Regissören James Mangold är just nu i full färd med att planera inför sin kommande Star Wars-film som ska utspela sig cirka 25 000 år innan händelserna i The Phantom Menace. En tid där Kraften var ett nytt fenomen och ord som jedi och sith ännu inte hade yttrats för första gången.
I nysläppt intervju från The Happy Sad podcast berättar Mangold lite mer om hur han ser på användandet av just väletablerade termer inom Star Wars-världen i en tidsålder då galaxen långt långt borta var en såpass mycket yngre plats än den vi känner idag.
"I don't wanna make any guarantees one way or another, but it will be before Jedi, meaning you might be experiencing something that might become Jedi. Despite the fact that other people make movies other ways, I don't tend to think people brand themselves before they've actually found themselves. So you don't come up with a name for your organization ... 'Let's put this big thing on our chests.' I think that the branding tends to happen later."
Senare frågades han om vad det var som fick honom att backa bandet såpass långt tillbaka i tiden och arbeta med en, för Disneys Star Wars, outforskad tidsålder.
"When I talk to some of the Star Wars clerics who keep track of all these timelines, I was like, 'So when would this have happened?' and they were like, '25,000 years before Episode I.' And I was like, 'Oh, I was looking for some distance, but that's distance.' The reality, for me, was that feeling of space, pun not intended but apropos, was something that I felt was really important. Not to get away from -- again, fan service or the intricacies of what George [Lucas] has set up and dreamed of, but to just have the space to tell a story and not be instantly encumbered by the bases you have to hit. Which, honestly, there's no way to explain it to folks other than to say it's like that game we played as kids, Twister, that at a certain point, you're in a tangle because you just are trying to find a way to tell a story with so many constraints that you can't."
Star Wars skapare, George Lucas kom också på tal under intervjun och det visade sig att Mangold ännu inte har fått ett tillfälle med att sätta sig ner och prata om filmen med den avlägsna galaxens fader.
"I have not had a chance to talk to him at all about what I'm thinking. He was involved and read the script and was a Ford v Ferrari fan, I'm told, but it would be very interesting to talk to him. I'm very protective of myself, in the sense of ... Even describing meeting Bob Dylan in relation to the Dylan film, I like to have my sh-t together before I get into those kinds of situations. Because every good idea skates at the very edge of being precipitously awful. And every safe idea never gets towards that edge. So the trick is always to develop your idea enough that you're compatriates and consultants and mentor can understand how you're avoiding going over the edge, not just daring it."
Mangolds kommande Star Wars-rulle ser på förhand ut att bli något av en prequel till hela universumet där Kraften, Jedi-orderns ursprung och mycket annan motologi kan tänkas få en eller annan förklaring och detta berättade han lite kort om.
"It's a chance to tell the entire story of its own, the birth of the force. When I first talked to Kathy Kennedy about it, I just said, 'I just see this opening to make kind of a Ben-Hur or The 10 Commandments about the birth of the Force.' The Force has become a kind of religious legend that spans through all these movies. But where did it come from? How is it found? Who found it? Who was the first Jedi? And that's what I'm writing right now."
Är du nyfiken på vad som hände 25 000 år innan Anakin och Obi-Wan möttes första gången?
