John Carter hasn't even opened yet, but director Andrew Stanton is already talking about sequels. He spoke with Ain't It Cool News about his fears in tackling the stories, the process of making the movie from story elements, characters and major plot points that will appear in the first film. He also outlines in great detail elements from the second and third book in the series by Edgar Rice Burroughs: The God of Mars and The Warlords of Mars. Fans of the series can read the entire lengthy interview here.
Among the highlights of the interview include Stanton talking about removing some elements from the first book, A Princess of Mars, and saving them for later films.
"What we basically did is we mapped out a trilogy and we took all the cool elements and all of the cool characters, all the cool creatures, and sort of made a grocery list. We said, 'We don’t have the time to put all of the things that are mentioned in the first book or in any of these books all in one movie and we don’t want to shortchange anything, so if we can make them much more grounded and integral to the story some of these things may be worth waiting for later while some of these other things may be worth putting in early,' so you get Matai early, but the air plants will be later."
Stanton then talked about things he couldn't wait to include in the sequels.
"I can’t wait to see the goddess ISSUS herself and the plant men. I can’t wait… We kind of held back on really going full bore with air ships, because I knew what we were going to do in film two and I didn’t want it to feel redundant from film one, so I had to find that balance of 'How much is just enough' to enjoy what you were seeing, but want a little bit more."
The director added that he has already begun outlining the second movie saying that if they were going to make it, it would be another huge movie and "you can't get started early enough."
John Carter opens March 9.
