Kathleen Kennedy: Legitimate Gripes or Blistering Mysogyny?

[Username taken]

I don't think there's ever been a unified fanbase. At any rate, almost all the blame for the division can be laid at the feet of fans themselves. We alone control how we'll react when we don't like stuff. It's a choice to discuss it civilly (or refrain if it's too much of a sore subject) or be a toxic jerk over it.



Besides, Disney has had three successful films in a row. Even if Solo's "failure" does cause them to rethink how they move forward with the franchise, the narrative that I've seen some haters pushing that the franchise is falling apart around Disney and they're on the brink of failure simply isn't true.

Yeah, Star Wars isn't falling apart and the fandom will NEVER be united.

There will always exist a toxic part of fandom with very loud voices, these guys largely have their own agendas and there's literally no way Disney/Lucasfilm can please these guys.

[WebLurker]

Yeah, Star Wars isn't falling apart and the fandom will NEVER be united.

And what's wrong with being different? We''re all Star Wars fans, regardless of the specific elements we're fans of.

There will always exist a toxic part of fandom with very loud voices, these guys largely have their own agendas and there's literally no way Disney/Lucasfilm can please these guys.

Unfortunately, fans like that seem to be the ones that expect everything will please them and that not being pleased is justification to engage in harassment.

[Derek Metaltron]

I recognize that there will always be vocal aggressive minorities in fandoms like Star Wars, and it is annoying that they impact the ability for other people to understand what are and aren't legitimate and well reasoned issues with something within said fandom. But for those moaning few who grew up in 1977 and expect that Star Wars should always be catered to their needs and not anyone else, or any other generation who acts the same way, kindly grow up and respect fandoms can be flexible and include stuff not made for you.

Ultimately there's no harm in pointing out stuff we're not fond of, but equally we know Star Wars has to keep evolving and trying new things in new eras, even if we can also have the chance to see elements of nostalgia in different ways of perspectives.

[Derek Metaltron]

Nope, that would be the Dr Who fans.

The only times I remember some Whovians getting massively vocal (bearing in mind I wasn't around for the Classic era even though I love all of the series) is when Chris quit (Outpost Gallifrey had to close down for a while to deal with the outcry), when they announced Martha as Rose's replacement (with Rose fangirls losing their **** about anyone replacing Rose, it seemed) and finally when the new Doctor was a woman (with venom on both sides). Otherwise we seem ok. I like to think Classic Series fans and New Series fans get on a lot better than most sections of Star Wars fans can seem to...

[Starter Set]

10 minutes reading youtube comments, if you can survive that much without a brain seizure, is quite enough to understand what kind of people just keep crazily hating on that woman.

Let's just say that it's not humankind's finest.

I strongly disliked that movie, for reasons i talked about here and there on those forums, but that's not the responsibility of one person.

Plus, the whole "it's too political" farce of a discussion is beyond ridiculous. First, when people say that what they actually mean is not "there is too much political in that movie" but "i don't like this particular political angle", secondly, that's far, FAR from being the Star Wars movie with the most political elements in it. (episode 3 anyone?)

So yeah, spend enough time on the net and you always end up wondering if internet ever was a good thing.

[Darkseid Is]

I heard yesterday (probably a rumor) that Kathleen Kennedy is stepping down. Pretty strange if you ask me. Force Awakens, Rogue One and Last Jedi are all like top 20 all time as far as highest grossing goes.

[Gray Lensman]

I heard yesterday (probably a rumor) that Kathleen Kennedy is stepping down. Pretty strange if you ask me. Force Awakens, Rogue One and Last Jedi are all like top 20 all time as far as highest grossing goes.

If she is it's largely because of Solo. The mistakes made with that film were easily avoidable and Disney is likely is almost certainly unhappy with both the end result and the road that led to it.

[BeastieRunner]

Solo is actually a good film.

It's fun, felt like Star Wars, came across like an old EU tale, had great music, great SFX, and fantastic direction when Howard came over.

Eh, maybe it will be redeemed in the future.

[Anthony W]

I heard yesterday (probably a rumor) that Kathleen Kennedy is stepping down. Pretty strange if you ask me. Force Awakens, Rogue One and Last Jedi are all like top 20 all time as far as highest grossing goes.

She also has the very first Start Wars flop which is a lot more impressive. You have to work a heck of a lot harder for a Star Wars bomb than for a Star Wars success.

[Gray Lensman]

Solo is actually a good film.

It's fun, felt like Star Wars, came across like an old EU tale, had great music, great SFX, and fantastic direction when Howard came over.

Eh, maybe it will be redeemed in the future.

I hope so. Due to my work and personal schedule, I am unlikely to see it before video. My local theater only has 6 screens so things never stay too long.

Working evenings means I am stuck with weekend showings, and other obligations prevent me from seeing stuff on Sundays as well.

[ClanAskani]

I heard yesterday (probably a rumor) that Kathleen Kennedy is stepping down. Pretty strange if you ask me. Force Awakens, Rogue One and Last Jedi are all like top 20 all time as far as highest grossing goes.

The production problems with Lucasfilm are beyond what most other studios would allow to happen because they simply don't usually have that kind of money to expand budgets.

- Josh Trank was fired from Boba Fett (a good decision)
- Rogue One had extensive reshoots which director Gareth Edwards was not apart of. It seems like the issue was he and Lucasfilm had two different visions of the movie and Lucasfilm ended up winning out.
- Obviously the issues with Solo and firing Lord and Miller
- Firing Colin Trevorrow as writer and director of Episode IX.
- The lack of any SW movies other than Episode IX having dates. There's scripts being worked on, but nothing has moved forward to a point that Disney has greenlit it and given it a date on the calendar. This is something that was very telling at the Disney Shareholders meeting. They only talk about projects which have dates.

