I have a bad feeling about this

I've always been of the mind that any new Star Wars story, even if it was bad, was inherently a good thing. After all, it's chance to take a fresh trip into that world, even if it doesn't tell a story with the same magic and excitement that the Original Trilogy.

I suppose that is why it's always been easier for me to overlook the flaws of the Prequel Trilogy, and yet be so harsh on those of the EU. The prequels were, at times, bad story telling, most of which I lay at George's feet. I had quibbles with the world — for example, I never liked the fact that most of the human Jedi on Coruscant dressed like they were on Tatooine. Oddly enough, my favorite Jedi uniform came from a comic book, which showed Obi-Wan Kenobi in a flashback to his days as a Jedi Knight. His dress? The same black outfit that Luke wore in Return of the Jedi.

If you will allow me a brief side-trip, I will always think that George missed a great chance when he based the Prequel Jedi uniforms on what Ben Kenobi was wearing on Tatooine, rather than what Luke was wearing as a Jedi Knight in Return of the Jedi. Ben was wearing that because he was on Tatooine. It would be silly in the extreme that a man hiding out from the Empire walk around in the same outfit he wore as a famous Jedi Knight. I think George missed two "oh, cool" moments in the prequels — the first, when we see that the old Jedi are dressed like Luke Skywalker did at the end of the first trilogy; and the second, when we see Obi-Wan leaving Luke with the Lars family garbed as Ben.

But, like it or not, the Prequels are Star Wars, so whatever we are not comfortable with in those stories must somehow be reconciled. Not so the EU. I won't waste time recounting what I found troubling in the EU, since I've already done it elsewhere. But in the end, it doesn't matter; all of those many tales were never part of the official story, painful as that is for the people who loved them. I never thought they were part of the "real" story, even though there were some in the Lucasfilm world who have said so.

For better or worse, that changed a few weeks ago. The announcement that the now non-canonical EU would be rebranded under a new Legends banner was a welcome development for me. I stated in my earlier blog post why I never thought those stories were canon; to have that authoritatively in print was a welcome development.

That announcement was coupled with a second one: that a second EU would be created: one that absolutely would matter, and which would bear equal weight to the films. At first, I was encouraged by this; I always had a sense when I was reading a Star Wars novel that I was, in some sense, wasting time because, in the end, it didn't really matter. It was fun, but it didn't really count — only the movies did. This is a lesson that was brought home to me rather early on, with the first EU book, Splinter of the Mind's Eye. I loved Splinter when it was released. It was both the priceless gift of new Star Wars, and it was absolutely the way I wanted the romantic triangle of Han/Luke/Leia to pan out. Plus, it was enormous fun, or so I thought at the time. Despite that, I had no trouble jettisoning it as a harmless bit of fun when Empire was released a couple of years later.

So it sounded like a good thing when Disney said that, from now on, the books were going to join the films as part of a larger story. It would, I though, be nice to read a book and have it be part of your experience with the films. Do you have a hunger for more Star Wars after the last movie? A book can now add to that experience. For example, the first New EU book is a prequel to Star Wars: Rebels. I may not be interested in it before I see the first episode of that series, but if I like Rebels enough, you can be sure I will be seeking it out after the fact. How much more will this be the case after a new Star Wars movie, when I am seeking out as much to do with that movie as I can afford to lay my hands on (as George's accountants know all too well).

Then a couple of things changed my mind; or, at least, made me think twice.

The first was a comment that a couple Del Ray book representatives made during an interview on  RebelForce Radio. To paraphrase, he said that everything counts now — movies, television shows, novels, comic books, games, and even children's books, are all on equal footing. What happens in one now affects the other.

As I listened in the car, that sentence kind of echoed as I mulled the implications.

Movies...

Well, yeah, sure — the movies have always been canon. For most of us, anyway. If you want to throw away half of them, that's your affair.

…television shows…

Okay, sure, I guess, if they're done well enough. Clone Wars didn't strike me as canonical back when it started (Anakin with a padawan? Really?), and I still haven't seen the bulk of it. But it was really, really good when it left the air after the Disney acquisition, and if anyone can do canon-level Star Wars now, it's my fellow Pittsburgh boy, Dave Filoni.

