D.B. Weiss and David Benioff aren’t doing Game of Thrones anymore, or their ill-advised HBO slavery show Confederate, and now, they aren’t making any Star Wars movies, either. The duo has been developing a new trilogy of Star Wars movies Disney since the beginning of last year, but now, Weiss and Benioff have decided to quit the three-movie project and leave the galaxy far, far away for good, Deadline reports.
Weiss and Benioff said in a statement that the departure is due to their new, absurdly huge $300 million overall deal they inked with Netflix last spring. “We love Star Wars. When George Lucas built it, he built us too,” Benioff and Weiss said Monday. “Getting to talk about Star Wars with him and the current Star Wars team was the thrill of a lifetime, and we will always be indebted to the saga that changed everything. But there are only so many hours in the day, and we felt we could not do justice to both Star Wars and our Netflix projects. So we are regretfully stepping away.”
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And, sure, it makes some level of sense that the pair would want to focus all their attentions on the juicy Netflix paycheck, especially since making three separate Star Wars movies isn’t exactly an easy lift. But given the spot that the Star Wars franchise is in right now, there might be more to their departure than just busy schedules.
Disney brass has had complicated relationships with Star Wars directors ever since Gareth Edwards lost control of Rogue One. There was Lord and Miller’s replacement in the middle of shooting Solo, Josh Trank’s exit from his spinoff movie, and the whole Colin Trevorrow and JJ Abrams stuff with The Rise of Skywalker. Rian Johnson even sounds a little uncertain about the fate of his own proposed trilogy right now. We’ll probably never get the full story behind Weiss and Benioff’s decision to leave.
“David Benioff and Dan Weiss are incredible storytellers,” Lucasfilm head Kathleen Kennedy said in her own statement. “We hope to include them in the journey forward when they are able to step away from their busy schedule to focus on Star Wars.”
It’s unclear what, exactly, Benioff and Weiss are planning for Netflix, but whatever it is, let’s just hope they are a little more sure about what they’re doing this time around.
