Concerns over AI forcedAndorcreator Tony Gilroy to withdraw from releasing the scripts for his hit Disney+Star Warsseries. In 2023, duringAndor’s For Your Consideration campaign for the Emmys, Gilroy announced he would release the scripts to the series online. This news was positively met by fans eager to get a peak at how Gilroy crafted what many consider to be one of the best entries in the entireStar Warsfranchise. Yet, two years later, withAndorSeason 2 on the horizon, the scripts have never been released.
While speaking withCollider, Gilroy spoke about his decision not to release the scripts toAndoronline, which is rooted in his not wanting to have his work used in AI learning software to make content. “I wanted to do it. We put it together. It’s really cool. I’ve seen it, I loved it. AI is the reason we’re not,” he said. Gilroy expanded on his decision further, noting he didn’t want his work to go into feeding and training a machine.
“In the end, it would be 1,500 pages that came directly off this desk. I mean, terribly sadly, it’s just too much of an X-ray and too easily absorbed. Why help the f***ing robots any more than you can? So, it was an ego thing. It was vanity that makes you want to do it, and the downside is real. So, vanity loses.”
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Gilroy is a prolific writer and director. BeforeAndor, he was likely best known for 2007’sMichael Clayton, which was nominated for Best Director and Best Original Screenplayat the 80th Academy Awards. His other writing credits include the original three Jason Bourne movies,Armageddon,The Cutting Edge, andThe Devil’s Advocate, to name a few. Combining all that, plus his work doing rewrites onRogue One: A Star Wars Storyand the creator ofAndor, he has an impressive resume that also makes him a target for companies invested in AI who want to use his body of work to train their learning machines.
Tony Gilroy’s Concerns Over AI Are Real
While Tony Gilroy might say it is vanity, his concerns are entirely valid. The concerns around AI were a major factor in the 2023 WGA Strike, and despite the strike being resolved, the concerns of AI are becoming more concerning every day. In July 2024,Wiredreported that tech companies used subtitles from 173,536 YouTube videos from more than 48,000 channels to train their AI programs, often without the consent of the video creator. There is seemingly nothing stopping tech companies from using the scripts of a critically acclaimed Disney+ series associated with one of the most popular franchises in the world in an effort to make its own “content.”
This is simplyanother story of how AI has become a net negative on society. Releasing scripts for fans to view is a vital component for teaching a new generation of filmmakers and storytellers, as they can not only see a technical layout of how a script is formatted, but also see exactly how what is on the page will translate to the screen. One has to wonder how many more filmmakers will be skeptical about releasing their scripts for movie fans to see due to concerns about it being used to train AI.
Source:Collider