…novels…

Umm, okay, if you say so. I've been burned a lot in the past on this score, but I'm just going to have to trust you.

…comic books…

Seriously? With the sheer volume of comic book stories, that's a lot of plot line to have to keep straight.

…games…

Uhh...no. I still remember the scene in The Force: Unleashed where the main character pulls a freakin' Star Destroyer out of the sky by using the Force. A STAR DESTROYER!!! None of the other characters in the movies, not even the Chosen One or Master Yoda, even hinted at abilities of this scope, yet this character whose name I can't even remember could do it. Yet it worked within the game, because games are supposed to be fun, and big-league Force powers were a big part of that game.

…children's books…

Okay, you've left the planet on this one. Who drops a key plot point in a children's book?

For me, the idea that The Force Unleashed could hypothetically be on an equal canonical footing as The Empire Strikes Back is beyond ludicrous, and somewhat frightening. I don't know how Disney plans to make this work, but there is a huge margin for error looming on the horizon that, frankly, frightens me.

I am also concerned by the shape of things to come in what I'm already seeing going on the Marvel Universe. As you may have heard, the excellent show Agents of Shield is now tracking the same storyline as the Marvel movies. This was brought rather forcibly home with the April 8 episode, which tied in with the also-excellent film Captain America: The Winter Soldier. Fans of the show were given precisely one week from the April 1 episode, which ended with a scene from Winter Soldier, to go out and see the movie before key and crucial elements of the plot were laid bare in the next episode. Watch that episode, and you would be completely and irrevocably spoiled for Winter Soldier.

Fortunately, my wife and I were warned in time, and endured a six-week hiatus from that show until we could manage to make it to Winter Soldier before it left the theater altogether. If we hadn't, we would have had no choice but to delete all of the episodes we had DVRd, and wait for the release of both Winter Soldier and the Agents of Shield boxed set before we could catch up.

It felt more than a little like narrative blackmail — to enjoy this story, you must go out and purchase this one. If you don't, well, you won't mind knowing every big surprise that's in it, will you? After all, you didn't see it as soon as it came out, so you must not care.

Disney has practiced this sort of thing before. I'm still annoyed at the forced demand created by their "back into the vaults" practices with the DVD and Blu-Ray releases. If I'm remembering correctly, an average of seven years elapses between these releases. Want your five-year-old to see of Beauty and the Beast but didn't buy the DVD release two years before she was born? That's too bad. Maybe she'll still want to know about Belle when she's older.

Don't get me wrong: I truly love Disney. I think the people who are a part of it really, passionately care about quality, and giving their audience a good experience. But they are a corporation whose goal, at the end of the day, is to make money. And if they can do something like they just did with Captain America, it's only a matter of time before they do it in Star Wars.

An unexpected turn of events

I had intended this post to be about the unexpected resurgence of my interest in Star Wars. It was supposed to be about how the simple announcement about the EU being jettisoned had rekindled my enthusiasm for the Saga. I was even going to talk about how I, after a long-time and publically-documented indifference to the EU, was considering reading some of the "new canon" books, and was even eager to do so.

I even had a name for the post — Yesterday's News.

Then things changed.

As I began to write, the fine folks at starwars.com finally did what Star Wars fans around the world have been waiting for months for them to do — they announced the cast of Episode VII. 

I immediately penned some initial thoughts, determined for once to be A) quick, and B) timely. Unfortunately, through a combination of family and work concerns, I was neither. However, I'd still like to put my thoughts out there, so that my dedicated audience of Canadian pharmacies and work-from-home opportunities aren't deprived of my witty and wise repartee.

First, I know next-to-nothing, if not actually nothing, about new cast members John Boyega, Daisy Ridley, Adam Driver, and Oscar Isaac. I also have no clue about what roles they are supposed to play; whether they are good guys or bad guys, etc. My initial impression from their IMDb pages was that they were a vaguely diverse looking group. They are also, to a man, relative unknowns — just like the original trio was back when. I'm actually happy about this; unknown actors mean a clean slate. It will be much easier to see them as their characters, rather than "that guy from x"

I'm very happy about the new names that I do know. Domhnall Gleeson is on my radar because he played Bill Weasley in the Harry Potter films, and Andy Serkis is a modern-day Lon Chaney who's very presence on this film is, for me, highly reassuring. I don't who, or what, he's playing, but I can't wait to see it.

