Project Hail Mary Author Andy Weir Explains How He Would Fix the Star Wars Franchise

Andy Weir, famous for penning The Martian and Project Hail Mary, has some strong ideas about how he would tackle telling stories in the Star Wars universe if he had the chance.

Andy Weir is well-versed in writing sci-fi stories with mass appeal. He is the author of two major novels in the genre, after all, both of which have been given the Hollywood treatment with big-budget film adaptations. And while his own tales have captivated audiences for over a decade, he has a good idea of what he’d do if he got put in charge of some pre-existing source material.

In a November 2 interview with SlashFilm, Weirs was asked what he’d do if he were in charge of the Star Wars franchise — and he had a decisive answer. According to Weirs, moving away from the Galactic Civil War isn’t something that most fans are likely to get excited about; thus, in his opinion, a return to that time period focusing on different characters is the way to go.

"Star Wars is more about massive upheaval. One problem that happens is, if you're going to have a story about a monumental war, then when it's over and the good guys win, you want it to stay that way. So it's very unsatisfying if you roll into a new monumental war,” he began.

“I feel like the best way, in my opinion, to do another Star Wars movie — and I'm not George Lucas and this might be a terrible idea — would be to have the story of other people during the Galactic Civil War.

“Think of it like this: We know what happened in World War II, but there are some really good fictional stories that take place during World War II. So if you treat the Galactic Civil War as, 'Okay, that's established canon, those are the things that happened,' but there's still a lot of stories to tell about other people living through those wars. So that's what I would do."

To this point, Weirs had nothing but praise for Andor, Disney’s Star Wars series that takes place just before the Galactic Civil war with a focus on several different characters and their roles in the rebellion. However, he doesn’t feel like its sprawling story is something that could be translated to the big screen for a two-hour viewing experience.

"Andor was amazing and really good, and it was a series and [that was the correct choice]. You're going to do a movie, you've got to tell your whole story in like two hours. So it needs to have a lot more — 'Andor' was very intellectual, extremely clever, extraordinarily well-written, very well — I mean, I loved everything about it. But it's not something that you could make into a movie,” he said.

This is the latest big news to come from Weirs following his comments on AI, which are pretty bleak. Also speaking with SlashFilm, Weir admitted that it’s “only a matter of time” before the technology proliferates in careers like his, saying he “might be among the last generation of fully human writers."