Game of Thrones Showrunners' Movies Will Be 'Star Wars On Acid'

25 May, 2018

Game of Thrones actress Emilia Clarke is eagerly anticipating what her current showrunners, David Benioff and D.B. Weiss, will do with their planned series of Star Wars movies. True, the actress has beaten the two to the punch. She is one of the stars of Solo: A Star Wars Story. As Han's childhood friend Qi'ra, Clarke's character is seemingly the female lead of Solo, making it her first big (and hopefully more successful) role since the underwhelming Terminator Genysis.

Yet Clarke's impact on the Star Wars universe seems to be rather self-contained. The same can probably not be said of what Benioff and Weiss are about to do with the franchise in their own spinoff series. The plans for Benioff and Weiss' movies were announced shortly before The Last Jedi. Yet all that is really known about this new Star Wars series is the duo will be writing and producing, but not directing. For her part, Clarke is sure that the pair will do something that has never been seen in the franchise.

In an interview with Variety, Emilia Clarke was pressed on what she thinks will happen with the movies. Although she doesn't know any details, Clarke was quite confident and excited about what the writers have up their sleeves. The actress explained:

[They'll bring] what they brought to fantasy as a genre people are appreciating on a much grander scale. Putting all that creativity, all of that skill and all of that intellect into something that already is, or has, so much. I think it's just going to be Star Wars on acid.

Out of anyone, Clarke is probably in one of the best positions to predict what will happen with the mysterious movies that Weiss and Benioff are creating. She's the only person, at the moment, who has worked on Game of Thrones and the new era of Star Wars movies. Yet it's still some pretty heavy speculation on the actress' part. Even though Clarke knows people who are intimately involved with the new series, including Weiss and Benioff themselves, she probably knows little more than the average movie fan.

However, Weiss and Benioff taking the series in a bold, new direction probably isn't too far off base. Although the pair's most famous work is adapting an extensive (but unfinished) series of novels in Game of Thrones, they've taken their share of liberties with that material. Game of Thrones did start off being a very faithful adaptation of the books but eventually diverged from the source - though all of the story beats are the same since Benioff and Weiss were briefed by Martin himself on how it will end.

The more interesting thing is how the audience will respond to a less than traditional Star Wars series. Since the launch of The Force Awakens, Lucasfilm and Disney has stuck pretty close to the status quo. They've continued the Skywalker saga in the mainline movies and the spinoffs, Rogue One and Solo, have been directly in the framework of the original trilogy. Weiss and Benioff's series - along with the Star Wars trilogy being planned by Rian Johnson - will be neither of those things.

Johnson's The Last Jedi dipped its toe into the waters of changing the standard Star Wars formula, breaking convention all over the place. However, the changes that The Last Jedi made to standard formula is something that some fans had a lot of problems with. Weiss and Benioff creating Star Wars "on acid" may cause even more of an uproar.

On the other hand, if Lucasfilm and Disney plan on churning out Star Wars movies to the end of time, some risks should be taken and changes should be made. Weiss and Benioff getting into the Star Wars sandbox and mixing everything up might not be what every fan wants. However, in the end it could be exactly what the franchise needs to survive and thrive.