Finally, there is Max Von Sydow. Again, I'm not sure what role he will be playing. I'm guessing it's a heavy, but as he's known for villains (his turn in Needful Things was a particular favorite) and good guys/mentors (he's played both Jesus and St. Peter, for crying out loud), it could easily go either way.

Finally, there were a few names that brought a broad smile to face just by reading them: Kenny Baker, Anthony Daniels, Peter Mayhew, and, most importantly, Carrie Fisher, Harrison Ford and Mark Hamill.

I've written elsewhere of my desire to see Leia Organa-Solo, Luke Skywalker and Han Solo as older, wiser versions of their young selves. Now it appears that I will get that chance. Whether I will like it or not when I do is another matter. For now, for today, I am going to pretend that I will, and hope for the best.

While I have always been, and shall always be, much more of a fan of Luke Skywalker than of Han Solo, I am actually just a little bit happier that Ford has returned. For one, he was always very vocal about disliking the character, and never wanting to do Star Wars again. So just the fact that he's gotten past that, for whatever reason, is good news. (I'm sure there was a large check involved at some point, but I hope it's more than that).

The second reason is more selfish. I never really "got" the character of Han until much later in life. When I did, the sheer "wrongness" of what happened to his character in RotJ became much more painful. He was a different character, and largely good only for comic relief. And I still cringe at his final 'romantic' scene with Leia — from the way he kissed her at the end, you'd think he was her brother, and not Luke. He started out a dangerous space pirate who accidentally fell in with the good guys; he ended as an emasculated buffoon.

I try to rationalize it by saying Han came out of two-plus years of carbon sleep a radically changed man, but I suspect most of the blame can be laid at the feet of the late Richard Marquand, the director, although George Lucas probably bears a good share of the blame himself.  My wife thinks it's because they wanted to make Solo safe for kids in Jedi, which is also a good theory. I think it probably came from a combination of bad directing choices, and an actor that just threw up his hands, and resigned himself to getting through filming so he could move on to other roles.

Whatever the reason, it no longer matters. Because now, finally, Harrison Ford is going to have another crack at Han Solo. Hopefully, we'll see flashes of the same guy we knew from A New Hope and Empire. Time will tell. Whether we do or not, I am excited about the possibilities for this film, and still largely (albeit cautiously) optimistic for the future of Star Wars in general.

Having their cake...

I just went to starwars.com for the first time in a while, and I admit to being equal parts excited, disgruntled and confused.

I'll deal with the excitement part first. I just noticed that they've updated the front page of their website, which for some reason, gave me a little thrill of excitement when I saw it. I've been following Star Wars long enough to have been through home page redesigns, so I don't know why this one is any different. Maybe it's because I've been doing it long enough that "new look" is somehow associated with "new Star Wars movies." I only know that it was the first flair-up of the old excitement for the Saga that I've felt in a long time.

The confused bit came from two stories on that saidsame website. The first was the official announcement that the massive Expanded Universe of novels, comics and games that take place after Return of the Jedi officially, once and for all, is not canon. J.J. Abrams & Co. will not be forced into trying to incorporate Grand Admiral Thrawn and Mara Jade into whatever story they're making if they don't want to. They can do so if they wish, but the filmmakers, wisely, have been given a clean slate to create a new, and hopefully, exciting story.

So far, this is exactly what I've been hoping for. My official position on the EU can be found here, but in short, I follow the same take that Lucasfilm claims to be taking; namely, that the six Star Wars films are, once and for all, IT when it comes to the story of the Skywalker family. That is the only part of the massive fictional output of massive narrative factories of Lucasfilm from the past 37 years that cannot be ignored. Sorry, Jar-Jar haters — that means the Prequels, too.

Except that they left themselves a rather large loophole. The filmmakers are free to use whatever part of the EU they wish. If they want to use elements from the EU, they can — the same way that Lucas himself took the name of Coruscant for the capital planet of the Republic/Empire from the Zahn trilogy.

The confusing bit comes from the fact that they have, in one stroke, thrown out the entire EU for the filmmakers, but allowed them to keep the parts they wanted to use, while creating a NEW EU that will be overseen by a new story department to keep it in harmony with the films, but they're still going to keep publishing stuff from the OLD EU because they can still make money on it.

