George Lucas Stole Chewbacca
The creation of Star Wars is comprehensive mythology onto itself, populated by rarely documented anecdotes, the likes ofA"the Millennium Falcon was inspired by a hamburger, with the outrigger cockpit being an olive off to the side" (1)AorA"My original inspiration for Chewbacca was my dog Indiana." (2), compelling enough to be repeated until they're so prevalent that theyAmust be true, and are accepted even by hardcore fans and Lucasfilm itself. Unfortunately sometimes they're embellished truths or half-truths, sometimes entirely false and in pretty much all cases oversimplifying a truly interesting, and luckily exceptionally well documented creative process.
And that's what this is about; the creative process. Cultural touchstones like Star Wars might seem to have sprung fully formed from the minds of their lauded creators, but as in all creative endeavors, movie making, web design or this very post, nothing could be further from the truth. Creation is a process, and strangely, by looking at how everyone's favorite plushy first-mate sprang into existence, we can learn a lot about any collaborative creative endeavor.
Unfortunately, perhaps because of the verisimilitude of the disciplines needed to make a film like Star Wars come together, the making-of narrative is surprisingly fragmented and often incomplete. A quick look at the bibliography needed to put together this post should give a good idea of justAhow fragmented. And once you're down the rabbit hole, you quickly learn that nothing found there can be taken at face value. Quotes, drawings, photos and diagrams lack sources, are undated, some old, some new, some so distorted as to be pure fiction and most of it entirely out of context.
Posted: September 29th, 2010
at 1:28pm by Koookiecrumbles
Categories: myninjaplease,not ninja-worthy,film,mnp is for the children
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