Seth Green Explains the Key Reason Fans Won’t Ever See Star Wars Detours

For nearly 50 years, the Star Wars franchise has permeated all corners of pop culture, and with the massive footprint of the series, it inherently has opened itself up to parody. While TV shows like The Simpsons and Family Guy and movies like Spaceballs and Fanboys have poked fun at the series, Lucasfilm sanctioned the animated series Star Wars Detours from Robot Chicken creators Seth Green and Matthew Senreich to put their satirical spin on the saga. As far as the current status of the series, which Lucasfilm has shelved indefinitely, Green recently recalled that one reason a release seems even more unlikely is the amount of time and money that it would take to remaster the original episodes to meet the standards of streaming platforms.

“Detours itself would have to be edited, upgraded … they’d have to do new work on it to make it possible to put it on streaming. And I just don’t think that they’re willing to commit the spend to update and release this when they can’t see a clear benefit,” Green confirmed to ComicBook.

Detours was first announced at Star Wars Celebration in 2012, just months before it was revealed that Lucasfilm was being purchased by The Walt Disney Company. While a trailer for the series was unveiled at the event, no other official looks at the project have been released, despite Green previously revealing that nearly 40 episodes had been completed.

“It’s so complicated, because where that fit into Star Wars history was a very specific moment. George [Lucas] had not sold the company yet, there weren’t concrete plans to make any new Star Wars movies, and Lucasfilm was primarily like a licensing company separate from the films they already produced, the projects they hadn’t developed. George wanted to make something that was The Simpsons in the Star Wars universe. That’s what we set out to do. I don’t know, I think he just wanted to have fun, I think that’s why he hired us,” Green recalled of the situation. “They were writing the last couple of seasons of [Star Wars: The] Clone Wars and were planning what would become [Star Wars] Rebels, and we were just making this show up there.”

[RELATED – Star Wars: “Weird Al” Yankovic Reveals He Recorded Music for Unreleased Detours Series]

He continued, “And then when he put Kathleen Kennedy in charge, her task was not to make Star Wars for the next two years or three years, her task was to embed Star Wars in the populace for the next 30 years. And the biggest thing that she said was, ‘Hey, look: we’re going to make these new movies and kids have not seen any new Star Wars, so aside from the animated series, Clone Wars, this could be a whole new generation’s first blush with Star Wars.’ She said, ‘It’s more valuable for us to point everything towards the movies.’ So the idea that, on Detours, we have Vader in his Life Day sweater hosting a Life Day for all the imprisoned Wookiees in the detention center, it competes. You’re gonna alter the way that you meet these icons, which I agreed, at least for the purpose of pointing everything towards these movies, is valid.”

While fans who have been aware of the series for more than a decade are disappointed that Detours is seemingly scrapped forever, Green has a much more positive outlook on the situation.

“I am consoled by the insane and unlikely experience that I got to have with one of my greatest influences. There’s so many things you create that never get made, there’s so many things that you make that never get seen, it is a painful reality of being in this business,” the creator recalled. “I look at all the people that I know, the work I got to do, this insane experience I got to have … I’ve learned so much just from getting to do it, about everything. Getting to spend that time in tutelage by Kathleen Kennedy, it’s an honor.”

All current seasons of Green’s Robot Chicken are now available to stream on Max, with a 20th-anniversary special coming this summer.

Are you disappointed about this news on Star Wars Detours? Let us know in the comments below and contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter or on Instagram to talk all things Star Wars and horror!