Did I miss anything?

So now we have two EUs, not one. One is a "real" EU, and the other is basically professionally produced fan-fiction. It is not the canonical Saga that the people who have loved it for so many years have maintained that it was. That is now the job of the new EU, which will produce officially sanctioned back story for the characters.

Forgive me for being cynical, but Lucasfilm has tried this before. When Star Wars fiction came out, they took a hard look at the morass of unconnected stories that made up the Star Trek novels, and decided they were going to have all the EU novels be part of one, big story. My main problem with the EU stemmed from this decision, because what was laid down by these authors as canon was, in my humble opinion, unworthy of so great an object. So even if you hated one of the books, you were stuck with it, because it became canon for the other writers. This was especially true for the granddaddy of the EU, the Thrawn trilogy by Timothy Zahn, which created characters and situations (Luke's wife, Han and Leia's kids, etc.) that dominated all the other books, good or bad.

So now, all that is gone, and we're going to try again with a new set of books. Only it's going to count this time. I understand that this is probably being done to give the books an added sense of weight; of importance. With fan fiction easily and cheaply available, both really, really good, and really, really bad, the stuff that you pay for has to be worth it; you have to get something extra from it. So the first book will be an official backstory for two primary characters in the new Rebels series. We'll see how it goes, but the whole thing smacks of having your cake, and eating it, too.

The disgruntled part comes from the great, gaping void of news about the new Star Wars movie. It has, according to most reliable sources, has not only been cast, is set to begin shooting in May. The official site has next to nothing on this fact. The only information on Episode VII was this press release, which promised a "trio of new young leads along with some very familiar faces."

I really, really like following selected things about the filming of any new Star Wars film. It helps feed my interest over the long haul, and even helps get me excited about it, in moderation. I try to stay away from spoiler-ridden sites like theforce.net, especially as the release date nears and entire shooting scripts find their way onto the site, and instead confine myself to the Official Site. Usually, about a month before release, I decide even the Official Site is too dangerous, and adopt a strategy of plugging my ears, putting my hands over my eyes, and saying "La-La-La-La-La" as loud as I can. Which makes driving kind of tricky, as you might guess.

I have the exact opposite problem right now. There is absolutely NOTHING out there to whet my appetite for a film that will supposedly be released at the end of next year. Rather than turn to dubious "news" sites, or even the semi-official Force.net, I am, for the moment, opting to wait. I'd really like to start thinking about the "what ifs" of this film; to pleasantly mull the future from a few tantalizing clues about what is to come. Apparently, Mr. Abrams and Ms. Kennedy have decreed that we must still be patient. Unfortunately, for the moment, I have no choice but to do otherwise.

Maybe I should read an old Star Wars novel while I wait.

A director with flare

A couple of nights ago, the final piece of the puzzle for new Star Wars movies, apart from the casting of actors (or, hopefully, the re-casting of actors), was announced. J.J. Abrams, Hollywood golden boy de jour, was confirmed as the new director for Episode VII by Lucasfilm.

Abrams is a favorite of many of my co-workers, particularly for his involvement on Lost. The only of his movies I'm familiar with is, of course, Star Trek. While I'm grateful that he and his team were able to kickstart that beloved franchise, I initially didn't think Abrams was the man for Star Wars. He seemed too trendy, and with a vision that was too specific and personal to take on someone else's world. If anything, the fact that he did Star Trek took him out of the running for Star Wars, in my opinion, since he put so much of himself in that film. I really don't want lens flare to start injecting itself into the Star Wars world ever 15 seconds.

There's also the fact that no one man should have that much absolute power over geekdom without some sort of general election, or something. Either, way, I thought it wasn't a good thing.

Happily, after a couple days to reflect, I'm pretty sure I was wrong.

In one of the articles I read on this, the writer referenced a TED Talk where Abrams talks about his love of mystery — both in life, and in storytelling.

There are a couple of cool things that came out of this talk. For one thing, he sounds like an Apple Geek's Apple Geek, which makes me like him immediately. The main thing, though, is when he references the first Star Wars movie as his primary example of the importance of withholding information in storytelling. I won't pretend to do it justice here, so just go and watch it.