Budgets are key to studios. Star Wars films have made so much money that when there were issues, they just threw money at the problem to fix it. Most other production companies don't have that luxury. And that worked fine as long as movies were cranking in the box office revenue. If they take risks, then it means they have to keep to a budget.

Hitting release dates is another key metric Disney would be looking at and Lucasfilm hasn't been able to do that. With the reshoots, there's been constant issues with pushing back dates. That's worked to help Star Wars do well in the December release date, but that's not where Disney wanted Star Wars. They wanted Star Wars slotted every Memorial Day and dominating that weekend. Now that's not going to happen and they're schedule is going to be crazy with trying to fit Star Wars into December and find something else for Memorial Day.

The MCU has a cohesive schedule and plan that allows them to release movie after movie and they fit together and build hype for the next release.

Since Star Wars movies jump around in the time line, they don't like to promote multiple movies at the same time. That's why Solo's campaign only started after Disney was finished marketing TLJ. That's what going to need to change, but they risk alienating the audience who aren't hardcore fans and understand when the movie is set. In China, Disney put little pop-up boxes into TLJ to try to explain who the characters were, but they still had massive confusion due to the Chinese audience not understanding TLJ was years after Rogue One. This type of criticism is going to resonate far more with Disney than fanboys whining on YouTube since they can actually fix it by only having movies set during one time period. But I have no idea how they can do that with the sequels and movies like Boba Fett and Obi-Wan.

Kathy Kennedy's solution seems to be to let writers and directors do whatever they want, look at the results and step in to fix it. If each Star Wars movie made 2 billion at the box office, Disney can afford that. But with no money coming from China and the domestic box office declining, there's no way they're going to let her have an unlimited budget and no plan.

[Starter Set]

Solo is actually a good film.

It's fun, felt like Star Wars, came across like an old EU tale, had great music, great SFX, and fantastic direction when Howard came over.

Eh, maybe it will be redeemed in the future.

I certainly agree with that but still, the evil mouse likes its numbers to be higher than what Solo made i dare to imagine.

But yeah, i think time is going to be nice to that movie and it will be fondly remembered in a decade or so.

[Username taken]

The production problems with Lucasfilm are beyond what most other studios would allow to happen because they simply don't usually have that kind of money to expand budgets.

- Josh Trank was fired from Boba Fett (a good decision)
- Rogue One had extensive reshoots which director Gareth Edwards was not apart of. It seems like the issue was he and Lucasfilm had two different visions of the movie and Lucasfilm ended up winning out.
- Obviously the issues with Solo and firing Lord and Miller
- Firing Colin Trevorrow as writer and director of Episode IX.
- The lack of any SW movies other than Episode IX having dates. There's scripts being worked on, but nothing has moved forward to a point that Disney has greenlit it and given it a date on the calendar. This is something that was very telling at the Disney Shareholders meeting. They only talk about projects which have dates.

Budgets are key to studios. Star Wars films have made so much money that when there were issues, they just threw money at the problem to fix it. Most other production companies don't have that luxury. And that worked fine as long as movies were cranking in the box office revenue. If they take risks, then it means they have to keep to a budget.

Hitting release dates is another key metric Disney would be looking at and Lucasfilm hasn't been able to do that. With the reshoots, there's been constant issues with pushing back dates. That's worked to help Star Wars do well in the December release date, but that's not where Disney wanted Star Wars. They wanted Star Wars slotted every Memorial Day and dominating that weekend. Now that's not going to happen and they're schedule is going to be crazy with trying to fit Star Wars into December and find something else for Memorial Day.

The MCU has a cohesive schedule and plan that allows them to release movie after movie and they fit together and build hype for the next release.

Since Star Wars movies jump around in the time line, they don't like to promote multiple movies at the same time. That's why Solo's campaign only started after Disney was finished marketing TLJ. That's what going to need to change, but they risk alienating the audience who aren't hardcore fans and understand when the movie is set. In China, Disney put little pop-up boxes into TLJ to try to explain who the characters were, but they still had massive confusion due to the Chinese audience not understanding TLJ was years after Rogue One. This type of criticism is going to resonate far more with Disney than fanboys whining on YouTube since they can actually fix it by only having movies set during one time period. But I have no idea how they can do that with the sequels and movies like Boba Fett and Obi-Wan.

Kathy Kennedy's solution seems to be to let writers and directors do whatever they want, look at the results and step in to fix it. If each Star Wars movie made 2 billion at the box office, Disney can afford that. But with no money coming from China and the domestic box office declining, there's no way they're going to let her have an unlimited budget and no plan.

Marvel has had their own share of director drama, the only difference is that their movies come out and generally hit their financial (and critical) targets. Solo on the other hand got good reviews but performed pretty badly at the box office.

However, I fully agree with the bolded part and that's one issue I have with Kathleen Kennedy. I mean, the whole world knows the kind of movies that Lord and Miller make and Kathleen Kennedy (Lawrence Kasdan) freaked out when they made something closer to Guardians of the Galaxy than the Last Jedi (a movie that I don't like at all).

[ChrisIII]

She also has the very first Start Wars flop which is a lot more impressive. You have to work a heck of a lot harder for a Star Wars bomb than for a Star Wars success.

The 2008 "Clone Wars" film wasn't a huge hit either, and I remember people at the time calling it the first Star Wars flop as well....although unlike Solo, it was somewhat low budget ($9 million) and made that back several times with a gross of $70 million.

[Gray Lensman]

The 2008 "Clone Wars" film wasn't a huge hit either, and I remember people at the time calling it the first Star Wars flop as well....although unlike Solo, it was somewhat low budget ($9 million) and made that back several times with a gross of $70 million.

Expectations are always different for animation - at least in this country.