Friday, January 17, 2020

“THOR” Director TAIKA WAITITI Reportedly Approached for Future “STAR WARS” Film


There is no denying now that New Zealand filmmaker Taika Waititi has become a hot commodity in the international motion picture industry from Hollywood. It began in 2017 when his directing job on the MCU film “Thor: Ragnarok” made for perhaps the most positively-received installment of the movies starring Chris Hemsworth as Marvel’s God of Thunder. He even acted in it too, as well as in “Avengers: Endgame” last year. Then he directed the final episode of the first season for “Star Wars” spinoff “The Mandalorian” on Disney+ streaming, and his latest film “Jojo Rabbit” is a multiple Oscar nominee.

So it does not come as a surprise anymore that as The Hollywood Reporter tells us, Taika Waititi has been allegedly approached to direct a potential new future film about a Galaxy Far, Far Away from a long time ago. Indeed, Waititi might just be the next currently-prominent director being courted to be at the helm of a “Star Wars” production, according to inside sources. There were no specific details on what exactly was discussed with Waititi, and no comment on the matter was given by Lucasfilm and Disney either.

Talk about “Star Wars” films seems to be at low ebb recently. The latest movie, “The Rise of Skywalker,” premiered December last year to cap off a Disney-produced sequel trilogy that started out strong but has since been wracked by fandom dissatisfaction. Even “Rise,” despite becoming a billion-dollar moneymaker, was felt to be not as epic a block buster as either the original or even the prequel trilogies were. Recent statements from Lucasfilm have hinted that they would give the film franchise a rest after concluding the nine-episode “Skywalker saga” and the failure of the non-Skywalker spinoffs. For the moment, they would be focusing on TV animations and more streaming series such as “The Mandalorian.”

Speaking of which, Taika Waititi certainly had lots of fun directing the Disney+ spinoff’s season 1 finale. It helped perhaps that the show-runner for “Mandalorian,” Jon Favreau, had worked with him on Marvel Studios’ MCU franchise. And it is being speculated that the various episode directors of the show were being tested if they could do more with another “Star Wars” series or movie. The film being proposed for direction by Waititi is, after all, different from another rumored project that is being conceptualized by Marvel Studios’ boss Kevin Feige.

Outside of “Star Wars,” Waititi is probably waiting with bated breath for the outcome of the nominations for his historical comedy-drama film “Jojo Rabbit” in the 92nd Academy Awards this February. He is also directing “Thor: Love and Thunder” for the MCU, coming in 2021, and he is still attached to the Warner Bros. project for a live-action adaptation of the classic anime film “Akira.”

Image courtesy of Deadline

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