There could be a contest as to whether there are more unmade Guillermo del Toro projects or more unmade “Star Wars” movies. So it’s not illogical that the two briefly intersected. The filmmaker himself noted, during a Q&A sponsored by Collider, that he was once working on a “Star Wars” movie with screenwriter David S. Goyer set on Tatooine. The project was indeed a would-be “Star Wars Story” centered on the crime lord Jabba the Hutt.
Goyer previously confirmed the project in the abstract on the Happy Sad Confused podcast, where he stated that “There was just a lot of behind [the scenes] stuff going on at Lucasfilm at the time. But it’s a cool script.”
Del Toro confirmed at the Q&A that it was indeed about “the rise and fall of Jabba the Hutt.” He noted: “We were doing a lot of stuff, and then it’s not my property, it’s not my money, and then it’s one of those 30 screenplays that goes away. Sometimes I’m bitter, sometimes I’m not. I always turn to my team and say, ‘Good practice, guys. Good practice. We designed a great world. We designed great stuff. We learned.’”
Even though LucasFilm declined to make the movie, Del Toro has no ill will toward the studio.
“You can never be ungrateful with life,” he said. “Whatever life sends you, there’s something to be learned from it. So, you know, I trust the universe. I do. When something doesn’t happen, I go, ‘Why?’ I try to have a dialogue with myself. ‘Why didn’t it happen?’ And the more you swim upstream with the universe, the less you’re gonna realize where you’re going.”
Del Toro was once attached to a version of “Beauty and the Beast,” before that (non-Disney) project got shelved. He then made a loose variation on the fairy tale. “The Shape of Water” then won a slew of Oscars, including Best Picture and Best Director.
Many fans still mourn the R-rated, $150 million-budgeted, Tom Cruise-starring “At the Mountain of Madness” that never came to be. However, the filmmaker made the original and relatively popular “Pacific Rim” instead. There’s a long history of famously unmade projects and what-if movies. Sometimes, it’s a tragedy, sometimes it’s for the best.
F. Gary Gray was among the finalists to helm “Captain America: The Winter Soldier.” However, it can be argued that his career got a bigger boost from directing the N.W.A biopic “Straight Outta Compton.”
Likewise, after Scott Derrickson walked away from Marvel’s “Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness,” Sam Raimi got a chance to make a Hollywood comeback. Meanwhile, Derrickson made the acclaimed and $150 million-grossing “The Black Phone,” which reasserted him as a major voice in mainstream horror.
We’ll never know what a Guillermo del Toro-helmed Jabba the Hutt movie would have become. But it’s hard to argue with the Del Toro movies we’ve gotten instead.
By the way, happy birthday to the director of “Pan’s Labyrinth” and “Blade II,” who turns 59 on Monday.
