Sequel trilogy

❌ Note: The following is based on the majority of the information publically given by Lucas between 1978 and 1994 in regards to a sequel trilogy to the original trilogy. The sequel trilogy was a putative film trilogy originally to be made by George Lucas and set in the Star Wars Galaxy.

The sequel trilogy
The sequel trilogy was to feature Luke Skywalker as a Jedi Master in his sixties passing on the flame to the next young hope and the rebuilding of the Republic. It would also have concerned the reestablishment of the Jedi Order, as foreshadowed by Yoda's line in Return of the Jedi, "Pass on what you have learned." Its main theme would have been, according to a 1983 Time magazine article, "the necessity for moral choices and the wisdom needed to distinguish right from wrong". According to more recent reports from Lucas, a major villain in the sequel trilogy would have been a figure previously frozen from Revenge of the Sith. In an interview with Lucas from Bantha Tracks in 1980 Lucas was asked what the third SW trilogy was about and he said that "It deals with the character that survives Star Wars III and his adventures. One wonders if he was reffering to Luke Skywalker from Episode VI:Return of the Jedi or the frozen villian from Episode III:Revenge of the Sith.

George Lucas mentioned the sequel trilogy in an interview published in Denise Worrell's 1983 book ICONS: Intimate Portraits. In a chapter entitled "The Dark Side of George Lucas", Lucas says has a vague notion of will what happen in the sequel trilogy.

Mark Hamill has said that George Lucas asked him to play Luke as an Obi-Wan type character who passes on the excalibur to the next young hope in Episode IX and that the sequels were to feature new characters with Hamill doing the cameo in Episode IX and that the sequels would be made around 2011. George Lucas has dismissed this as nothing more than an off-hand comment.

Other reports have revealed that Luke and Leia were not originally going to be related, and that Luke would eventually find his sister sometime in the sequels. Episode VII would have ended with Leia being crowned as queen of the remaining Alderaanians, and originally the Emperor was not to make an appearance until Episode IX.

Episodes VII, VIII, and IX would have taken place from approximately 40 ABY to 203 ABY, based on early facts from Lucas. A detailed fan timeline, Star Wars Timeline Gold, has suggested narrowing this further to 59 years after the Prequel Trilogy and 36 years after the Original Trilogy though this remains conjectural. Nathan Butler, the timeline's author, suggests that the storyline would have concerned Luke's efforts to save his son from falling to the dark side.

A Kenner promotion for Return of the Jedi vehicle playsets suggested that there would be 5 trilogies in total, with Kenner there "all of the way."

It is said that many of the proposed themes of the sequel trilogy were adapted into Dark Empire.

Further episodes
There have also been reports by Lucas of other Star Wars films that he considered than these three. Although they were at one point at least considered, no information is currently known of their stories, other than that they were to be of the further adventures of Luke Skywalker, according to the second issue of The Official Star Wars Bantha Tracks Newsletter from 1978.

Entries

 * The Sequel Trilogy (cancelled movie trilogy: George Lucas)
 * Star Wars: Episode VII (cancelled movie: George Lucas)
 * Star Wars: Episode VIII (cancelled movie: George Lucas)
 * Star Wars: Episode IX (cancelled movie: George Lucas)
 * "Post-Sequel Trilogy I" (cancelled movie trilogy: George Lucas)
 * "Post Sequel Trilogy I Episode I" (canceled movie: George Lucas)
 * "Post Sequel Trilogy I Episode II" (canceled movie: George Lucas)
 * "Post Sequel Trilogy I Episode III" (canceled movie: George Lucas)
 * "Post-Sequel Trilogy II" (cancelled movie trilogy: George Lucas)
 * "Post Sequel Trilogy II Episode I" (canceled movie: George Lucas)
 * "Post Sequel Trilogy II Episode II" (canceled movie: George Lucas)
 * "Post Sequel Trilogy II Episode III" (canceled movie: George Lucas)

Official claims
At this point in time, this trilogy is no longer to be made. The facts above are the only known facts given by Lucas about what he actually had in mind for the rest of the series. It is necessary to include these events, if only to support the fact that there was a Sequel Trilogy planned at one time, despite what Lucas has said since 1995 in rebuttal of what he said from 1978 to 1994. Of this information, only the name of Luke’s son, Ben Skywalker, is taken from other sources, from the Expanded Universe.

At this point (2005) after finishing his 6th movie of the saga, Lucas said that he has no plans of making another set trilogy, although there is still hope among some fans of passing the project to someone else, while controlling it behind the scenes, or doing the trilogy after some time.

Considering however the great success of the movie franchise&mdash;more than $4 billion&mdash;there is a suggestion that the creators and masterminds of the franchise wouldn't want to stop.

Officially, the sequel trilogy's place can be said to be taken by the Thrawn Trilogy, the Dark Empire comic series, and the other books and comics produced since 1991 which continue the adventures of the heroes of the original trilogy.

Other fan theories
Some fans have come to the erroneous conclusion that the Star Wars novels set after Return of the Jedi, most notably the Thrawn Trilogy or the New Jedi Order series, represent the "real" Episodes VII through IX&mdash;either believing that they will be made into films in the future, or believing that they are novelizations of unproduced scripts.