And the parents who knew "Star Wars" could take kids and feel like they've gone back to a place that is familiar and yet found brand-new characters that took them somewhere they'd never been. And it was important me that we embrace that feeling, and you can call it retro, but I think it's what "Star Wars" is.

I hope to make movies that are so small they don't need to make anything to be profitable.

Well, we knew that we wanted to tell a story that made bold choices, and one of those bold choices was meeting a storm trooper and seeing who this person was. That's something that had never been done.

You can never guess or assume what anyone is going to think.

Making movies was more a reaction to not being chosen for sports. Other kids were out there playing at whatever; I was off making something blow up and filming it, or making a mould of my sister's head using alginating plaster.

The ability of a television series to make adjustments is something you've got to take advantage of.

One of my favorite things about 'Star Trek' wasn't just the overt banter but the humor in that show about the relationships between the main characters and their reactions to the situations they would face; there was a lot of comedy in that show without ever breaking its reality.