I’ve spent the last couple months pondering this “Ultimate Star Wars Saga” of mine, trying to figure out how I’d go about it. Do I want it to be a trilogy of trilogies, a series with an indeterminate number of seasons, or a single film? How faithful do I want to remain to Lucas’ PT, or Legends, or my own previous rewrites? How many elements do I want to take from earlier SW film drafts? Do I want it to be a conservative rewrite, an extensive rewrite, or a little of both? Do I even really want to rewrite the entire saga? Maybe I really just want to pare it down to the PT, or the OT.
After considerable thought, I’ve reached some final conclusions. The Ultimate Star Wars Saga would consist of twelve episodes, forming four trilogies spanning four generations of the Skywalker family. The first trilogy, the “Pre-Clone Wars Trilogy”, would be a rewrite of my previous PT rewrite, tailored to make Obi-Wan & Anakin peers, Anakin & Vader completely separate characters, etc. The second trilogy would be a PT rewrite proper, aligning more closely with Lucas’ films. The third trilogy would be an OT rewrite. The fourth trilogy would be the ST rewrite, incorporating elements from Disney’s films, the Dark Empire trilogy, Dark Forces II, and possibly also the Thrawn trilogy.
Fickle sumbitch that I am, I don’t think I’ll be going this route after all, as interesting a route it may be.
I keep reflecting on my incompleted PT rewrite. It was something of a hot mess, but I like the story I was crafting; I’d rather streamline/expand it into a TCW-esque series than work with Lucas’ table scraps.
Some concepts I have in mind for this prequel series:
- Darth Vader & Anakin Skywalker are separate characters. Darth is the biological son of Shmi Warka & Chlorian Vader, adopted son/apprentice of Obi-Wan Kenobi & Siri Tachi. Anakin is a non-Force-sensitive farmer married to Amidala Skywalker; their daughter is Nashira Skywalker, Darth’s lover.
- Tatooine was a prosperous frontier world until the Clone Wars.
- The Clone Wars were instigated by Mandalorian clone warriors, descendants of Mandalorians who fled to the Rishi Maze during the Mandalorian Wars and conquered the native Kaminoans.
- Yoda & Qui-Gon Jinn are among the “Lost Twenty”, heterodox Jedi who left the order due to disillusionment with the Order. Yoda went into self-imposed exile on Dagobah while Qui-Gon established the Potentium.
- Asajj Ventress is Qui-Gon’s foremost apprentice and second-in-command.
- Jedi wield blue lightsabers, Potentiates violet lightsabers. Only Darth has a unique lightsaber colour (yellow).
- Darth loses his right arm/legs in his penultimate duel with Obi-Wan, but otherwise remains unharmed. Further injuries/bionic enhancements will accumulate over the course of the Jedi Purge.
- Adopting the alias “Owen Lars”, Obi-Wan takes baby Luke into hiding with him on Tatooine, where he eventually meets/marries Beru Whitesun.