Mark Hamill says fans are getting Star Wars fatigue

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Mark Hamill is currently promoting his History Channel series, Knightfall, about the Knights Templar. But Hamill is never going to escape being asked about Star Wars, no matter what he does. On The Hollywood Reporter’s podcast, Awards Chatter, they asked Hamill if the underperformance of Solo was an indication of Star Wars fatigue. Hamill said he thought it was.

Nearly a year after Solo: A Star Wars Story became the franchise’s first box office disappointment, Mark Hamill is saying that he believes in the possibility of “Star Wars fatigue” is real.

During the last few minutes of his “Awards Chatter” podcast with The Hollywood Reporter, which posted on Tuesday, Hamill responded to speculations that audiences are tired of new titles from the galaxy far, far away given the box office underperformance of Solo, which grossed almost $393 million worldwide against a budget of at least $250 million and multimillion-dollar marketing campaign.

“Yes,” Hamill said. “I’m not gonna tell them how to run their business, but is there a possibility of ‘Star Wars fatigue’? Yeah, I think there is. I’ve experienced it, to a certain degree. But they never listen to my ideas anyway, so who needs ’em?”

When asked about the forthcoming Star Wars content for the Disney+ streaming service, which will include a seventh season of The Clone Wars, a series that previously aired on Cartoon Network and streamed on Netflix, Hamill responded, “They already have animation, with Clone Wars, Rebels and what’s it called, The Mandalorian? that’s a Jon Favreau TV series.” Disney+’s Star Wars offerings, in addition to Clone Wars, will include the pre-Return of the Jedi drama series The Mandalorian and a Star Wars: Rogue One prequel.

[The Hollywood Reporter]

There’s a fine balance between striking while the iron is hot and burnout. So although I get these studios trying to capitalize on a film/franchise’d popularity, fatigue is always a risk. We’re seeing the same thing with superhero films. And even though I’ve had my fill of all these franchises, I’m still going to see them so I guess they know what they’re doing. But I do wish they’d take a little more time to think these stories through. I’ve professed my love for Rogue One but that admiration is based on my finding the premise clever: an entire movie to explain a plot hole and a line from A New Hope. And they did a good job with it. But I don’t care a whit what any of those characters did before they appeared in Rogue One (although we all know I’m paying money to spend two hours with Diego Luna).

Basing the franchise’s future on the performance of Solo, though, is a mistake. There was a lot working against Solo, not the least of which was a poorly thought out story – and I really wanted to like that film. Plus, with all the production problems and changes, and, honestly, the fact that Harrison Ford wouldn’t be in it, it was always fighting an uphill battle. Pull back on the Star Wars glut, yes, but don’t cite fatigue as the reason no one went to see Solo.

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32 Responses to “Mark Hamill says fans are getting Star Wars fatigue”

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  1. Jenns says:

    I love Star Wars. And I’m buying whatever they sell me. But I think Mark does have a point. Star Wars doesn’t need to be a Marvel franchise.

    With that being said, if they do move forward with projects, it should be new material. I’m glad Kathleen Kennedy put the brakes on the prequels. There is so much you can explore with the Star Wars universe. And I don’t need a backstory on Boba Fett because a bunch of fan boys elevated a mediocre character to a cult-like status.

    • Erinn says:

      I’ve really enjoyed it as well. I was in the target kid range for the second set of films… which – when you’re a kid are really exciting movies haha. But as an adult they’re kind of just… garbage in a lot of ways.

      But I’ve been loving the new movies. I understand the fatigue – and I think some of that fatigue comes from the absolute venom from the neck beards just revolting over everything. But it HAS been a lot of movies in a short period of time. But I have enjoyed them all. I’d rather watch star wars than about 80% of the super hero movies.

      • Digital Unicorn says:

        I have enjoyed the new movies but my big criticism is that lack of originality on the plotlines – The Force Awakens WAS A New Hope. They’ve played it safe to pander to the hardcore nerds.

        I LOVED Rogue One – it was original and had great characters (Donnie Yen’s character was BADASS). I know there were problems but it was still watchable and if Howard had been director from the beginning it would have been a better film. The change of director and plot showed in the last half of the movie.

    • Anne Call says:

      I saw the first movie as a young twenty something and it was so groundbreaking and a wonderful combination of an adventure and a character driven story. A very unique cinematic experience filled with special effects we had never seen and characters we truly fell in love with. Going back to same theatre almost 40 years later to see some of the same characters in episode 7 was an emotional experience. Then they killed off Solo and Carrie Fisher died. So I will see the last one next December but I agree wholeheartedly that they need to slow down. It’s like they took Citizen Kane or Casablanca or Vertigo and just wouldn’t leave it alone and continued to make sequel and prequels until we just lost interest and didn’t care.

    • Some chick says:

      Have you heard Fette’s Vette, by MC Chris? I encourage you to look it up. It’s really the only Boba Fett story needed. (It’s also really good and really funny.)

