ABC plotting Star Wars TV series

US TV network ABC are said to be considering bringing the planned 'Star Wars' TV series into production.

The series has been in the development stages for several years, but now that Disney has bought up George Lucas's Lucasfilm, it may decide to broadcast it on ABC, which it also owns.

[Related story: Guilermo Del Toro turns down Star Wars VII]

Said ABC president Paul Lee to Entertainment Weekly: “We’d love to do something with Lucasfilm, we’re not sure what yet. We haven’t even sat down with them.

“We’re going to look at [the live-action series], we’re going to look at all of them, and see what’s right. We weren’t able to discuss this with them until [the acquisition] closed and it just closed. It’s definitely going to be part of the conversation.”

The series is being produced by Rick McCallum, a long-term collaborator of Lucas's who worked on the special editions of the original 'Star Wars' trilogy, and produced the newer prequels 'The Phantom Menace', 'Attack of the Clones' and 'Revenge of the Sith'.

McCallum, who also produced the 'Young Indiana Jones Chronicles', has said that there are 50 scripts written for a series of one-hour 'Star Wars' TV episodes, written by the likes of Ronald D. Moore who was behind the re-booted 'Battlestar Galactica'.

The series is said to be 'darker' and 'more adult' than the existing films, taking in peripheral characters rather than the main protagonists, and has been described by McCallum as 'Deadwood in space', referring to the celebrated HBO series.

The issue, however, is said to be one of finance, with each episode said to be budgeted at around $5 million, considerably more than is traditionally spent in television.

There is also the issue of how a TV series would be juggled with the forthcoming sequels, the first of which is set for released in 2015.

“It’s going to be very much up to the Lucasfilm brands how they want to play it,” added Lee.