Before I started watching this talk, I was pretty indifferent to Abrams getting his hands on Star Wars. After I saw it, I was one board 100 percent. Because, like Michael Arndt, he seems to get what makes Star Wars special at a basic level. It's not the characters, or the worlds they inhabit, or the technologies they use — its the story, and how that story is told.

I love the Prequels; to me, they are just as much a part of that world as the Original Trilogy. But what was missing, particularly in the first two films, was a sense of suspense. I'm pretty sure that, between Arndt and Abrams, that won't be a problem for Episode VII. And that is a very good thing indeed.

Starting with a whimper, not with a bang

Since the announcement that Disney was going to buy Lucasfilm, Ltd., and all of the Star Wars movies, characters and other assorted ephemera contained within, I've been pretty upbeat about the future of the franchise. Here, at last, was the possibility of new (and canonical) Star Wars movies; a chance to see Luke, Leia (and, just maybe, Han) hand the Saga off to a new generation of Jedi. I had long thought that Saga wouldn't outlive George. Now, for the first time, and completely from left field, was the possibility that the Saga might outlive me. It is now entirely possible, and even likely, that R2-D2 will live on after George, just as Mickey Mouse has outlived Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks. And since the Saga seemed to be in capable hands, I was very, very excited about the future. The Star Wars fan in me who went dormant between films need never die — starting now, there will always be a Star Wars, as long as there's an audience.

But judging from what aired on The Disney Channel Friday, I find myself agreeing with those that say this may not be such a good thing.

It has been several years since I've watched The Disney Channel, but I'm familiar with the types of programs it airs — upbeat, professionally produced fare, typically of a good, if forgettable, quality, starring attractive and ethnically diverse examples of the target age group, and often geared toward promoting other areas of the Disney brand. Often, it's not so bad, and is frequently entertaining — I survived both Hannah Montana and The Cheetah Girls with few, if any, scars, and my entire family genuinely enjoyed all three High School Musical movies. So I have no bias whatsoever against what the channel has to offer.

That said, I think that the first post-announcement collaboration between Lucasfilm and Disney that aired recently on the Disney Channel has all the earmarks of being exactly what everyone is afraid of.

The show in question is A.N.T. Farm — a sitcom about child prodigies that started airing on the DC last year. The Nov. 2 episode, "scavANTger hunt," has the main characters embarking on a scavenger hunt around San Francisco, and entering Skywalker Ranch in order to secure the autograph of one G. Lucas. Once there, they (naturally) meet R2-D2 and C-3PO (with the latter not voiced by Anthony Daniels). A brief sample of the horror can be found here — watch if you dare.

Bear in mind, I haven't actually seen the entire episode; I've only heard a 2 minute audio clip played by The Weekly ForceCast. But that was enough — it was exactly the kind of meaningless character prostitution that everybody fears will become the norm under the new regime.

Thing is, there's a long history of equally dopey stuff with George at the helm — and, in point of fact, he's still at the helm. The deal has to be cleared by regulators before it takes effect, and the episode was filmed before the Lucasfilm purchase was even announced. I'm hoping that no one involved in the writing and production of the episode in question had any clue about the Star Wars deal; or, at least, that they had no clue about the timing of when it was going air. Because what aired is exactly what fans are afraid a Disney Star Wars will become, and it would have been stupid in the extreme to deliberately show millions of nervous fans that episode as a first taste of the future.

Fears aside, I don't think this is the shape of things to come. I think the people now in charge of Star Wars will take every measure they can to make the best Star Wars they possibly can. I think the Mouse's marketing department will continue to pull stuff like we've just seen from time to time, but that it will be the exception, rather than the rule. I am still terribly excited, and optimistic, about the future of Star Wars — mainly because now, there actually is a future.

But my enthusiasm has been tempered ever-so-slightly by this misstep, intentional or not. The less I see of this sort of thing, the better.

Angry Jedi?

This post will be an experiment, with the question behind the experiment being "Can I write a quick here-and-gone blog post without spending three or four hours crafting an article?" And since I only have two pieces of information to talk about this week, I think we have a good chance of getting out of here in five paragraphs or less. Wish me luck!

