I mean, come on, we’ve all made fan films. When video editing programs come with “Galactic Crawl” presets, when we have more computing power on our spare cell phone than was used to render the light cycles in Tron, who hasn’t staged their own lightsaber battle?

That’s why it’s a paradigm shift that Josh Trank, the director who will be directing the first between-episodes Star Wars snack, made his own fan film less than a decade ago.



This opens up unimaginable possibilities. Where could this lead? Could Ghostbusters 3 include a sarcastic Russian guy? Ben Affleck in Batman Vs. Predator? If we’re having this conversation, let us put this out there: in 1992, when backyard epics were shot on VHS (or Hi-8 if you knew someone with rich parents) and edited with two VCRs, Mowrer and I revisited our favorite cinematic world, a world where leisure rules. I wrote and directed, Mowrer played Cameron, and he played it to the hilt:

So, if the makers of fan-films can be given the keys to the kingdom, our cards are on the table. We have ideas for a return to Shermer Illinois, home of Ferris Bueller, the Breakfast Club, Ducky, and the rest of John Hughes’ teen canon. Alan Ruck, email me. And Sid and Marty Krofft, watch this space…