Thanks to CGI animation, the "Stars Wars" saga is coming back to theaters this summer -- but George Lucas said fans shouldn't get their hopes up about any future films that take the epic beyond the point of Darth Vader's death at the end of "Return of the Jedi". In other words, it ends with the Ewoks.
That sequel was unquestionably a hit, yet it ended its global run below the likes of Inception, The Twilight Saga: Eclipse, and DreamWorks Animation's "written off as a miss" Shrek Forever After ($755m on a $165m budget) in the summer of 2010.
The Fox franchises would add to Disney's already formidable stable of entertainment brands, including Marvel superhero movies, Lucasfilm's "Star Wars" saga, and a powerful animation business, all of which combined could be a formidable draw for streaming customers.
But how else to explain the attitude I had going into Kung Fu Panda 2, the new film out of DreamWorks Animation and the continuation of the saga of an ursine martial arts master and his quest for identity in an anthropomorphic, medieval China?
His cartoon animation (a detail from above) is a bleak, seven-scene saga owing much to Goya, with nods to the Chapman brothers and Leviticus.
The next film which Bluth made, for which Spielberg also negotiated a release through Universal Pictures, was the dinosaur saga "The Land Before Time". Again, it hit animation pay dirt.
That has these beautiful painted backgrounds with flat character animation, and that sort of thing inspired the whole look of "Saga".
The studio's first 3D animation rolled in on the back of appreciative reviews and knocked The Twilight Saga: Eclipse off its perch to score a terrific $60.1m opening weekend, according to estimates.
For the most part, the story skilfully combines elements from the Bible, Alice in Wonderland, Greek mythology, Japanese animation and kung fu movies to create a modern myth, possibly the most popular film saga since Star Wars.
Cheeky animation of anthropomorphized rats — and the dash and swagger of a team of Louisiana lawyers — burn through the factual fog, while familiar video clips remind us of the saga's heroes and villains.