Item 1 — Episode VII gets a writer: Michael Arndt has been confirmed by Lucasfilm as the screenwriter for Episode VII (I'm starting to get used to writing that). This surprised me a little bit — not that he had been picked, but that the media and fan reports about his being selected were not only confirmed, but had been confirmed so quickly. As someone with several years of waiting for new Star Wars movies under his belt, I'm finding the amount of confirmed information that's out there at this stage of the game refreshing.

Arndt is a bit of an unknown to me, but then again, most screenwriters currently working in Hollywood are unknown to me. A consummate industry watcher, I am not. But I have seen at least one of his movies (Toy Story 3), and I have heard tell of some of the lectures he's given on Star Wars and writing. I think he'll do nicely.

So the next bit of news is likely to be who is chosen for the director's chair. With that in mind, there's an interesting take on why Disney shouldn't choose a popular "geek mob" director like J.J. Abrams or Joss Whedon here.

Item 2 — Angry Birds: Star Wars: I've been equal parts cynical and fan-boyish about this one. I've held off on buying an Angry Birds title as long as I've had access to iOS devices. I don't dislike them, per se, but I seldom purchase apps since there's so much free stuff out there.

That said, I've been leaning toward buying an AB title for as long as I've had access to iOS devices, and now that I'm in "I must have everything to do so with Star Wars" mode, I find myself particularly vulnerable. There's lots of reasons not to buy it — chiefly that it's $2.99, with paid access to the next level at $2, and that's just for the iPad version. Sadly, this is not a universal app, and if I were to buy it, it would be for the iPad, since that's what I typically play games on the most.

Then again, it's Star Wars, and I pay more for a fish sandwich at McDonald's. So the jury's still out on that. Tune in next week for an update on that particular quandary. Also, I've been getting back up to speed on The Clone Wars series (which I hadn't watched for a long time), so I may have some observations on that as well.

Experiment results — Okay, that seems to have taken about an hour and fifteen minutes. In my defense, I was doing a lot of texting while I was trying to write. Surely, I can do better.

Update: I decided to take the plunge and got the iPad version of the game. I'll post a short review in a future post, but my initial impression is a good one.

A day long remembered

I honestly don't know where to start.

I've been thinking about changing the name of this blog from The Padawan Pause to something more generic for months now. It's been more than a year since I wrote anything about Star Wars here. And it was probably going to be a long, long time before I felt enthusiastic enough about it to write something new. The state of Star Wars just didn't interest me anymore, and while I still loved the movies, there was nothing all that exciting about them anymore.

All that changed Tuesday afternoon.

While my friend Kenny and I were in Nashville enjoying the rare privilege of hearing Ian Anderson perform Thick as a Brick live, the world of Star Wars fandom was being turned completely upside-down.

For those who haven't heard (which I'm guessing is exactly none of you), George Lucas announced that day that he was selling Lucasfilm to the Walt Disney Company, putting Kathleen Kennedy into his role as head of the company, and, oh yeah, they're going to release Star Wars: Episode VII in 2015.

Typing that last part still feels a little surreal.

It will be weeks — months maybe — before I can fully wrap my head around this news. It's taken me this long to even figure out how I feel about. But after giving it some thought, and poking my head into some of the talk in the fan community (thank you Weekly ForceCast), I think I'm prepared to put forth a few preliminary opinions.

• I'm pretty sure that Kathleen Kennedy is a great choice to take over for George: I'm ashamed to say I barely knew who Kathleen Kennedy was before Tuesday's announcement, despite the fact that I've seen 32 of her movies over the past three decades. Since Tuesday, I've looked up C.V. on IMDB, and heard some other opinions (hats off, once again, to the Weekly ForceCast). She's not only produced some of the definitive action/adventure films (Jurassic Park, The Sixth Sense, Back to the Future), she's also made critically acclaimed character pieces (The Color Purple, Schindler's List) as well. She's also done some great comedy work, including Noises Off and Who Framed Roger Rabbit. With that kind of résumé, it's hard to argue that she can't find the range for Star Wars. At the very least, she deserves a chance.

