Taylor Hill/FilmMagic;Lucasfilm/Kobal/Shutterstock Disney, if you're listening,Ryan Reynoldsknows how to save your franchise. TheDeadpool & Wolverinestar, co-writer, and producer recently revealed he visited the House of Mouse with a novel concept for a newStar Warsproject. "I pitched to Disney, I said, 'Why don't we do an R-ratedStar Warsproperty?'" he shared on Sunday's episode ofThe Box Office Podcast. "It doesn't have to be overt, A+ characters, there's a wide range of characters you could use, and I don't mean R-rated to be vulgar. R-rated is a Trojan horse for emotion. I always wonder why studios don't want to just gamble on something like that." Reynolds, who became the world'ssecond-highest paid actorin 2024 after thephenomenal successof the above-mentioned Marvel mash-up, has increasingly taken on producing and other behind-the-camera positions ever since he boarded 2016's firstDeadpoolfilm as a producer. Though he may seem like a natural fit to star in hisStar Warspitch, he clarified, "I'm not saying I want to be in it — that would be a bad fit. I would want to produce and write or be a part of behind the scenes." TheStar Warsfranchise, first inaugurated byGeorge Lucaswith 1977'sStar Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope, began as a gamble and has always heavily trafficked in emotionally resonant themes such as loss, betrayal, and revenge. Not to mention the unmissable and complex political allegories woven through each of the film trilogies and the subsequent proliferation of series, includingAndorandThe Mandalorian. But Reynolds seemed mainly to have those series in mind when discussing hisStar Warsidea; in particular, the fact of their exhibition over streaming rather than in a theatrical setting. "You're never going to get the same emotional investment from a streamer that you are from a theatrical movie, because they're getting in cars and paying for parking, and babysitters, and sitting down, and watching the movie, and then driving home. That's the emotional investment you can try to sell," he said. To Reynolds, an R rating unlocks the emotional punch needed to deliver the tougher sell over streaming: "On a streamer, my only note, always, is that, for God's sake, with everything you can, to grab them in that first shot, like that first thing that happens in the movie... Start with something, 'Holy s---!' and then, 'How did we get here?'" "Streamers, I think that model is even more important because we have all these distracto-fat things clogging our arteries of attention, and it is so easy to tune out unless you have them right at the top," he said. 20th Century Studios/MARVEL The highest rating aStar Warsfilm ever got was PG-13, the rating consistently applied to films in the franchise since 2005'sStar Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith. Reynolds' idea to push the franchise into more provocative territory isn't a new one, and the outcome of the previous attempt might worry him.James Mangold, who was tapped to co-write and direct an upcomingStar Warsfilm in 2023, waspreviously attachedto a Boba Fett origin story. That film eventually became the Disney+ seriesThe Book of Boba Fett, but Mangold had originallyenvisioned his filmas "much more of a borderline rated-R, single-planet, spaghetti Western." "I was probably scaring the s--- out of everyone," he joked, noting that the major players behindStar Wars"suddenly decided they weren't making pictures like that, and I think the opportunities in streaming presented themselves." You can listen to the rest of Reynolds' interview onThe Box Office Podcastabove. Read the original article onEntertainment Weekly
