Excited to be excited about Star Wars again

There was a time when I was practically a walking encyclopedia of Star Wars.  And...I still am to a certain extent, but I will admit that I have gotten a bit rusty over the years.  But it's not really my fault...it's because there just hasn't been enough new stuff to maintain a significant interest.

Sure there's been books, but I've never been a big fan of the book series (although I still kept up with what was going on with them through the internet Star Wars encyclopedias).  I am a gamer (see my gaming tumblr here), so I did keep up with Star Wars video game canon.  The Knights of the Old Republic series was awesome, and the The Force Unleashed was epic.  I would play the The Old Republic game that is out now, but I don't really have a good gaming PC for playing it on.  But as awesome as the games are, they don't quite measure up to the hype of a film.

A live-action Star Wars TV show has been discussed for years now, but keeps getting put off.  The Clone Wars cartoon is decent, but I feel like I mainly watch that to try to remember the glory days of being excited about Star Wars.  It's more of a nostalgia than an excitement.  The heyday of my Star Wars excitement was during the years the prequels were being made.

Why?  Because there was an epic film to look forward too.  And not only that, the internet was buzzing with Star Wars news, opinions, and theories on what would happen in the prequels.  I frequented Star Wars forums and kept up with all of that stuff and came up with theories of my own.  But when the prequels were over, there wasn't that much to look forward too anymore.  So I guess that's when I started to get a bit rusty with my Star Wars knowledge and excitement.  I started getting my sci-fi fix from other outlets...like Stargate and Battlestar Galactica.

But now I feel myself getting excited about Star Wars again!  We are going to have more movies...and maybe that TV show they've been talking about too!  The buzz can begin again.  I'm already wondering things like how far in time the plot line of episode 7 will be after Return of the Jedi.  I'm wondering who will be in it.  Who will direct?

My excitement grew even more when I considered the possibility that what if  Star Wars could actually be better than ever?  I was reminded of a documentary I saw that was made by Gene Roddenberry's son, Rod.  Rod showed a video clip of Gene saying that maybe one day someone could make Star Trek better than he ever did.  And Rod said he showed that video to J.J. Abrams (who made the Star Trek movie reboot).

So when I thought about that, I thought, George Lucas made an epic film series, but what if someone else could do just as good...or better?

With that in mind...let the buzz about the new movies begin.  I've heard some people saying Joss Whedon should direct, and initially I thought that sounded like a good idea since Whedon is famous in sic-fi circles (Firefly, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The Avengers).  And considering that he directed The Avengers, which is a Disney affiliated film, it sounds like a possibility he could be considered.  But after I thought about it, I'm not sure he is the best choice for Star Wars.  I consider Star Wars to be more of a science-fantasy than a science-fiction.  In other words, I see Star Wars as a fantasy story with elements of science-fiction mixed in, as opposed to your more traditional sci-fi stories like Star Trek or Stargate.  With that in mind, I think a fantasy director would be better suited choice...maybe someone like Peter Jackson, who directed the Lord of the Rings trilogy and should be finishing up the Hobbit movies now.  Or maybe someone like J. J. Abrams that I mentioned earlier, who has been involved in big hits like Lost, Person of Interest, Cloverfield, and the Star Trek reboot as either executive producer or director.  Lost has elements of fantasy in it and Star Trek is classic sci-fi.  So he is familiar with both genres.  Plus he's made TV shows that aired on Disney owned ABC, so he probably has some Disney contacts.

But there are so many potential choices for director.  Spielberg anyone?  Let the buzz begin indeed!