An Animation Legend Turned Down The Chance To Lead Lucasfilm Before Dave Filoni

Earlier this year, it was announced that Kathleen Kennedy would be stepping down as President of Lucasfilm, and we now know that Lynwen Brennan and Dave Filoni will be replacing her. But while casual fans may not recognize her name right off the bat, Brennan has a long history with Lucasfilm. Indeed, she joined ILM in 1999 and even served as its president before becoming Lucasfilm's General Manager in 2015.

Filoni, meanwhile, is a name "Star Wars" fans are well familiar with. After a brief stunt as a storyboard artist and director on "Avatar: The Last Airbender," he was recruited by George Lucas himself to help build Lucasfilm Animation and develop "Star Wars: The Clone Wars." It was Filoni, Henry Gilroy, and a team of writers who had to deal with Lucas' whimsical additions to the "Star Wars" franchise, like suddenly giving Anakin Skywalker a Padawan (something that caught Filoni by surprise). Filoni was long considered a protégé of Lucas and was a key figure in the animated side of the property for over 15 years before he shifted to working on live-action projects like "The Mandalorian." In fact, Lucas reportedly vouched for him to remain a central pillar of Lucasfilm after he sold the company to Disney back in 2012 (via Vanity Fair).

Initially, however, Lucas tapped a different animator to oversee a galaxy far, far away back in the 2000s. According to TheWrap, the filmmaker once offered a leadership position at Lucasfilm Animation to none other than Genndy Tartakovsky, himself a legend of animation who helped build an entire TV network devoted to cartoons with a little animated show about a genius kid and his work station. (Or, as everyone now knows it, "Dexter's Laboratory.")

TheWrap's report doesn't go into much detail, but it does state that George Lucas only recruited Dave Filoni after Genndy Tartakovsky turned down his offer. That said, the idea of Lucas going to Tartakovsky first to lead a new animation branch of Lucasfilm makes a lot of sense. By then, after all, Lucas had already worked with Tartakovsky on the "Star Wars: Clone Wars" micro-series, which won a Primetime Emmy and had some of the best animated "Star Wars" moments ever. More than that, "Clone Wars" had a unique (and incredible) sense of visual storytelling that relied on iconography rather than dialogue. It's also the show that introduced the beloved characters Asajj Ventress and General Grievous, all while making Mace Windu the coolest Jedi around.

As the leader of Lucasfilm Animation, Tartakovsky likely would've given us more animated "Star Wars" projects that experimented with different visual styles. At the same time, it's possible Tartakovsky simply didn't want to be stuck working on the same franchise for the rest of his life, especially considering how hands-on Lucas was with "Star Wars" back then. Tellingly, when Yahoo! Entertainment once asked if he'd ever return to a galaxy far, far away, Tartakovsky replied, "I did what I did, so I wouldn't go back."

Really, just imagine if Tartakovsky had agreed to oversee Lucasfilm Animation when it was founded in 2005. We probably wouldn't have gotten his "Samurai Jack" revival (one of the greatest achievements of adult animation), and we definitely wouldn't have gotten his incredibly violent and gnarly magnum opus "Primal," seeing as Tartakovsky would now be working for Disney. Sure, he could've been great for "Star Wars," but "Star Wars" would've been horrible for him.