  2. Original T.C. says:

    It’s becoming just a reboot. The new StarWars is really a sort of repeat of the original but with new stars. The first series began and ended the wars against the Empire. The End. It’s like saying history is repeating itself but that means there can never be a happy ending. StarWars is a fantasy series, which believes in happy endings. It’s not supposed to be cynical like Game of Thrones.

    Also most importantly, the original cast was part of the successful formula. It’s hard to replace the original trio.

  3. Mabs A'Mabbin says:

    There is probably some element of fatigue, but I think most of us enjoy a saturation of highly superb tv/movie streaming. It’s bound to liquidate the numbers and lessen frenzied viewership lol.

  4. CharliePenn says:

    I been done HAD Star Wars fatigue for about 15 years now lol

  5. Tootsie McJingle says:

    I do have to say that Mark Hamil is one of my favorite people to follow on Twitter and he’s always up for Star Wars questions and other Star Wars related things.

  6. Lala11_7 says:

    They should have made a prequel about Obi Wan…since Obi Wan IS one of the biggest pillars in the story…

    Solo is dashing and all…but he is a SIDE PIECE!!! Yea…I SAID WHAT I SAID…Anakin/Vader…Obi Wan…the Skywalker children…THOSE are the load bearing walls…so to speak…and Ewan is the PERFECT age for the prequel….

    And yea…I’m OVER it regarding Star Wars for a while….

  7. Case says:

    I’m a huge Star Wars fan, and while I’m not experiencing Star Wars fatigue, I do need them to be more mindful about the extra content they’re putting out besides the main series. Not many fans wanted the Solo movie, which is why it didn’t perform well at the box office (also, it was an awful, unnecessary movie IMO. MANY fans, however, have been asking for an Obi-Wan movie. They just need to listen to what fans are interested in (much like Marvel very smartly making spinoff shows for popular characters like Loki, Bucky and Falcon, and Wanda and Vision) and they will come.

    When Disney first obtained control of the franchise they announced that they wanted to make a Star Wars movie every year. And yes, of course that’s excessive when they’re planning a movie a year without even considering what those movies might look like. If they put out “Star Wars Story” films that add actual depth to the original story (Rogue One was fantastic), they’ll have no problems. But maybe they should just make GREAT Star Wars movies every few years, instead of mediocre movies every year.

  8. Becks1 says:

    A NEW HOPE. A NEW HOPE!!!!!! Not A New Beginning lol.

    I love Star Wars. the original trilogy are three of my favorite movies of all time. And I like Force Awakens and Last Jedi, and I did appreciate Rogue One – I enjoyed it and liked how it filled in some background for A New Hope.

    Solo was fine. Too much backstabbing, too many betrayals, a convoluted plot – but at least it answered the question of how the rebels got their money (but conveniently Solo seems to have forgotten that by the time A New Hope rolls around?) It was fine though. I can see why it didn’t gross more money.

    I think people are interested in the original trilogy, and everything else kind of stems from there. So the extent a movie helps us better understand Episodes IV-VI, I think people are interested. Solo didn’t really help with that. What did we learn about him – he has relationship and trust issues, he and Chewy are ride or die for each other (I guess we learned why?) I just didnt feel like it added anything to the overall story. Episodes I-II seemed to really help at the time, but in retrospect- meh. And people like knowing what happened after Return of the Jedi, but even that is in danger of getting played out.

    Basically – I love Star Wars, but they do need to take a deep breath and slow down.

    There is something to be said

  9. Bryn says:

    Big fan here, myself and my husband and we have star ways fatigue. It started with rogue one for us. A long ass movie about how they got the Death Star plans, two major characters were entirely CGI, it was terrible. The characters all kind of sucked, with no development, which didn’t matter because they all died in the end. The last Jedi was underwhelming, Rey’s parentage and what happened with Snoke. I haven’t watched Solo yet because I’m tired of it.

  10. Incredulous says:

    JJ Abrams killed it for me. I am truly baffled his movies are so popular. Any way, I hope one day they make a movie about the life and death of Manuel “Manny” Bothans.

  11. Jared says:

    If the new movies were actually good, there wouldn’t be fatigue, but rather, excitement. Mark Hamill is an amazing actor and is the only one speaking on behalf of the fans of the holy trilogy. Business decisions are clearly trumping creative ones and this franchise is now just another horse in Disney’s stable of mediocraty. But I’ll be in line like a sucker for episode 9 because I just cant help myself, so I’m certainly not blameless in helping fund this directionless trainwreck of a franchise, creatively speaking.

  12. Kate says:

    Perhaps it was because my expectations were super low after all the negativity around it, but I actually liked Solo.

  13. Mabs A'Mabbin says:

    Best Star Wars song like EVAH.

    https://youtu.be/U9t-slLl30E

  14. Algernon says:

    I’ve been wondering why we can have half a dozen, or more, superhero movies a year and they all do well (mostly, not Justice League, obvs), but Star Wars is like a precious egg we can only see once every couple years. What is the difference, really?

