JJ Abrams to direct next 'Star Wars' film

Interesting mix.

Good news, unless you are a fan of the old Star Trek.

well he can't do any worse than what lucas did to epi 1-6. and i love what abrams did to star trek.

As long as script os good should be a blast. No Ewoks though.

wouldn't it be cool if abrams combined ST with SW? i got my money on shatner/kirk kicking yoda's arse.

His first Star Trek was indeed different and still interesting... Looking forward to the new movies...

Good news. I hate lost, but I thought his Star Trek was awesome.

The Galaxy is celebrating.

Return of the Jedi showed where Lucas was allowing the rot to set in, and the three prequels were just dire.

I'm not a fan of JJ's Trek... yes it looks all bright and flashy, lots of action, but it all seemed too rushed... and those phasers... ugh. Clearly designed with toys in mind.

Star Wars was already an action-packed franchise so I don't suppose he can do any worse than the Bearded One. Just no Ewoks or JarJar Binks.

"Just no Ewoks or JarJar Binks"

Or C3POs.

Very appropriate... he already turned the Star Trek reboot into a new wannabe Star Wars full of action and playing extra-loose with science. It only makes sense that he gets to make a movie in the series he actually wanted to do it in.

Lucas wrote outlines for 9 chronological stories. After he looked at the outlines, he figured the fourth one was most likely to be accepted as a film so he fleshed-out the screenplay for "A New Hope" and that's the one he presented to the movie studios. Even still, he was rejected by many studios until 20th Century Fox took a chance on the screenplay.

When you pitch a movie concept to a studio, you're not thinking sequels, you're just trying to get ONE made. Therefore, you pitch your BEST story to them. Considering that even Lucas felt the fourth in the series had the best plot, it's no surprise the remaining five episodes were considered "less". I've always wondered what was in outlines 7 through 9. Lucas never said, but they undoubtedly didn't match episode 4 either.

"A long time ago, in a hundred million annoying, blinding and unnecessary lens flares away..."

Considering that even Lucas felt the fourth in the series had the best plot, it's no surprise the remaining five episodes were considered "less".

George Lucas wrote the Original Trilogy as a singular movie with a lot of what was used for the prequels written as footnotes and appendices that were later expanded on some 15 years after the initial script. After a string of rejections Alan Ladd Jr. convinced the board at 20th Century Fox to greenlight it. The proviso being to split the script in some form or fashion, what we got was simply "Star Wars" not "A New Hope". Star Wars wasn't called Episode IV: A New Hope until it was re-released into the theaters just prior to "The Empire Strikes Back" knowing then that the whole trilogy would be made because the phenomenal success of "Star Wars".

Arguably just about every Star Wars fan knows that "The Empire Strikes Back" is far and away the best Star Wars movie there is; whether it's an individual's favorite or not doesn't matter, more often than not they know and readily admit it's it's the best. Case in point: Myself; My favorite is "Return of the Jedi", for personal reasons, it was the very first movie I had ever seen. But I know now that "Empire" is the best. And the fanbase almost unanimously concurs with this opinion. (This can be verified by waltzing into any Star Wars fan-forum.)