It does seem like a new strategy is emerging to a degree.
One movie is on the traditional timeline, one goes way back with all new characters but on the original story, and one movie gives the streaming pieces a look.
Don't know how it will all end up being, but it's nice to see Disney finally have a strategy for the movies beyond "milk the original movie for all its worth".

I'm just saying a character that can do this:



along with rockets, flamethrowers, missiles, tow ropes, and jet packs would be an awesome sight on screen.

Brian Earl Spilner said:

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TCTTS said:

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TCTTS said:

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I take it to mean more of an overall steward/glue guy. Not quite a Feige type, but more of James Gunn type; a creative who will help oversee the overall story/vision, but also someone who will write and direct when compelled, starting with whatever this new project is. Which, if I had to guess, MIGHT be some kind of Avengers-esque culmination movie that sees Mando, Bo, Ahsoka, etc all teaming up together. If they're shifting all of the focus to that particular time period/story, that's what would make the most sense to me, but who knows.

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Dave Filoni will direct a ‘STAR WARS’ film culminating the events of the ‘MANDOVERSE’. #SWCE pic.twitter.com/yxiVtVS16O

— DiscussingFilm (@DiscussingFilm) April 7, 2023

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Been saying this for years. Love it.

Also, Sabine is super hot.

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hunter2012 said:

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Brian Earl Spilner said:

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Also, Sabine is super hot.

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Btw, there's an establishing shot in that grainy, bootleg Skelton Crew trailer that has me so intrigued/excited, even though it's technically the most mundane thing ever. But it's a shot of the neighborhood the kids/families live in, and instead of looking like the typical villages and town squares we've seen dozens of times on countless planets in Star Wars before... it's an actual, suburban neighborhood. With street lights and sidewalks and driveways and trees and middle-class homes. Like something straight out of an '80s Spielberg movie, but with a Star Wars twist. And I don't know why, but that's the coolest thing ever to me, getting a glimpse of that kind of life in this galaxy...

TCTTS said:

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Btw, there's an establishing shot in that grainy, bootleg Skelton Crew trailer that has me so intrigued/excited, even though it's technically the most mundane thing ever. But it's a shot of the neighborhood the kids/families live in, and instead of looking like the typical villages and town squares we've seen dozens of times on countless planets in Star Wars before... it's an actual, suburban neighborhood. With street lights and sidewalks and driveways and trees and middle-class homes. Like something straight out of an '80s Spielberg movie, but with a Star Wars twist. And I don't know why, but that's the coolest thing ever to me, getting a glimpse of that kind of life in this galaxy...

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Remember when I said I could be sucked into this one if it done like a Spielberg movie?

I remember.

Wow. What kind of choices does one have to make in life to become THAT pathetic and THAT enraged over a movie franchise?

The old "weaponized autism" moniker may fit here.

John Boyega suddenly remembering how much he likes Star Wars last week sure makes a lot more sense when they announce a movie TROS+15 with Rey as one of the leads.

double aught said:

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TCTTS said:

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redline248 said:

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Why are they going to strike?

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They're smack dab in the middle of negotiations right now. But *if* they strike, it's for a number of reasons...

Quote:

---

The WGA released its broad demands on its website earlier this year; members approved them in March. The union has grouped these demands into three categories: compensation and residuals, pension plan and health fund, and professional standards and protection in the employment of writers.

Specifically regarding pay and compensation, the union calls out the devaluation of writing across TV, movies, and other media; it's asking for an increase in minimum pay to address that. It's also asking for pay and residuals to be standardized between streaming and theatrical releases and to ensure TV writers are paid throughout production, too. A WGA report from mid-March suggested that writers have been disadvantaged as production companies "[leverage] the streaming transition to underpay writers, creating more precarious, lower-paid models for writers' work." After adjusting for inflation, the WGA estimates that "median weekly writer-producer pay" has declined by 23%.

"The companies have used the transition to streaming to cut writer pay and separate writing from production, worsening working conditions for series writers at all levels," the WGA wrote. "On TV staffs, more writers are working at minimum regardless of experience, often for fewer weeks, or in mini-rooms, while showrunners are left without a writing staff to complete the season. And while series budgets have soared over the past decade, median writer-producer pay has fallen."

The other big issue is "mini rooms," which Variety described as a scaled-down writers room. A traditional writers room is roughly eight writers, Variety's report explained, while a mini room enlists two or three writers to help a showrunner write a few scripts at lower rates, regardless of their experience level. Using this type of small-scale writers room keeps costs down while the platform decides if it wants to greenlight a show, or - in the event that a full season has aired - to determine if the show should be renewed. With mini rooms becoming more prominent, pay has decreased due to the lower-scale rates involved. It's particularly bad for newer writers, Variety said.

