Poor George Lucas

Now, we all know that George Lucas has swimming pools filled with gold coins, and he likes to start each day with a brisk swim. I, on the other hand, am contemplating payment on a new furnace. I don’t pity his money. I don’t pity his fame. He’s doing just fine.

We talk on this blog and the podcast about people who will not let their first, great idea go. They muck with it time and time again, not willing to let it lie and move on to other projects. I shake my head when someone has been working on their first novel for ten years. It makes me sad.

Star Wars (not his first film, but he certainly hit a home run early in his career) came out in 1977. And Lucas will not let it go. It was just announced that he is going to retool all six Star Wars movies into 3D. He’s looking at a cake, which was baked and frosted to perfection thirty-three years ago, and thinking, “hmmm, it’s not done yet.”

Thirty three years. He’s still working on the same project. And yes, Clone Wars and (like them or not) Episodes I-III were other stories in the same universe. That’s fine. But he’s mucked about with Luke, Leia, and Han’s stories, what, twice now? This will be the third time. He can’t let it go.

I really hope in thirty or so years I’ll look back on what I’m creating now and see it as typical of work in the beginning of my career, not the work that must be retooled over and over again. Does he think it’s the best thing he’ll ever create? Is he really that much in love with it? Is he afraid that it’s the best he’ll ever do, and is afraid he’s going to make another Howard the Duck? Wikipedia tells me he’s venturing into another movie that, for the first time in sixteen years, is not a Star Wars or Indiana Jones movie, but if he’s going back to Star Wars, the man has a problem.

Someone has to take away his security blankie.

I know Lucas can buy and sell me a hundred times over. But I’m not talking about money. I’m talking about creative fulfillment, and personally I would be quite depressed if I still felt the need to be messing with my creations thirty-three years later.

Put down the security blankie, George. I’m sure you have some more good ideas. Move on.

(For the record, I don’t think George “raped my childhood” as some people fear. I don’t have a sense of ownership over Star Wars and wish he’d leave my memories alone – it’s his property and he can keep messing with it until he dies, if he wants to. I just think it’s sad that he can’t create something and then leave it to be consumed by the fans.)

(Also, I’d love to say I’m not giving him my money any more. But I’m a parent, and my daughter is RIGHT NOW playing with her Millennium Falcon (piloted by Storm Troopers) instead of cleaning her room, and I can’t promise that I’m going to deny her the pleasure of seeing Star Wars on the big screen. I can’t promise I won’t get good and liquored up beforehand, though. — OK, I can promise that. Jeez, what kind of parent do you think I AM?)