James Mangold teases his Dawn of the Jedi Star Wars movie in a recent interview. Mangold was announced as developing a Star Wars movie which would go back 25k years to the Dawn of the Jedi era at SWC. However, since then we’ve had almost no other details. Partly I’m sure because Mangold has to actually write it and there is a writers strike on now. Another reason is how busy Mangold is. The writer/director spoke to ComicBook recently promoting of Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny.

Freedom Working With Lucasfilm

Mangold has now worked with Lucasfilm and brought a movie to the fore which seemed eternally stalled. He began by praising the freedom Lucasfilm gives him as a filmmaker. This has been both a blessing and a curse for Star Wars before, but there you go.

“Well, I think the simplest level is movies are all about people and I’ve gotten to know everybody involved in all walks of life at Lucasfilm and Disney and that certainly makes it easier,” Mangold explained. “And the amount of trust and the amount of the freedom they give you to me is honestly the most important aspect of making a movie like this.”

“Because where big movies can get into trouble is when they become committee films. And we all know what those films feel like and look like and to me, they’re not only, I don’t enjoy those kinds of movies so much, but on another level, I certainly don’t want to make one because I don’t feel connected to what I’m doing. I’m just performing a service, enacting what a committee has come up with. For me, if I’m not involved in the writing and what the story is, I don’t know why I’m there directing it.” 

Dawn of the Jedi Teases

However when Mangold spoke with io9 recently, he gave a little more detail on what to expect from his Dawn of the Jedi movie. That’s the era folks for now, not the movie’s title, which as yet it does not have.

“Well, I’ve talked to [Lucasfilm] before and even worked a bit before on other projects,” Mangold told io9. “And I’m always interested in what’s going on there and have friends who work on other Star Wars projects. But I understood that much of what they were doing was kind of continuing the saga forward.”

“So when I mentioned to Kathy [Kennedy, Lucasfilm president] the idea that I had about going backward—really far backward—I was surprised that it excited her and the other wonderful people she works with at Lucasfilm,” he continued. “For me, it’s about, I want to be part of the saga, but I also don’t want to be holding so much lore in the air that you can hardly tell a story. And what I really wanted to do, what I told her, was just can we make a kind of the Ten Commandments of the Force, you know? A kind of origin story of how the Force came to be known, understood, wielded, and harnessed.”

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It makes sense. Mangold wants to play in the Star Wars sandbox. However, he doesn’t want to be trapped into some of the lore and canon issues. Going really far back, solves that partly, but only partly for me. Whilst Mangold can explore aspects of the Force that have long been forgotten, it still needs to feel like the Universe we know is where all this moved towards. That means there will remain certain rules which should be adhered to. It’s always about pushing the boundaries without breaking them for me in Star Wars.

I’m excited by the idea of this era more than I am Mangold himself. I didn’t love Logan like many fans did. So far I’m also not that impressed with what little I’ve seen of Indiana Jones an the Dial of Destiny. I hope my mind is changed when I see the movie though to be sure. For me, this Dawn of the Jedi era the right idea. I just can’t say whether it’s the right person delivering the right idea for now.

What do you think as James Mangold teases his Dawn of the Jedi Star Wars movie? Does what Mangold decsribes about discovering the Force interest you as a fan? Thoughts below as always.

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