New Adaptations of the Star Wars Saga from Disney Publishing Worldwide
Sat. April 18| 11:30 AM - 12:30 PM | Behind–The–Scenes Stage
Hear from these bestselling children’s book authors how the classic Star Wars saga comes to life through adaptations: Hosted by Creative Director of Disney Lucasfilm Press, Mike Siglain, with Tony DiTerlizzi (The Adventures of Luke Skywalker, Jedi Knight), Alexandra Bracken (Star Wars: A New Hope), Adam Gidwitz (Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back), and Tom Angleberger (Star Wars: Return of the Jedi).
This panel was moderately attended but was a heck of a lot of fun.After introducing the panelists, Mike proceeded to ask them their favorite Star Wars films, which was amusing due to the fact that they had, for the most part, written their favorite film.
First up, Tony DiTerlizzi, co-author of
The Spiderwick Chronicles, shared with fans how he went about distilling the three Original Trilogy films into his recent book
The Adventures of Luke Skywalker, Jedi Knight. He also talked a little about the inspiration that he drew from the Ralph McQuarrie paintings that make up the illustrations throughout.
Then Alexandra Bracken (known for the
Darkest Minds series) discussed the challenge with writing a new adaptation of
A New Hope, which she says is a near perfect story. Her book follows more closely Princess Leia and includes some new scenes, including one with Leia trying to escape from the Empire's clutches. She also expressed how cool it was to be on a panel, as she's been to all but one of the US Celebrations as a fan. Now she was getting a chance to see it from a new perspective.
Adam Bracken, writer of
A Tale Dark and the
Grimm series, was next discussing his take on
The Empire Strikes Back. Adam had a slightly different approach turning the book into a 2nd person narrative, with
you the reader, becoming the one being trained by Yoda on Dagobah. He shared how he based his characterization of the wise Jedi Master on his karate sensei. Adam then invited a couple young fans on stage to practice their Jedi skills. They closed their eyes and meditated while he threw fruit at them! It was an awesome and funny exercise. Adam also mentioned inserting some new elements to the story, especially in the Dagobah training sequences.
Finally Tom Angleberger (of the
Origami Yoda series) talked about writing his adaptation of
Return of the Jedi. He is as funny as his books would lead you to believe, and was surprised at how many new scenes every other author had included. He has only added one new scene in his book. He also promised to keep the potty humor to a minimum.
Fans in attendance were treated to a a pre-release excerpt of all three books:
The Princess, The Scoundrel, and The Farm Boy;
So You Want To Be A Jedi?; and
Beware the Power of the Dark Side. The books are due in June, July and August respectively in a new hardcover printing.
