The arrival of Star Wars: Visions has caught the attention of the wider press, it’s vivid design and unique style bringing new eyes to the galaxy far, far away and Variety talk with a number of creatives behind the show – executive producer James Waugh, vice president of production at Lucasfilm Animation Jacqui Lopez, co-executive producer Justin Leach, producer Kanako Shirasaki, actor Masi Oka – discussing the thoughts behind its creation and how seven independent animation studios crafted a nine episode series of distinctly Japanese Star Wars stories.
One of the biggest sticking points was just how Lucasfilm should go about incorporating anime into the world of “Star Wars.” The clearest path to drawing a “Star Wars”-sized audience would be an anime feature film or animated series, but those kinds of projects would be tied to a single aesthetic that would by necessity leave behind the vast spectrum of visual and narrative approaches in anime.
“We wanted this to be a kind of survey of all the nuance and tones and textures of anime,” Waugh says. “We didn’t want this to be one note, because I think there’s an expectation of what anime is versus, you know, truly the diverse array of storytelling that is done in the medium.”
Another hurdle was the sticky issue of how to make a “Star Wars” anime project while remaining within “Star Wars” canon. “But if we have to stay in canon, we’re going to be completely directing it,” says executive producer Jacqui Lopez, vice president of production at Lucasfilm Animation.
The dilemma stalled any progress, leaving “‘Star Wars,’ with anime” as a tantalizing idea floating through the halls of Lucasfilm without any home — until Disney’s nascent streaming service walked in the door.
“It took Disney Plus, really, to give us the opportunity for a platform that changed the way we were thinking about ‘Star Wars’ storytelling,” Waugh says. “Then it was just a matter of how do we do it in a way that was going to be as authentic as possible, and really let the studios own the storytelling as unique expressions of ‘Star Wars’ — which we just hadn’t explored within the creative strategy we were working through at the time. That’s what unlocked the ‘Visions’ framework. We really wanted to have something that allowed us to lean into the medium in a more celebratory way.”
With the relative freedom afforded by Disney Plus, and a desire to cast as wide a net as possible, Lucasfilm seized on the idea of recruiting a suite of anime studios — each with their own visual specialities and storytelling interests — to make a series of one-off short films. Starting in early 2020, Lucasfilm partnered with Qubic Pictures, a production company that specializes in bridging anime projects between Japan and the U.S., to find the right anime studios in Japan for the project, sort through their pitches, and develop their final ideas into finished films.
Exploring the galaxy since 1978, Mark wrote his first fan fiction in 1981 and been a presence online since his first webpage Fanta War in 1996. He currently contributes to Star Wars Insider, ILM.com, SkywalkerSound.com and Starburst Magazine, having previously written for StarWars.com, Star Wars Encyclopedia, Build The Millennium Falcon, Geeky Monkey, TV Film Memorabilia and Model and Collectors Mart.
He is a four-time Star Wars Celebration Stage host, the only podcaster to have appeared on every Celebration podcast stage since it began in 2015, the Daily Content Manager of Fantha Tracks and the co-host of Making Tracks, Canon Fodder and Start Your Engines on Fantha Tracks Radio.
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The arrival of Star Wars: Visions has caught the attention of the wider press, it’s vivid design and unique style bringing new eyes to the galaxy far, far away and Variety talk with a number of creatives behind the show – executive producer James Waugh, vice president of production at Lucasfilm Animation Jacqui Lopez, co-executive producer Justin Leach, producer Kanako Shirasaki, actor Masi Oka – discussing the thoughts behind its creation and how seven independent animation studios crafted a nine episode series of distinctly Japanese Star Wars stories.
One of the biggest sticking points was just how Lucasfilm should go about incorporating anime into the world of “Star Wars.” The clearest path to drawing a “Star Wars”-sized audience would be an anime feature film or animated series, but those kinds of projects would be tied to a single aesthetic that would by necessity leave behind the vast spectrum of visual and narrative approaches in anime.
“We wanted this to be a kind of survey of all the nuance and tones and textures of anime,” Waugh says. “We didn’t want this to be one note, because I think there’s an expectation of what anime is versus, you know, truly the diverse array of storytelling that is done in the medium.”
Another hurdle was the sticky issue of how to make a “Star Wars” anime project while remaining within “Star Wars” canon. “But if we have to stay in canon, we’re going to be completely directing it,” says executive producer Jacqui Lopez, vice president of production at Lucasfilm Animation.
The dilemma stalled any progress, leaving “‘Star Wars,’ with anime” as a tantalizing idea floating through the halls of Lucasfilm without any home — until Disney’s nascent streaming service walked in the door.
“It took Disney Plus, really, to give us the opportunity for a platform that changed the way we were thinking about ‘Star Wars’ storytelling,” Waugh says. “Then it was just a matter of how do we do it in a way that was going to be as authentic as possible, and really let the studios own the storytelling as unique expressions of ‘Star Wars’ — which we just hadn’t explored within the creative strategy we were working through at the time. That’s what unlocked the ‘Visions’ framework. We really wanted to have something that allowed us to lean into the medium in a more celebratory way.”
With the relative freedom afforded by Disney Plus, and a desire to cast as wide a net as possible, Lucasfilm seized on the idea of recruiting a suite of anime studios — each with their own visual specialities and storytelling interests — to make a series of one-off short films. Starting in early 2020, Lucasfilm partnered with Qubic Pictures, a production company that specializes in bridging anime projects between Japan and the U.S., to find the right anime studios in Japan for the project, sort through their pitches, and develop their final ideas into finished films.
Exploring the galaxy since 1978, Mark wrote his first fan fiction in 1981 and been a presence online since his first webpage Fanta War in 1996. He currently contributes to Star Wars Insider, ILM.com, SkywalkerSound.com and Starburst Magazine, having previously written for StarWars.com, Star Wars Encyclopedia, Build The Millennium Falcon, Geeky Monkey, TV Film Memorabilia and Model and Collectors Mart.
He is a four-time Star Wars Celebration Stage host, the only podcaster to have appeared on every Celebration podcast stage since it began in 2015, the Daily Content Manager of Fantha Tracks and the co-host of Making Tracks, Canon Fodder and Start Your Engines on Fantha Tracks Radio.
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