I feel like I don’t really need an R-rated Star Wars movie. Andor is pretty damn mature thematically, and what else would an R rating add? Violence and nudity? We already have a lot of decapitation and impaling, I feel it gets the point across.
Even TCW, you see ahsoka dealing with some exceptionally mature issues like the morality of war, trust and betrayal, corruption. grief, loss and PTSD… there’s more there.
Yes, it’s packaged as a kids show, but it goes pretty hard at times.
And Rebels hits even harder. It’s difficult to imagine what value being R-rated adds. It’s not like we can’t find twilek cosplay porn at the drop of a hat; and gratuitous violence simply for the gratuitous violence tends to ruin movies.
Deadpool works because it’s a parody of the super hero genre. What’s fun about those movies is that he’s deliberately doing things that are out of place in the Marvel universe - which includes going far more violent than usually allowed in the Marvel films. That’s kind of his challenge.
I’m not sure an equivalent in the Star Wars universe would work.
The only way I could see that style working in Star Wars is with Reynolds playing Jaxxon T. Tumperakki to fully lean into the absurdity and snarkiness, but I don’t think he’d be willing to play a green-colored comic book astronaut again any time soon
He specifically says he does not want to act in it, as [his comedy] is a bad fit for Star Wars. He also says he wanted it to be r-rated in terms of “sneaking” in emotions.
And let’s be honest, lightsabers could be much more violent without parodying anything. They should be, but they’re censored down because of ratings and target demographic.
An R-Rated film, where a Sith Lord goes around killing Jedi in the most gruesome ways like he’s Michael Myers would be something different. People would still bring their younglings and don’t think it would be a good time, Star Wars brand could lose that “family image” and appeal. Disney says no, can’t blame them.