---

Basically, what it comes down to is that streaming has screwed writers, in some pretty dire ways. We had a model that worked, where everyone was payed fairly, and didn't need to try and juggle four jobs a year to get by. But streaming blew all that up, and the studios used that opportunity to undercut the writers like crazy in the process. Streaming is obviously the future, change of course comes to every industry, and corporations are always going to look out for their own bottom lines above all. But the current model simply isn't sustainable, and will eventually implode. So with their union contract up come May 1, the WGA is trying to make things right, and basically everyone agrees that what they're asking for is beyond fair. The problem is, the studios claim they're loosing money on streaming - which they are (though profits will come in the next couple of years) - but they're also making a sh*t ton elsewhere, theatrically, in residuals, on cable, etc. And what the writers are asking for would cost only $600M more annually, split between all the studios, which is beyond reasonable.

---

This is interesting stuff. Thanks. And it does seem reasonable. At the same time I wonder: hasn't streaming allowed for more jobs for writers? It seems that there's currently more scripted content being produced than any time in history. In that respect, looks like a good time to be writer; lots of jobs to go around.

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That's the whole crux of the situation. There are more shows but, ironically, way less jobs. Think of it like this...

Most seasons of television used to be 20+ episodes, while cable series were 10-13 episodes per season. And every show had a writers room consisting of anywhere from, say, five to ten writers or more, who were employed throughout the entirety of each season, and they not only wrote the episodes, but were on set and basically involved in every facet of production, gaining all kinds of valuable production experience.

Additionally, most series used to not only run longer (meaning multiple seasons), and more frequently (a season per consecutive year), but if the shows were popular, they also went into syndication, which means reruns on a separate network, which meant writers collecting residual checks for those episodes as well, which is what kept them afloat between jobs/seasons, gave them enough savings if their show got canceled and they had to look for another job, etc.

Now, however, in the age of streaming, the majority of seasons are not only 8-10 episodes, but in many cases there will be two-year gaps between seasons. So, yes, more shows overall, but way fewer episodes per show, and the seasons for those shows don't air as frequently, in sequential years. So you can see how that negatively affects writers, who get paid per episode. But that's not even the kicker. Studios have also started doing away with traditional writers rooms, and instead have "mini rooms," where a staff of writers show up for, like, two or three weeks, help the showrunner outline an 8 or 10 episode season, and then the showrunner and maybe another writer or two are the ones who then go off and write all eight or ten episodes after that.

In other words, the hundreds of people who used to be staff writers, and were employed on shows for nine months a year, are now finding themselves having to jump from two-week stint to two-week stent, helping showrunners outline their series... and that's it. They're not staying on during production, and they're not getting the valuable experience of actually *making* shows. So the studios are perpetuating a system in which only the top dog showrunners/writers are *maintaining* that experience, while hardly anyone else is *gaining* experience.

Further, because the broadcast/cable model is dying, shows are no longer being sold into syndication. They just stay on their respective streaming platforms for eternity. So there's no way for most writers to even earn residual checks to keep themselves afloat. Combined with the sparse nature of the mini rooms, a number of writers are having to find other work - outside the industry - just to be able to keep writing *in* the industry.

Now, yes, there are still a number of broadcast series on the air that still have 20+ episode seasons. And they still employ full writers rooms for the duration of those seasons. It's just that there are way fewer of those shows, and way more of the latter, under this new system. So what the WGA is essentially trying to do is A) put a stop to mini rooms - if you're a studio and you employee a writer, it should be for the entire season - then B) establish a better residual structure, wherein the streamers pay writers in perpetuity for their work. No more paying someone once for something that you then get to air for eternity, for free. Granted, certain residual structures do exist for the streamers, but they're based on ridiculous metrics that make no sense, and the WGA is addressing that as well.

Overall, it's a lot more complicated than what I've outlined above, and there are a number of additional issues on the table, but that's the basic answer to your question.

Thanks for that explanation. It helps me understand it better.

TTCTTS said:

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double aught said:

---

TCTTS said:

---

redline248 said:

---

Why are they going to strike?

---

They're smack dab in the middle of negotiations right now. But *if* they strike, it's for a number of reasons...

Quote:

---

The WGA released its broad demands on its website earlier this year; members approved them in March. The union has grouped these demands into three categories: compensation and residuals, pension plan and health fund, and professional standards and protection in the employment of writers.

Specifically regarding pay and compensation, the union calls out the devaluation of writing across TV, movies, and other media; it's asking for an increase in minimum pay to address that. It's also asking for pay and residuals to be standardized between streaming and theatrical releases and to ensure TV writers are paid throughout production, too. A WGA report from mid-March suggested that writers have been disadvantaged as production companies "[leverage] the streaming transition to underpay writers, creating more precarious, lower-paid models for writers' work." After adjusting for inflation, the WGA estimates that "median weekly writer-producer pay" has declined by 23%.

