Originally posted by: Tiptup
If I remember LotR history correctly, Tolkien had a basic idea for the King of Gondor returning and the fall of Sauron, but he didn't work it into a story until the publishers, who wanted a sequel to the hobbit to make money with, liked his ideas along those lines. Then, through the writing out of the story, Tolkien invented many of its beloved subjects and events.
As for Star Wars, again if I'm not mistaken, it was originally pitched to 20th Century Fox by Lucas in a way where the toy sales would help to increase profits so the marketing existed in the franchise before the first movie was released. Plus, all movies are items meant to be marketed. Though I would guess that marketing was less important to Lucas than art in those days. Maybe.
If I remember LotR history correctly, Tolkien had a basic idea for the King of Gondor returning and the fall of Sauron, but he didn't work it into a story until the publishers, who wanted a sequel to the hobbit to make money with, liked his ideas along those lines. Then, through the writing out of the story, Tolkien invented many of its beloved subjects and events.
As for Star Wars, again if I'm not mistaken, it was originally pitched to 20th Century Fox by Lucas in a way where the toy sales would help to increase profits so the marketing existed in the franchise before the first movie was released. Plus, all movies are items meant to be marketed. Though I would guess that marketing was less important to Lucas than art in those days. Maybe.
I believe that Tolkien also had his son reading the book as he wrote it. That helped to catch any discrepencies that might have existed. Each time his son found something wrong, he'd go back and rewrite the story. Once it was published though, it was a done story. Tolkien never released a special edition to change the story
I'm willing to bet that was something Lucas threw in there just to get them to fund it. Remember, they let him keep the rights to everything (except maybe distribution). Sequels, merchandise, and whatever else there is was all left to Lucas. Let's face it, in those days, toys based on a movie weren't that successful. Sequels were practically unheard of at the time. Fox figured they had nothing to lose by letting a young Lucas keep the rights to everything. Something like that will likely never happen again either. In fact, look at Firefly. Fox won't give up the movie rights to that, so they had to title the movie Serenity. As much as Fox doesn't plan on doing anything with it, they want any money that might be made from it.