Taika Waititi's Star Wars Movie Is on Ice, and I Think That's a Win for Filoni

Taika Waititi's Star Wars movie has been put on ice, by the director's own account. I think that's a green check mark for Dave Filoni, because it suggests he has a vision for Lucasfilm and is willing to make calls on it. I've been tough on Filoni. John Rocha joined me to talk it through.

This story takes me back to the Rian Johnson trilogy. I said many times that the Rian Johnson Star Wars trilogy wasn't happening, and people would push back and insist it was. It wasn't, in the same way this Taika one isn't. Now it clearly isn't. Things have shifted dramatically.

Waititi told Inverse his Star Wars film is in cold storage

The report I read lays out the history. It has been six years since Waititi was linked to a Star Wars film, and according to the director it's going to be a very long time before we see it, if we ever do. He was originally slated to helm the film, with Krysty Wilson-Cairns set to write. Screenwriter Tony McNamara later came on board. It never seemed to go anywhere.

There was an update in January, as Kathleen Kennedy exited Lucasfilm. At the time it was said that a completed script was hilarious and great, and Waititi said at Sundance that he hoped to harness more of the fun of the original films. Since then there has been little movement, and Waititi has had multiple projects in development, any one of which could move forward.

Speaking with Inverse while promoting his upcoming film Klara and the Sun, Waititi said the project is being locked away in cold storage. "It's very iced," he said. "I've got about four other movies that I'm trying to do." Asked what the different project he mentioned was, he checked with his publicist and was told: "if you have to ask. The answer is no." Still, the report notes he isn't shutting the door on the film, just leaving it open a crack.

Waititi's film record, and why I push back on the word stumbled

The report lists a Charlie and the Chocolate Factory movie among the upcoming work on his slate. It then says that, after a dream run of acclaim, his directorial efforts stumbled with Thor: Love and Thunder. I hate that movie. It's my least favorite Marvel movie. But I don't know if stumbled is the right word, because it came close to a billion dollars. You can still say it made $800 million or whatever it made, so that's hard to put in there.

The report also notes Next Goal Wins received mixed reviews, which is fair. Klara and the Sun was panned at its recent premiere, and it opens on October 23rd.

Filoni has a vision, even if it turns out to be the wrong one

Here's why I think this is a win for Filoni: he clearly has a vision. I don't know if the vision is going to be good. But he has one. Taika did great stuff on The Mandalorian, there's no doubt about it, in the episodes he directed and other things. But a hilarious Star Wars movie is not what they need right now.

This was a Kathleen Kennedy project, and Filoni effectively said no thank you, that's not where we're going. So Filoni is making moves. He has an idea of what he wants to do and where he wants to take it. Again, I don't know if those moves are going to be right. They could very well be terrible.

Starfighter came up in the discussion as the last thing Kennedy put into motion, and not Filoni's. There are rumors that he raised concerns about it rather than refusing it outright, but that he was overruled because Kennedy was still in play at the time. The point was made that he will probably be judged on Starfighter even though it isn't his, because he's the guy in power, and that he'll be judged on the Simon Kinberg material too, which seems to be where things are headed.

Lucasfilm finally looks like it has a plan

The one thing I've always wanted Lucasfilm to have, and it seems like they have it now, is a plan. I don't know if it's the right plan. But there's a plan in place. As hard as I've been on Filoni, it seems like he's making decisions instead of just signing people because they're popular.

That's what Kathleen Kennedy did. Everybody loves Taika, he's a big hot director, so get him and do a movie. Lord and Miller are great, so do a movie, and then when she didn't like what they were doing, they were gone. This person's hot, that person's hot. Filoni isn't doing that, and I respect it.

Look at Jon Watts on the first movie. He didn't just come off Spider-Man. He's been dormant for a bit, and they liked working with him on Skeleton Crew. So the thinking is that they need someone to bring the first movie of this trilogy together.

John Rocha thinks Waititi's film career is in trouble

John pointed out that all of this is only coming out because Taika did a red carpet. He thinks Filoni made these moves right after he took over, made it very clear who was going to keep going with their projects and who wasn't, and showed he would walk his own path for better or worse. In his view it's a very clear vision, even if we may not like it in the end.

He also noted that Daisy Ridley recently wiped her Instagram of everything but one post from her film Magpie, with all the Star Wars material gone, and he thinks things are starting to come into motion and line up.

John thinks the Taika project was never going to work right now. Maybe they'll revisit it down the road, but he sees Waititi as damaged goods in many ways, and he thinks Klara and the Sun is going to come out and flop. He called it a hell of a descent from Jojo Rabbit and Thor: Ragnarok. Next Goal Wins was fun, he said, but it was never going to make much money.

He compared Waititi's situation to M. Night Shyamalan's, a director with huge hype who then had to work his way back up, though John doesn't know if the projects are there, or if Waititi's style of humor works theatrically. On TV, with The Mandalorian and Our Flag Means Death, John says he's great and successful. Film-wise, he thinks Waititi is in trouble, so Filoni moving away from that and bringing in guys with more solid, current track records strikes him as a smart move overall.

Why hearing Love and Thunder was just a Taika movie worried me

That was my point when people turned against the Jon Watts announcement. I think Watts is going to be able to deliver what they want in terms of the plan, and that's what Star Wars needs right now.

I've used this example many times, but I think it's one of the reasons that phase of Marvel started to have problems. What was so great about Marvel was that it had the genres right. Winter Soldier was a spy thriller. Ant-Man was a crime comedy. Then Kevin Feige was asked about the genre of Love and Thunder, and he said, "Oh, this is just a Taika movie." I looked at Winston and went, uh-oh. In the same way, I think Multiverse of Madness was a Sam Raimi movie.

In these types of movies, if you're building a larger narrative, you don't want them to be corporate movies. You want the director's voice and the director's feel. But you don't want it to be the director's movie alone. Bring in David Fincher and it's going to be a David Fincher movie. Bring in Jon Watts and he's going to put his style on it, but he's going to give you episode 10.