Benioff And Weiss May Not Write Scripts For All Of Their New 'Star Wars' Trilogy

In February of 2018, Game of Thrones creators David Benioff and D.B. Weiss were officially announced as the writers and producers of a new series of Star Wars movies. Technically, that's still the only piece of official information from Disney and Lucasfilm about the duo's involvement in a galaxy far, far away, but now a new report suggests that they may not be writing each entry in that upcoming film series after all.

A new piece at The Hollywood Reporter wonders if it was wise for Netflix to lock down Benioff and Weiss for a huge five-year, $250 million development deal, and within that article, there's a fascinating piece of information about their work on the Star Wars franchise:

Sources say the Thrones pair is writing a treatment for a Star Wars trilogy and is committed to penning at least one of the films (the original deal was to write all three). It's unclear if the duo, who also have another feature for Fox/Disney carved out, will do more than just write for Star Wars.

Again, since the initial announcement from Lucasfilm said the pair would be writing and producing each movie in their "series," this is the first time we've heard that Benioff and Weiss are writing a treatment for three films and may not actually write the scripts for all three entries. It's never been clear if they'll direct one of these movies, so that aspect remains as murky as ever.

Earlier this year, a rumor suggested that their apparent trilogy would be set during the time of the Old Republic, hundreds of years before the Skywalker saga. That rumor was never confirmed, but it's easy to see how it might make sense, given the eight seasons of the vaguely medieval Game of Thrones they just wrapped up.

Benioff and Weiss, who are not nearly as prolific as fellow nine-figure deal recipients like Shonda Rhimes, Greg Berlanti, or Ryan Murphy, signed that mega-deal at Netflix without much to show for it upfront – in fact, in addition to their Star Wars commitments (whatever the specifics of those may be), they're also still lined up to write and direct an adaptation of the 1995 prison escape novel Dirty White Boys for Fox and Disney. Hence all the wondering aloud about whether or not Netflix made a good investment.

I could easily envision a situation in which their Netflix deal results in them writing a treatment for a trilogy, the script for one movie, and then handing the reigns to another writer altogether while retaining producer credits on the remaining Star Wars movies that continue their story, but that's just speculation for now. We'll let you know as soon as we learn more concrete details.