"The companies have used the transition to streaming to cut writer pay and separate writing from production, worsening working conditions for series writers at all levels," the WGA wrote. "On TV staffs, more writers are working at minimum regardless of experience, often for fewer weeks, or in mini-rooms, while showrunners are left without a writing staff to complete the season. And while series budgets have soared over the past decade, median writer-producer pay has fallen."

The other big issue is "mini rooms," which Variety described as a scaled-down writers room. A traditional writers room is roughly eight writers, Variety's report explained, while a mini room enlists two or three writers to help a showrunner write a few scripts at lower rates, regardless of their experience level. Using this type of small-scale writers room keeps costs down while the platform decides if it wants to greenlight a show, or - in the event that a full season has aired - to determine if the show should be renewed. With mini rooms becoming more prominent, pay has decreased due to the lower-scale rates involved. It's particularly bad for newer writers, Variety said.

---

Basically, what it comes down to is that streaming has screwed writers, in some pretty dire ways. We had a model that worked, where everyone was payed fairly, and didn't need to try and juggle four jobs a year to get by. But streaming blew all that up, and the studios used that opportunity to undercut the writers like crazy in the process. Streaming is obviously the future, change of course comes to every industry, and corporations are always going to look out for their own bottom lines above all. But the current model simply isn't sustainable, and will eventually implode. So with their union contract up come May 1, the WGA is trying to make things right, and basically everyone agrees that what they're asking for is beyond fair. The problem is, the studios claim they're loosing money on streaming - which they are (though profits will come in the next couple of years) - but they're also making a sh*t ton elsewhere, theatrically, in residuals, on cable, etc. And what the writers are asking for would cost only $600M more annually, split between all the studios, which is beyond reasonable.

---

This is interesting stuff. Thanks. And it does seem reasonable. At the same time I wonder: hasn't streaming allowed for more jobs for writers? It seems that there's currently more scripted content being produced than any time in history. In that respect, looks like a good time to be writer; lots of jobs to go around.

---

That's the whole crux of the situation. There are more shows but, ironically, way less jobs. Think of it like this...

Most seasons of television used to be 20+ episodes, while cable series were 10-13 episodes per season. And every show had a writers room consisting of anywhere from, say, five to ten writers or more, who were employed throughout the entirety of each season, and they not only wrote the episodes, but were on set and basically involved in every facet of production, gaining all kinds of valuable production experience.

Additionally, most series used to not only run longer (meaning multiple seasons), and more frequently (a season per consecutive year), but if the shows were popular, they also went into syndication, which means reruns on a separate network, which meant writers collecting residual checks for those episodes as well, which is what kept them afloat between jobs/seasons, gave them enough savings if their show got canceled and they had to look for another job, etc.

Now, however, in the age of streaming, the majority of seasons are not only 8-10 episodes, but in many cases there will be two-year gaps between seasons. So, yes, more shows overall, but way fewer episodes per show, and the seasons for those shows don't air as frequently, in sequential years. So you can see how that negatively affects writers, who get paid per episode. But that's not even the kicker. Studios have also started doing away with traditional writers rooms, and instead have "mini rooms," where a staff of writers show up for, like, two or three weeks, help the showrunner outline an 8 or 10 episode season, and then the showrunner and maybe another writer or two are the ones who then go off and write all eight or ten episodes after that.

In other words, the hundreds of people who used to be staff writers, and were employed on shows for nine months a year, are now finding themselves having to jump from two-week stint to two-week stent, helping showrunners outline their series... and that's it. They're not staying on during production, and they're not getting the valuable experience of actually *making* shows. So the studios are perpetuating a system in which only the top dog showrunners/writers are *maintaining* that experience, while hardly anyone else is *gaining* experience.

Further, because the broadcast/cable model is dying, shows are no longer being sold into syndication. They just stay on their respective streaming platforms for eternity. So there's no way for most writers to even earn residual checks to keep themselves afloat. Combined with the sparse nature of the mini rooms, a number of writers are having to find other work - outside the industry - just to be able to keep writing *in* the industry.

Now, yes, there are still a number of broadcast series on the air that still have 20+ episode seasons. And they still employ full writers rooms for the duration of those seasons. It's just that there are way fewer of those shows, and way more of the latter, under this new system. So what the WGA is essentially trying to do is A) put a stop to mini rooms - if you're a studio and you employee a writer, it should be for the entire season - then B) establish a better residual structure, wherein the streamers pay writers in perpetuity for their work. No more paying someone once for something that you then get to air for eternity, for free. Granted, certain residual structures do exist for the streamers, but they're based on ridiculous metrics that make no sense, and the WGA is addressing that as well.

Overall, it's a lot more complicated than what I've outlined above, and there are a number of additional issues on the table, but that's the basic answer to your question.

---

The whole mini room situation and not being involved throughout production explains so much of the streaming era it is not even funny