Lawrence Kasdan Talks the Future of Solo and Working With George Lucas in the Early Days of ILM

Lawrence Kasdan reasserted his name as one of the greats in directing the Light & Magic docuseries, currently streaming on Disney Plus. For a lack of better words, the series has put the spotlight on Industrial Light & Magic (ILM), and how they brought not just Star Wars, but so much of cinema to life. Kasdan of course was just the wordsmith behind The Empire Strikes Back and Raiders of the Lost Ark back when ILM was truly getting off the ground, but he still carries that personal history with him to this day.



Speaking with Inverse, Kasdan recalled what it was like to get his first major writing job with the sequel to 1977’s Star Wars. He also touched on what his future might hold, including revisiting the world of 2018's Solo: A Star Wars Story.



Jonathan and Lawrence Kasdan



Kasdan has remained a fixture in Star Wars, writing the screenplay for The Force Awakens as well as co-writing Solo with his son Jonathan. The later famously went on to perform poorly at the box office, grossing a franchise-low $392 million, but that hasn’t stopped fans calling for Lucasfilm to take another crack at Solo ever since.



With the introduction of Disney Plus, it seemed like an easy call to continue the story in some form. Lando was eventually announced in 2020, but it's unclear how much tangible movement has been made on the series since. On the subject of a Solo-specific follow-up series, Kasdan isn't a fan of the idea. He said:

Jon Kasdan and Ron Howard have also recently spoken about Solo, and Kathleen Kennedy herself had to clarify some comments. So until the door is forever shut, keep the faith Solo 2 fans.







The senior Kasdan is considered to be the one who fully realized Han Solo as a character in The Empire Strikes Back. Kasdan talked about his initial response when he was brought into the franchise by George Lucas:

Kasdan next touched on the idea that George told him to not worry about the budget while he was writing, instead just telling the best story possible. That's what Lucas had ILM for. He said:

(L-R): Joe Johnston, John Dykstra and Dave Jones in a scene from Lucasfilm's LIGHT & MAGIC, exclusively on Disney+. © 2022 Lucasfilm Ltd. & ™. All Rights Reserved.



42 years later and now we have a new documentary series about it all. No matter if he's writing or directing, Kasdan spoke about his approach to storytelling:

If you haven't checked out Light & Magic on Disney Plus yet, you can read our review of the series here.





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