Great Galloping Galaxies!

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Of course not. Though Lucas has no immediate plans for Han, Leia or Luke, that does not mean he will not come up with some in the next decade or so. If he does carry the story any further, he will probably go back to the beginning, before these characters were born, and make what he calls a "prequel," another trilogy that would explain how the Republic fell. Only after that—and certainly not before the 1990s—would he do the sequel and show what happens to the Star Wars trio after Jedi. But at the moment the only words he likes to think about are The End. "I look upon the three Star Wars films as chapters in one book," he says. "Now the book is finished, and I have put it on the shelf."

— By Gerald Clarke. Reported by Mary Cronin/ London, Dick Thompson/San Francisco and Denise Worrell/Los Angeles