Lucasfilm has hired Simon Kinberg to write and produce a whole new trilogy of Star Wars movies, and there’s a lot he could bring to the franchise – for better or worse. Kinberg is best known for his work on the X-Men franchise, having written four of them and produced several others. He could bring a strong sense of continuity to a galaxy far, far away, but depending on how you feel about his movies, that may not be a good thing.
Kinberg is the screenwriter behind X-Men: The Last Stand, X-Men: Days of Future Past, X-Men: Apocalypse and Dark Phoenix. He also wrote the 2015 reboot of Fantastic Four, and he produced several other X-Men movies as well as all three Deadpool movies. Kinberg was a creative consultant on Star Wars: The Force Awakens and was thanked in the credits of both The Force Awakens and Rogue One. According to The Hollywood Reporter, he will now write and produce a new trilogy of Star Wars movies, which will be about new characters – not a revival of the Skywalker Saga.
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This leaves a lot of possibilities for Kinberg and Star Wars, and a lot of questions for fans. Looking at Kinberg’s past week, there are some strengths that should carry over to this new endeavor. According to a report by Variety, Kinberg was chosen because he has a proven track record of success, and he is considered safe, bankable and easy to work with. Industry insiders said that Kinberg knows just how to talk to studio executives in a way they understand, especially when it comes to taking creative risks in big franchises.
Still, Kinberg has some flops to his name as well. The screenwriter took a lot of the heat for Dark Phoenix in 2019 – the X-Men movie with the worst average reviews and the lowest box office gross. That was the third X-Men movie in a row written and produced by Kinberg, and it was his directorial debut. It was generally criticized for failing to faithfully adapt the beloved comic book arc it was named after. If Kinberg’s movies touch on anything that has been covered in the Star Wars Legends canon before, this could be an issue for him again.
On the plus side, Kinberg’s X-Men movies were generally committed to consistency and worldbuilding, even if critics and fans didn’t always love the way they executed. If done correctly, this will work well in Star Wars, which relies on nostalgia yet still requires an injection of fresh ideas and characters. Kinberg will get big points for subtle hints that he knows the material and he respects its history. That will be easy for him considering his history with Star Wars.
Variety‘s sources speculated that the biggest reason Kinberg was hired for this job was because of his success with Star Wars Rebels – the animated series he co-created, wrote and executive produced. They noted that Kinberg has a strong relationship with Lucasfilm executives Carrie Beck and Dave Filoni, both of whom were co-creators on Rebels. Since the trio has practice collaborating together and they know how to serve such a big part of Star Wars‘ core audience, this could be a great fit for them.
It’s worth noting that Kinberg’s trilogy seems to be in the earliest stages of development, and there are plenty of other Star Wars productions coming out much sooner. In the meantime, the whole franchise is streaming now on Disney+.