With the upcoming release of Star Wars: The Last Jedi, critics and fans alike are high on writer-director Rian Johnson. Hell, Lucasfilm themselves is high on Rian Johnson. If they weren’t they wouldn’t have given him the go-ahead to develop a whole new trilogy set in the Star Wars universe.

But how did this new trilogy come about? We’ve heard from Johnson himself that it was kind of a means to continue working together after a fantastic experience with The Last Jedi, and in a new interview with /Film, he reiterates that point. However, there is one key embellishment here.

RELATED – How The New Star Wars Trilogy Came About

When asked by the outlet if he even had a story for his pitch, Johnson said:

“No. It came about because we were getting to the end of making this and again, I knew I wasn’t doing the next one. And I had had a really good time not just making this movie, but working with Kathy and also working with Disney, working with Bob Iger, Alan Horn, and Alan Berg. And we just had just a really good experience. And we were all…it was like last week of senior year. We were cleaning out our lockers. And all getting kind of sad. And saying, how do we keep working together? And that I threw out, I said, the most interesting thing to me would be a new trilogy, one story told over three movies. Go new places, meet new folks, come up with a new story to tell in the Star Wars universe. The sky’s the limit. That sounds thrilling. And they really responded to that. So we’re off, yeah.”

So it sounds like the folks over at Lucasfilm are going on good faith for this one. Such a great experience they had working with Johnson that they’re really willing to put everything on the line for this brand new trilogy. It wasn’t any idea that excited them, but the prospect of working with a trusted collaborator once again.

This is key. Too often studios get caught up in aligning filmmakers too much with their ideas. As Pixar learned years ago, it’s not the ideas that matter, it’s the people behind the ideas, and Lucasfilm was smart to pick up Johnson when they did.

Star Wars: The Last Jedi hits theaters this Thursday!

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SOURCE: /Film