Before George Lucas sold Lucasfilm to Disney, he was working on a Star Wars TV series which would have cost $40 million per episode.
Before George Lucas sold Lucasfilm to Disney in 2012, he was working on a handful of new Star Wars projects. One of those projects was Star Wars: Underworld, a live-action TV series which would have been set between the events of Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope. The series was axed when Disney took over the franchise, but a lot of work had already been done, including writing over 60 scripts.
However, Star Wars: Underworld wouldn’t have come cheap. While speaking on the Young Indy Chroniclers podcast, producer Rick McCallum said each episode would have cost $40 million. “I think we had over 60 scripts… like third draft scripts,” McCallum said. “These were dark [scripts]. They were sexy. They were violent. They were absolutely wonderful, complicated, challenging scripts. The problem was that each episode was bigger than the films, so the lowest I could get it down to with the each that existed then was $40 million an episode.“
McCallum didn’t spill any details on the series, only to say that it “would’ve blown up the whole ‘Star Wars’ universe and Disney would’ve definitely never offered George to buy the franchise.” Intriguing. Some test footage from the series made its way online several years ago, but that’s the biggest peek into the project we’ve had. You’ve got to wonder what other goodies are in those 60 scripts, which, as far as we know, are just sitting there.
Although Disney scrapped Star Wars: Underworld, the studio was obviously keen to develop its own live-action series. The first was The Mandalorian, which was an enormous success. The Mandalorian was made possible due to the revolutionary digital background screen known as The Volume, and it’s easy to imagine that Lucas could have used that technology to bring Underworld to life. The Mandalorian was quickly followed by more Star Wars TV series, including The Book of Boba Fett, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Andor, Ahsoka, The Acolyte, and Skeleton Crew. The second season of Andor will be released on April 22, 2025, and a second season of Ahsoka is also in development.
