Star Wars IS in Ready Player One

File under: The Web – A Living Document

This post is a little weird, so bear with me.

On March 16, following news out of SXSW, I was ready to post the following…

No Star Wars in Ready Player One?

Steven Spielberg may have gotten Indiana Jones into the Disney parks, but apparently, he couldn’t get Star Wars into his latest opus. About Ready Player One, Syfy Wire reported:

This will sting specially bad for those who read the book, where a major character pilots an X-Wing through the OASIS. When Spielberg noted, “They wouldn’t give up the Star Wars rights,” Ben Mendelsohn, who was sitting right behind the director (and memorably played the villainous Orson Krennic in Rogue One), leaned in and said, “You could have called me. I built the Death Star.” Touché.

And, just looking at the poster, it seems like Director Krennic is in the movie. Maybe that’s the only Star Wars reference they needed, anyway.

But then, happily, one of my three boys called me away from the computer.

No Star Wars in Ready Player One

Later in the day, the always insightful Chris Taylor tweeted:

Was pleased to skip the controversy and go straight to the debunking on this one. https://t.co/eL7UOQcUJ6

— Chris Taylor (@FutureBoy) March 16, 2018

Taylor pointed to this Tweet by Fandango’s Erik Davis:

EXCLUSIVE: Contrary to reports spreading now, Disney did let Steven Spielberg use #StarWars in #ReadyPlayerOne. Here, Spielberg explains to me how they snagged IP rights from all the studios and what STAR WARS Easter Eggs to look for in the new film, in theaters 3/29 pic.twitter.com/LslVQP1iCv

— ErikDavis (@ErikDavis) March 16, 2018

Then, multiple outlets posted tweets and posts akin to the following:

Well, nevermind, then: Of course there's going to be Star Wars shit in Ready Player One https://t.co/jsCA3qiOZc pic.twitter.com/kTcEUdUk1K

— The A.V. Club (@TheAVClub) March 17, 2018

So what’s the bottom line?

No, Star Wars IS in Ready Player One

As io9’s Germain Lussier explained:

Despite his own quotes to the contrary, Steven Spielberg told Fandango Friday that Disney did allow Star Wars references into Ready Player One.

The A.V. Club also reported:

Like some sort of romance-averse space scoundrel, trying to keep his princess crush on the down-low, Steven Spielberg is sending a lot of mixed signals this weekend. Yesterday, we reported on a press conference the director gave about his upcoming film Ready Player One at SXSW, in which he reportedly said, “We couldn’t get any Star Wars rights,” in reference to the film’s over-flowing grab-bag of references. “[We tried] very hard,” he added. “They wouldn’t give up the Star Wars rights.” 

They added:

Except they did, apparently; that’s per no less authoritative a source than, well, Ready Player One director Steven Spielberg. Fandango’s Erik Davis posted an interview clip of Spielberg talking about the film yesterday, mentioning how a number of studios—including Disney—apparently bent over backwards to help him assemble Ernest Cline’s overwhelming collage of ’80s pop culture beats. Spielberg goes so far as to name a few Star Wars elements—an appearance by R2-D2 and an X-Wing, both of which are mentioned in the book—as specific Easter Eggs…

Fine with me of course; it doesn’t hurt this space to have more Star Wars to cover – assuming, of course, there is Star Wars in Ready Player One to cover.