that <I>Game of Thrones</I> employs. Multiple sets of characters, in a season or seasons-long quest, is a viable storytelling option, but trying something like that on an <I>Agents of SHIELD</I> budget can't produce the scope and sweep that a grand adventure narrative demands.

Pale Horse said:
But no one's mentioned my abs or bellies. Hmmmm.

More time at the gym, maybe?

***

Pale Horse said:
Now there's an origin story I'd love to see. Indiana Jones: The Forrestal Years...

Why not, Disney's spun Rogue One off, now.

Attila the Professor said:
He can be third in line, after Belloq and...heck, I wanted to put in a joke here, but I'd actually watch something about Sapito and Barranca.

Musings of an Unnamed Bureaucrat?

One conceivable test of best Indy movie might be how many of the characters you'd be willing to see spun off into something larger, even if it's just an hour of tv or a short story. I think Raiders obviously wins by that metric, give or take a story of Pankot Palace intrigue, or a prime-time industrial tycoon soap about Walter Donovan. (Thread spin-off time?)

Pale Horse said:
Panama Hat and Kazim (Brotherhood of the Cruciform Sword) would be compelling too.

Attila the Professor said:
Yep. Spalko. Mac. Pre-Indy Shanghai is absolutely a series too: Willie, Lao, Wu Han, Shorty.

Raiders112390 said:
I think the Adventures of Fedora would make an interesting spin-off. Given he was the proto-Indy in almost every single way, he is the most compelling character to me. It's also a great way to have Indy-in-all-but-name adventuring around in a time period which Indy himself couldn't - the late 19th century and early 20th. If done right, could become Disney's (better) version of Alan Quartermain. Have his adventures set between the 1880s and 1912, an interesting period.

JollyGreenSlugg said:
Anyone done a Lao Che spin-off in fan fiction?

I'd like to see how Lao fared in the Empire of the Sun Japanese invasion period.

Maybe Indy returned to China during WWII?

Duaner said:
There was a lot of tension in Shanghai following the Japanese invasion. I figure Lao Che would have been one of the Chinese businessmen who was loyal to the Japanese which would have made him the target of Chinese resistance groups.
 

Pale Horse

Moderator
Staff member
There's an interesting quote in this article that I think lends weight to the expanded universe.

“Kiri [Hart] and her group have mapped out a story and timeline across multiple platforms many years in advance, many exhausting years in advance. … We have a great honor to have responsibility for, so we want to be really careful with that. Not only for Star Wars but with Indiana Jones, which we’re all really excited about as well.” - ILM President Lynwen Brennan
 

Moedred

Administrator
Staff member
Here's an hour-long interview with Dave Filoni. Not sure if he's an official member, but pretty close to it. Nothing about Indy, but he talks about reading/watching the classics instead of immersing one's self in canon, as recommended by Lucas.

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/hcNXPNXOv2A" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
 

Moedred

Administrator
Staff member
Another peek inside...
Part of what makes Lucasfilm’s new system work is that Kennedy has set up a formidable support structure for her filmmakers. Upon her arrival, she put together a story department at Lucasfilm’s San Francisco headquarters, overseen by Kiri Hart, a development executive and former screenwriter she has long worked with. The story group, which numbers 11 people, maintains the narrative continuity and integrity of all the Star Wars properties that exist across various platforms: animation, video games, novels, comic books, and, most important, movies. “The whole team reads each draft of the screenplay as it evolves,” Hart explained to me, “and we try, as much as we can, to smooth out anything that isn’t connecting.”

What the story group does not do, Hart said, is impose plot-point mandates on the filmmakers. Johnson told me he was surprised at how much leeway he was given to cook up the action of Episode VIII from scratch. “The pre-set was Episode VII, and that was kind of it,” he said. If anything, Johnson wanted more give-and-take with the Lucasfilm team, so he moved up to San Francisco for about six weeks during his writing process, taking an office two doors down from Hart’s and meeting with the full group twice a week.
...from Vanity Fair's Episode 8 / Star Wars at 40 story.

Where Mark Hamill also describes snogging Carrie Fisher.
 

Stoo

Well-known member
Vanity Fair said:
Part of what makes Lucasfilm?s new system work is that Kennedy has set up a formidable support structure for her filmmakers. Upon her arrival, she put together a story department at Lucasfilm?s San Francisco headquarters, overseen by Kiri Hart, a development executive and former screenwriter she has long worked with. The story group, which numbers 11 people, maintains the narrative continuity and integrity of all the Star Wars properties that exist across various platforms: animation, video games, novels, comic books, and, most important, movies. ?The whole team reads each draft of the screenplay as it evolves,? Hart explained to me, ?and we try, as much as we can, to smooth out anything that isn?t connecting.?
They sure did a lousy job with the stories in both of the new movies but "Rogue One" is a major foul-up. Eleven people in the 'story group' and its script still got approved? The number of things that don't match with the original film is enormous and unforgivable. (n) :mad: :sick:

Without George, the new Lucasfilm doesn't give me any hope regarding ANY future "Star Wars" or Indiana Jones movies, at all. They clearly have no clue as to what they're doing.
 

Face_Melt

Well-known member
Stoo said:
They sure did a lousy job with the stories in both of the new movies but "Rogue One" is a major foul-up. Eleven people in the 'story group' and its script still got approved? The number of things that don't match with the original film is enormous and unforgivable. (n) :mad: :sick:

Without George, the new Lucasfilm doesn't give me any hope regarding ANY future "Star Wars" or Indiana Jones movies, at all. They clearly have no clue as to what they're doing.


Ha! The Force Awakens and Rogue One were unanimously loved. The approval ratings for those films by both audience and critics are through the roof.
 

Stoo

Well-known member
Face_Palm said:
Ha! The Force Awakens and Rogue One were unanimously loved. The approval ratings for those films by both audience and critics are through the roof.
Unanimous? No. :rolleyes: I've heard & read swathes of comments from plenty of people with the same complaints as mine. Folks who approve of the 2 new movies must be either 'fair-weather fans' or they just don't care about the problems.

John Knoll* co-wrote "Rogue One" and it was so disappointing to see such sh!t from someone whom I really admire. It's unbelievable how badly the story & other details are screwed up. I'd list its continuity mistakes in the appropriate thread...but it would be a lo-o-o-o-ng post.

*Co-creator of Adobe Photoshop and ILM Visual Effects Supervisor
 

JasonMa

Active member
Stoo said:
Folks who approve of the 2 new movies must be either 'fair-weather fans' or they just don't care about the problems.
Or they could, you know, just disagree with you.
 
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