    I don’t think there is superhero fatigue, really. Aquaman just made a billion dollars. Captain Marvel makes a billion like, two months later. Endgame is going to make two billion not even two full months after CM. Shazam won’t make a billion, but it’s not failing, either. Seems like audiences turn out for superheroes movies on the regular.

  15. line says:

    JJ Abrams has no creative talent, he ruined the saga by making a glue copy of the original trilogy by replacing with the characters that are also strangely similar to the characters in the original trilogy.They should have done another trilogy with a new story and new characters or just focuses on spin-offs.

  16. Mia4s says:

    Rogue One is the only new one I’ve loved. He has a point and some franchises truly lend themselves to being EVENTS only, rather than a high budget long running TV series like Marvel (Events plus fun filler). But I think the streaming series will be huge.

    Poor Solo, the series was due for an underperformer. But I just did a quick search and what the hell happened to the lead Alden Ehrenreich?? He’s done literally nothing since Solo. And I mean nothing! No plays, no commercials, no guest spots, and nothing in development! If it’s a voluntary two year break that’s a horrendously bad idea for a new talent. Wow.

    • Pulplove says:

      As far as Alden Ehrenreich is concerned, I have been wondering the very same thing for a long time now. He was fantastic in “Hail, Caesar!” actually.

      I don’t think he was a bad Han but the underwhelming storyline unfortunately prevented this version of Han to be a compelling one.
      I hope Alden gets back to acting, he’s talented.

      • Mia4s says:

        I wasn’t a fan of the Solo movie, but I thought he was charming. I was actually quite sad to see he hasn’t worked. Not everyone wants to or has to be a blockbuster star, so smaller and prestige projects would be fantastic. And it’s not like he’s waiting on an imminent sequel or streaming series. That’s just not happening given how the movie was received. To not be doing anything for this long? That’s worrisome.

  17. DS9 says:

    If by fatigue you mean weary of stories and iterations that retread old ground and don’t bring anything fresh or expand the universe and lore any, then yes.

    There is no comparison to Marvel because Marvel moves on and out. We’re not still in NY with the same guys front and center, the same ominous bad guys. Marvel is proof that you don’t need amazing stories or a deep dive into the past over and over again to be successful. You just have to entertain people with a new facet or at least, new to filmgoers.

    Star Wars as much as I love it, it’s kind of a weak, small world in terms of what can and has been farmed from it. And it will be without more work

    • Veronica S. says:

      People conflate the expansiveness of the setting in SW with the actual story, which is actually very tightly told. Anakin and Luke are parallel journeys with a very distinct and resolute ending. The big story was done in six movies. Lucas had a very explicit idea of what he wanted to accomplish, and he did it, so the only way to continue it was to override the ending of RotJ, which is…depressing? Who really wanted a future where everything they accomplished was torn apart? And they never even tell us why because we don’t know who the hell Snoke is or how he became relevant. It might have been smarter for them to just set in way in the future with a whole new cast.

  18. Veronica S. says:

    The fatigue is exacerbated by the quality of the films, to be brutally honest. We can trash the prequels all we want – and don’t get me wrong, they are flawed – but there is a distinct story vision there. The characters and plot make sense in context of the OT. They brought a different look and character to the SW universe, one that enhances it even with its stumbles.

    The new ones? Suffer from a very obvious lack of cohesion. TFA is an okay story, if repetitive and safe, but TLJ just goes full blown mess. It’s hard to get excited about something that’s been a general disappointment. They had plenty of time to come up with a good story. They chose to rush it out unplanned. *shrugs* SW fans love to complain while handing over their money, but we’ve already been through it once.

  19. M.A.F. says:

    Marvel has a game plan- they know where their stories are going hence the various phases. With Star Wars, I don’t think they know where they are going. They have so much cannon to pull from but they ignored it. TFA was a rehash of A New Hope. You mean to tell me that the First Order employed engineers who didn’t bother to learn from the original Death Star plans on what NOT to do with building a killing machine? I agree with the two post Veronica S said above. Why was everything undone? Is this suppose to be like the 20 year gap between WWI & WWII? So after these film everything be okay, like post-WWII? Or will there be like a Cold War era of Star Wars? And should we have cared more about who Snoke is? Clearly he was important but it seems like they decided “eh, lets kill him because we need these two characters in the same room.” The prequels were terrible (IMO) but at least Lucas knew where the story was going. These films have been rushed. They should have done the three years in between like their processors and take time to build a better story/world.

    But I’ll still go see it in December.

  20. me46 says:

    You guys do know that Disney announced today that Star Wars films after episode 9 are going on hiatus?

  21. Elizabeth says:

    Speaking of Solo, though, I liked it. It wasn’t amazing, but I enjoyed it.

  22. abezel says:

    Haha, he is so grumpy about the way luke has been written in the sequels. On YT, there’s a huge bunch of videos of him putting his foot in it with his criticisms, very on point ones, about the sequels.