The Hollywood Reporter reported today, that George Lucas has 50 hours of the proposed live action Star Wars TV series ready to roll before cameras but that the show is on hold indefinitely. According to Lucas, in an interview with cable network G4 last week, the technology doesn’t yet exist to produce the show in a way that is cost effective.
The untitled Star Wars TV series has been a subject of speculation and debate since Lucas announced plans for the series in 2006. At that time Lucas promised 100 episodes for the series would be produced while producer Rick McCallum took the promises even further stating that there would be four Star Wars TV series spinning off from each other and following four different characters from the Star Wars universe.
The series or multiple different series will be set in the timeframe between the end of Star Wars Episode 3: Revenge of the Sith, which featured the birth of Luke and Leia and the beginning of construction of the Death Star, and the start of Star Wars Episode 4: A New Hope.
However, Lucas and McCallum have since explained that the proposed series will not feature Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia, Han Solo, Obi Wan Kenobi or Darth Vader. According to IMBD Anthony Daniels, aka C3PO, is the only original Star Wars cast member to have signed on for the series. No word on the status of C3PO’s longtime companion R2D2.
Also signed on, again according to IMDB, is actor Daniel Logan who played young Boba Fett in Star Wars Episode 2: Attack of the Clones and has carried on in the role of Boba Fett on the cartoon series The Clone Wars. Logan who was 14 when he played Boba Fett in Episode 2, would allegedly play the grown up Boba Fett on the live action series. The Clone Wars returns for a fourth season on Cartoon Network later this year.
This is not the first time that George Lucas has asked fans to remain patient about a Star Wars TV series. In September of 2010 Lucas told IGN that though the series was mostly written it would cost upwards of 50 million dollars per episode to produce. Even for a man of Lucas’s considerable wealth that is cost prohibitive. For now, fans of Star Wars will have to wait for technology to catch up with Lucas’s vision before a Star Wars TV series comes to life.