George Lucas Didn't Plan on Being Involved with STAR WARS: THE CLONE WARS Until He Saw They Were "Creating Cinema"

When the Lucasfilm animation team started working on Star Wars: The Clone Wars series, George Lucus did not plan on being involved with it. He was going to be very hands-off and only meet with Dave Filoni and the team once or twice a year, but that all changed when he saw that they were “creating cinema” and at that point, he wanted to be a lot more involved!

During a recent interview with /Film, writer Henry Gilroy shared that Lucas initially told them: “I'm retired. I might see you guys once a year, twice a year maybe. You guys are making this. I'm not going to be around.”

Lucas wasn’t really involved at all with Genndy Tartakovsky’s The Clone Wars cartoon, and Gilroy said that he feels that “Lucas initially saw The Clone Wars as a cartoon first and Star Wars second.” So what exactly changed Lucas’ mind with the CGI series that Filoni was developing?

According to Gilroy, it was all about aspect ratios. It’s explained that Lucas saw that the series was being developed with a widescreen 2:35:1 ratio and realized, "Oh, you guys are creating cinema." It’s at this point that the filmmaker suggested that the first four episodes should be turned into a movie.

Lucas liked what he saw so much that he couldn’t help but want to be involved and he ended up meeting with The Clone Wars creative team once a week. Filoni, Lucas, and that team sure did create one heck of an incredible show!