The overwhelming fan animosity towards the Star Wars prequels, coupled with the fact that George Lucas hasn't directed anything since Revenge of the Sith, means that there have been relatively few demands that the creator of the sci-fi titan take the helm for one of the upcoming Star Wars movies. Lucas himself made it clear that he was done with the franchise in 2008, when he said, "There will definitely be no ‘Episodes VII-IX’. That’s because there isn’t any story. I mean, I never thought of anything!"

Obviously Lucas was ultimately proved wrong since Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens is arriving in theaters less than a year from now; and according to his son, the director spent some time mapping out a new trilogy before selling Lucasfilm to Disney for just over $4 billion. How closely Disney intends to adhere to Lucas' blueprints is unclear, though.

While he might have fallen out of the business of directing films, Lucas hasn't stopped working altogether. Screen Rant got the chance to talk to the Star Wars creator about upcoming fantasy film Strange Magic, for which Lucas wrote the story, and naturally we had to ask how much of the footage for The Force Awakens he'd seen, outside of the short teaser that has been released. It turns out that he's in the same boat as everyone else.

"I haven't seen anything; I mean I saw the trailer, it looks great, it looks interesting. But as I've said before: one thing I regret about Star Wars is that I never got to see it, you know? I never got to be blown away by the big ship coming over the thing, or anything. But this time I'm going to be, because I have no idea what they're doing."

Star Wars: The Force Awakens most anticipated 2015 film

Lucas also said that he isn't actively involved with building the new Disney-owned franchise, though he's no doubt still available to Abrams and co. for consultation. The fact that he describes himself as a fan is certainly indicative of a distance between himself and the new trilogy, and that he doesn't really see it as part of his own created world. That could imply that Disney isn't sticking to the roadmap he gave them... but we could just be reading way too much into this.

George Lucas and Alec Guinness

Even Abrams himself originally didn't want to direct The Force Awakens because, as a lifelong Star Wars fan, he also wanted to just sit back and be able to enjoy the movies as a fan. Since he ultimately gave in and said yes, though, Star Wars Episode VII could be called a movie that's being made by a fan, for a fan.

Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens will be in theaters on December 18, 2015.