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John Williams scored 6 Star Wars movies and 4 Indiana Jones flicks. Howard Shore scored 3 LOTR movies and is rumored to return for The Hobbit. John Barry scored 11 James Bond movies and did the arrangements for the theme in Dr. No.
Yet Danny Elfman has never gone past movie #2 in any of the various franchises/series he has been involved in.
Have you guys ever wondered how Elfman would perform with a long-term series? Like let’s say he never got into a feud with Raimi and worked on Spidey 3 and was ready to start work on Spidey 4 which was recently given a May 6, 2011 release date. Can you imagine all the different variations and new themes he would create? Sometimes I feel like us Elfman fans are missing out on stuff like this. John Williams fans can sit back and listen to 6 Star Wars scores. We can’t.
I rather hear a new score to a new movie over a series from Elfman any day. The man is wonderful at reinventing himself!
Yeah, I agree. It’s the law of diminishing returns. There are few really great series out there — one could argue that STAR WARS is really only 3 great films, forget the rest. I don’t want to see Elfman tied down to anything, and much prefer the diversity.
He does have quite the diverse palate, but one of his skills of which I’ve always been most fond has been his ability to do variations on a strong central theme. It has always been fun to hear variations on the Batman and Spider-Man themes because he just does so many things with them. So I agree, it would be nice if Elfman had his own “Star Wars”.
I agree with Spider-Fan. Elfman is a diverse composer, but I also enjoy his variations. That being said…I don’t think Elfman being involved with a long-term franchise will prevent him from being involved with other projects. Williams working on 6 Star Wars movies didn’t stop him from doing other movies. We still got E.T. and Schindler’s List.
“We still got E.T. and Schindler’s List.”
To name a few….
And hopefully Danny Elfman, who seems to gain another director collaboration every Tuesday, will “latch onto” a franchise that does not stop at the second one, as far as he is concerned. He does not really have partnerships with “franchise” directors, though, does he?
He used to be friends with Sam Raimi. Had that not fallen apart he’d be getting ready for Spidey 4 right now!
The Idea of a franchise is easier to deal with when there is a clear ark to the characters involved. In series like Star Wars and Lord of the Rings they had a beginning and end, and at least had direction based upon the creator’s vision before the films were made. Spider-man and Batman are just episodic in nature. If Elfman was giving an actual series I would be delighted, but projects like those are few and far between. I always wondered if Tim Burton ever had a dream project that would span multiple films that he could get made now with his great success… now that would be nirvana!!!
Batman was episodic , but not Spider-Man. In Spider-Man we go through the character’s journey. So, Elfman’s music had places to go.
The movies were written after the fact not before though, there wasn’t a clear defined ark, only one created by each screenwriter that came onto each movie. Part of the problem of adapting a comic book is that the material is episodic and, if it’s an old character, has gone through many different interpretations.
Despite what George Lucas claims he didn’t think of the Star Wars saga beforehand. There’s enough evidence that Lucas made it up as he went along. So, atleast the Spider-Man series had material beforehand. Still does.
All the Star Wars saga is based upon Joseph Campbell’s work with distilling myths (Campbell always refered to Lucas as is best student), and all the archetypes are all there, even in the prequels, I do believe there was an unfleshed-out backstory and saga in the works long before the first film was finished. It’s success just allowed Lucas to explore all of it. It’s all about the heroes’ journey and redemption of the Son of the father (Vader after all is Dutch for father). The little things like the role of the droids were a little sketchy when referenced in the prequels, but the overall ark of the story is as old as storytelling itself, Lucas just morphed it to Space Opera Fantasy.
Gary Kurtz, the producer on Star Wars and Empire has confirmed in several interviews that Lucas made it up as he went along. He had some loose ideas, but that’s it. In fact, the reason Kurtz left after Empire was because he claims that Lucas lost his mind during pre-production of Jedi. Current day George Lucas began with Jedi. Actually…Howard the Duck pretty much confirms this.
He had nothing to do with the creation of Howard the Duck – it was already a comic before he produced the movie….
????
I’m confused, do you Hate George Lucas or something, and you didn’t even respond to any of the Joseph Campbell stuff.
Anyway, I just want to go on record saying that I much rather have Elfman scoring many unrelated movies of many styles than have him stuck in a series of films. It just seems to me that in our day now of sequels and prequels and such there is very little original films being made anymore.
1. Yes, I know about the Joseph Campbell stuff, but that doesn’t mean George Lucas planned all 6 Star Wars movies in the mid-`70s. He had loose ideas but that’s about it. He made it up as he went along. You can ask Gary Kurtz and Lawrence Kasdan if you don’t believe me.
2. George Lucas didn’t create Howard the Duck but that doesn’t change the fact that he was making crappy movies even before the Star Wars prequels. And let’s not forget the Ewoks movies.
3. No, I don’t like post-Empire George Lucas. Most people don’t. He’s a fantastic business and technology man but a crappy filmmaker. He hasn’t directed a good movie since the original Star Wars in 1977 and hasn’t produced a good movie since Last Crusade in `89.
Yeah… Empire Strikes Back was my favorite Star Wars and that was the one where Lucas had the least say on… Coincidence…? I think not!
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I was talking about series as opposed to just sequels for a sequels sake, I’m not debating Lucas’ crappy filmmaker skills. I’m just talking about a proper series is what Elfman should score and not the sequels he has and used Star Wars as an example. And whither you like the films or not John Williams did write some wonderful scores (even for the prequels).
In the words of Sargent Hulka… “Lighten up Francis.”
Can we just talk about Elfman here or relate it to Elfman, this is not a George Lucas board after all?
Yes, Williams wrote some wonderful music. And Elfman wrote wonderful music as well for Batman, Batman Returns, Batman: The Animated Series, Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure, Big Top Pee-Wee, Spider-Man, Spider-Man 2, Men in Black, and Men in Black II.
There are supposed to be “Wanted” sequels, and Elfman seemed to form a great friendship with Timur Bekmambetov. Also, I hear WB is already planning Terminator sequels. Franchise possibilities?
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