Star Wars Peeps, Waititi is Tooling with You

Don’t worry about Taika’s take on a galaxy far, far away….

In itself, it’s a controversial moment in the already divisive Star Wars: The Last Jedi.

In the scene, we see General Hux (Hugs?) getting very frustrated with Resistance pilot Poe Dameron whose static-said word hurdles keep tripping up the overstuffed First Order general.

Finally, his adjunct has seen enough and says:

So, here’s me, trusted (hopefully?) Star Wars blogger saying to all of you who are worried about Taika Waititi’s ability to deliver a great movie set in a galaxy far, far away:

“I believe he’s tooling with you…”

Because I believe he is really tooling with all of us. He got bored on a press junket for Thor: Love and Thunder and started having fun.

Now, based on the Rolling Stone footage, do I believe the guy forgot about Natalie Portman being in Star Wars, Episodes 1 through 3? Sure. Possibly. Maybe. I mean, there’s a cottage industry of folks (I am not amongst them) who’d rather forget about the Prequels.

But, do I think he is any less capable of pulling together a fun, satisfying installment for the Star Wars universe based on his memory lapse? Nope.

Star Wars Sense of Humor

In fact, I think that his well-developed sense of humor around Star Wars helped Waititi while performing in and directing The Mandalorian. To that end, Taika re6minds Rolling Stone viewers that he’s the guy who filmed a scout trooper punching Baby Yoda.

By the way, even beyond the clickbait, the whole point of the beginning of his interview with Rolling Stone’s Brian Hiatt is to subvert the normal cadence of the auteur interview. He’s playing with action figures for Chrissakes.

And, before his Star Wars comments, he had already explained that he had already messed with Portman by mentioning to the Oscar-winning actor that she’s best known to him for an early part in the movie, Heat.

Then, with a twinkle in his eye, he added:

Natalie said to me, what do you do next? And I said “I’m trying to work on a Star Wars thing. Have you ever wanted to be in a Star Wars movie?” She said, “I’ve been in Star Wars movies.” I forgot about those ones. [Laughs]

Taika Waititi to Rolling Stone

The look on Waititi’s face says it all. He was playing around with Portman and, by extension, us.

My takeaways from the interview:

• He is honored to have a shot at Star Wars.
• It won’t involve anything that will drastically affect the current canon.
• Taika is a busy guy, so he knows that it’s probably easier to work with new characters, and settings.
• And he is taking his time so that he doesn’t have to have a tough talk with Lucasfilm boss Kathleen Kennedy.

He said:

[With] Star Wars, I don’t want to rush. It’s something I wouldn’t want to just leap into and not feel that it’s unique, it’s my film, and it makes sense. Because that would be a disaster. I’m writing at the moment. So I’m gonna do my best to come up with an idea that everyone loves.

Waititi on developing a Star Wars project.

Now, my final takeaway is that I don’t think we’ll be seeing this movie anytime soon (and certainly not on any proposed premiere date on the current Disney calendar).

Fine with me. I’ll wait.

But, then again, would it shock me to find out that the script is done and ready and they’ll begin shooting straight away?

Nope.

Don’t forget to watch the entire interview over at Rolling Stone.

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