George Lucas Unveils "Star Wars: The Clone Wars" at Cartoon Network Upfront

George Lucas unveiled his latest project, Star Wars: The Clone Warsat this morning’s Cartoon Network Upfront presentation, held at Terminal 5 inNew York. The CGI animated series is at the heart of the network’s efforts to continue to diversify its on-air offerings and which will anchor Friday night’s fantasy/adventure programming.

You might recall an animated series of shorts by the same name which aired onCartoon Network from 2003-2005, during which the network was experimenting with the form. The CGI animated Star Wars: The Clone Wars  feature-length film is set to release on August 15th. The Cartoon Network series debuts this fall and picks up where this summer’s feature film leaves off.

George Lucas, the guest-star of the upfront event, sat down for a Q&A with Cartoon Network president and COO, Stuart Snyder. Lucas shared that he started out in film school in animation and was enthusiastic about returning to the medium. When asked about the design of the series and characters, he said “When you’re doing animation about modern action actors, and everyone knows what they look like, you really have to come up with a very sophisticated and dynamic caricature of those people.” In addition to coming up with innovative ways to depict the existing Star Wars characters, Lucas added entirely new characters, namely a pre-teen Padawon who plays the role of Anakin Skywalker’s protégé. Lucas emphasized that most Padawons don’t become Padawons until they are 14 or 15. “So she’s a very young Padawon,” he says. “And she’s very feisty and she’s very outgoing and independent-minded which gives Anakin a real challenge because he’s sort of that way too.”

Lucas also talked about his enjoyment of working in television. When asked about working on feature films, he said “It comes and it goes. Television, oddly enough, has a longer life because it’s repeated and repeated. It’s much more like what we call the old-fashioned studio system where you just come up with great ideas; you execute them and move on.”

In his closing thoughts, Lucas said the target demographic for the series was pre-teens but added that the partnership with Cartoon Network and Turner Entertainment would give the series a wide reach and could very well be considered entertainment for the whole family. According to the Myers Emotional Connections Study of 2007, Nearly half (46.6%) of adults 18-24 agree they frequently watch the Cartoon Network. 42.% of males 37.2% of females age 18-24 agreed that Cartoon Network is relevant to them.

For a sneak peek, watch the video below.

Cartoon Network also announced the creation of The Cartoonstitute, a think tank for animators who will produce up to 150 pieces of programming over the next 20 months. The initiative will be lead by animation veterans, Craig McCracken (The Powerpuff Girls, Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends) and Rob Renzetti (My Life as a Teenage Robot, Dexter's Laboratory).