The Gap: The 10 Years Between TPM and AOTC

It could be explained in the Sequel Trilogy.

Here's Dave Filoni mentioning the reason they had the Sifo-Dyas arc in Clone Wars was because, it was something George wanted to lock down before he left.

He was writing treatments for the Sequel Trilogy before he left ....

 

I suspect it was probably more that the Sifo Dyas thing was one of the more obvious loose ends from the PT that he'd never really bothered to tie up.

 

He does mention in the Attack of the Clones commentary that it's something that will be explained in Revenge of the Sith. This ultimately didn't happen. Same with the revelation of Anakin's birth from midi-chorlians. It's possible he saw potential in waiting for the Sequel Trilogy to bind the story together. For the story is a continuation after all. Beginning with The Phantom Menace and ending with IX.

 

One thing to also bear in mind is, Lucas made substantial story cuts to ROTS after the first draft of the screenplay. We got to see some of those elements as deleted scenes on the DVD, but there were whole plot threads that were eliminated so that Lucas could focus more specifically on Anakin's struggles with his fears about Padme's death. One lost plot thread that still had a little bit of connective tissue left in the film was that of Palpatine trying to lead Anakin to suspect that Obi Wan and Padme had something going between them.

But apparently a good bit of story was excised from the ROTS script by the time shooting began, and even more was cut once it came time to edit the film together.

As of 2005, Lucas really didn't have any plans to make a sequel trilogy. His story has changed on a lot of things over the years, but I think that one is probably fairly solid. He spent a lot of time and effort pitching the notion that the Star Wars saga was meant to be "the tragedy of Darth Vader". I don't get the impression that he really began setting down treatment notes for the ST films until he began to consider selling LFL. I know he had some old notes from back in the late '70s and early '80s, which I assume he worked into the new treatments to some extent, but the whole sequel trilogy thing seems to me to have been more of a value-add to make the LFL sale happen.

Perhaps you're right, but I just don't get the impression that Lucas was planning ST films while he was making ROTS. Nothing he said at the time (or really at any time until the LFL sale rolled around years later) ever indicated to me that he intended to make any more Star Wars movies.

 

You have to remember this was in his denial stages.

There's this from George and Steven Spielberg in a BBC Documentary in the early 90's.

" Star Wars is a story, divided into three trilogies. It's a long movie of 18 hours, divided in nine parts." - George Lucas

" George always wanted to make nine. He wanted to make the first three, then he wanted to make the prequels to that, then he wanted to make the last three. And that was something that was part of his concept." - Steven Spielberg

There's also a quote from Rick McCallum in there mentioning rather or not the Sequel Trilogy gets made will depend on how George feels.

As well as a quote George made during his denial stage ..

" There's things in Episode I that need to connect with Episode VII, hang on we're not there yet."

I think it's more then possible he just denied things a lot. As Mark Hamill and James Arnold Taylor recently discussed at Celebration.

 

Quite possibly. We shall see! You know this will all come out in the behind-the-scenes books that get made over the next 5-10 years.

Remember too, there was also the "sequel trilogy" plan prior to ROTJ where Luke's story would have been spread out over 6 or 9 films, which was all consolidated into the ROTJ story (one of the major points of artistic disagreement that led to Gary Kurtz's departure after ESB.) A lot of the later references to a sequel trilogy seemed to be in response to that subject being raised (which it always was over the years.)

 

I don't see why it would be a problem to fill in some of this information, granted, the examples you mentioned don't interest me that much, but I don't see the harm if these details are revealed in short stories or in comments mentioned in other novels or elsewhere. If they don't interest you simply don't follow the stories set in that era.

 

I always remember the game Star Wars Bounty Hunter. Sort of filled in the gaps of what Jango was doing during this period and how he became the clone template. I think there is a lot of potential from this era, it's one of the few times between I and VI that is relatively peaceful. I've always imagined a Bioware style game featuring Obi Wan and Anakin would work really well here.

 

I always had thought the CIS was developed to battle the oppression of the Republic due to the Trade Federation blocking critical trade routes. Either way in its entirety the CIS's main goal was to destroy the Republic.

 

I like the idea of some character focused mini-series set in this time period like Marvel's been doing lately. It wouldn't help plug the gap very much (as we'd be focused on one particular event for each character most likely), but it'd help with really getting to understand the characters. In particular I'd really like one about Dooku, we know a lot about his time as a Sith Lord, but almost nothing about his time as a Jedi.

 

I don't think they knew what their purpose was, they were like pieces on a chess board with Sidious making the moves.

 

Yeah that actually makes a lot of sense, since Sidious dispatched Vader in ROTS to wipe out the rest of the CIS.

 

I've always wondered why he lost his lightsaber skill during AOTC time period. What exactly caused it? And in general, I can't say I hate AOTC. Sure it had its flaws but in its entirety I actually think it was an okay movie. I mean whats not to love? The character arc of Anakin (minus the dialogue in some parts), Obi-wans discovery of the Clones, Obi-wans detective work on the CIS and Trade Federation. Sure we can all agree AOTC was not THAT great, and some things could've been changed and moved around. But overall my opinion still stands, AOTC was an alright movie.

 

I think a tv series that focuses on the bounty hunters would be really interesting (either animated or live action). The rise of Cad Bane, Jango Fett, etc. An occasional Jedi appearance could be woven in.

TV shows like Smallville and Gotham have been really popular (showing the younger years of said heroes.) Perhaps a similar tale about Anakin would also be interesting. Without the beard, Ewan could be made to look the right age for the time period.

 

Yeah, they really haven't done much with this ten-year gap. I think there is a really good opportunity for Disney to use that period to flesh out Padme Amidala as a character - of the series leads, she is by far the most under-serviced. I think a comic book series or book series that follows her adventures between Episodes I and II would be awesome.

 

Lucas doomed the PT with the (self imposed) 3 episode per trilogy rule. It's absurd that this 10 year gap even exists. There needed to be at least 1 more episode between TPM and AotC. I suppose a TV show could've worked, but only about Anakin -- he doesn't see Padme at all during this time, so she can't appear; and neither Obi-Wan nor Anakin have heard of Jango by AotC, so he can't appear either. Still, this period needs to be flushed out. There are so many important stories to tell: Did Anakin go to the academy or just train with Obi-Wan? Were other padawans of his age unkind to him or jealous of his abilities? Did Anakin have any friends or was he a loner? What did Anakin struggle with as an adolescent? Did other jedi treat him differently because of the chosen one prophecy?

TFA should be episode 8 or 9. The reason the OT worked in 3 episodes is because Luke didn't start training 'til he was 19. Lucas defeated himself by trying to cram the PT into 3 episodes.