• I'm absolutely sure that Disney is the perfect home for the Star Wars franchise: It was bound to happen eventually — George was going to step away from the company. I'd always thought in the back of my mind that when that happened, Star Wars was probably wind up dying a slow, lingering death, living on though its E.U. properties — novels, cartoons, games and the like — while the company itself turned to production work on films by other filmmakers. I must admit, I never could have imagined what actually happened — that George would sell Lucasfilm to the Disney company, and give that company license to the full range of the Star Wars brand — movies, TV show, games, novels, what have you. While this has the potential to be a nightmare scenario, particularly with a company like Disney — I'd really wouldn't want to see a Star Wars musical on Broadway, for example — I'm pretty sure that's not the way things are going to go. We've already seen three similar companies bought by Disney — Pixar, the Jim Henson Studios, and Marvel — and in each case, it's been good for all of the companies involved. Bob Iger, Disney's CEO, has wisely left the creative elements in each company fully in place and empowered do what they do best (Avengers movie, anyone?). I expect nothing less with Lucasfilm. There's already a strong, long-term relationship between Lucasfilm and Disney, including several successful theme park collaborations. Some of the areas that Lucasfilm wants to branch out into — live action television, for example — are areas where Disney already has a strong presence, and resources that Lucasfilm would have to work hard to line up. Plus, to me, it just feels right — I love both companies, and I think Star Wars belongs at Disney. No one can see the future, but I feel strongly that Disney is a much better home than, say, Warner Brothers.

• After giving it some thought, I'm really, really excited about the prospect of new Star Wars movies: People have been talking about new Star Wars movie since A New Hope (or, as we called it back in the day, Star Wars). First, it was twelve movies. Then, for a long time, it was nine. Then, we had George saying it had always been six. And, given George's level of enthusiasm for making new Star Wars movies (i.e., none), I pretty much took him at his word. Before Revenge of the Sith was released, I have always known that there weren't going to be any more Star Wars movies. Suddenly, I'm writing about Episode VII (man, that still sounds weird). And while it would be easy enough to look to the Dark Side for my opinions about how good that movie is going to be, as some are, I refuse to do that. The period leading up, and after, Episode I was one of the high points of my life as a Star Wars fan (in fact, I still like Phantom, unfashionable as that opinion is). So I'm really, really looking forward to the coming months, since I know that at least some of that old magic and excitement will surely be resurrected. Even if the movie is awful (it won't be, since there's too much riding on it, but let's say it is), the process of waiting should be supremely enjoyable. Even more, the fact that the movies are post-Jedi means that we could see Luke, Leia and maybe even Han, as returning characters. What I wouldn't give for that! I wouldn't like to see them as the primary characters — galavanting around the cosmos is a game for the young, to quote another beloved franchise. But I've always wanted to see what General Solo, Chancellor Organa-Solo, and, best of all, Master Skywalker, would look like. Suddenly, unexpectedly, I've now got that chance.

• Tuesday's news means nothing less than the resurrection of Star Wars: I know that there are lots of folks that enjoy The Clone Wars animated series, and that there are plenty who are looking forward to the live-action series. There are probably even those who are enthusiastic about the existing storyline in the E.U. novels, although I am certainly not among them. But the life blood of Star Wars has always been, and will always be, feature films. George said it himself once — the story, for him, are those six films. I quite agree. Star Wars means movies — anything else is merchandising. In order for Star Wars to remain vital and interesting, you've got to have movies as the tall poles that hold up the tent. So when George said there would be no more films, not so long ago, it was the death of the franchise. Tuesday's announcement of more movies meant a complete resurrection. The door has been kicked open, and for the first time in a long, long time, we don't know what the future holds. Uncertainty can be frightening, or it can be exciting. I am choosing to follow the latter path. Starting this week, it's a great time to be a Star Wars fan — maybe even the best time. That remains to be seen. All I know is that I can't wait to find out.

Saga Creed I: On the E.U.

This will be a short declaration fairly long screed on my Official Position on the Star Wars Expanded Universe. Ahem, and here goes:

I pretty much hate it.

Okay, obviously I won't be able to leave it at that. For those of you who don't know, the Expanded Universe, or E.U., are any stories or characters outside of the realm of the six Star Wars films. These six are called canon, which is a riff on the concept of canon scripture — i.e., something considered to be authoritative.

And I both love them and hate them. Mostly hate.

Mind you, I've been reading Star Wars novels for as long as there have been Star Wars novels, starting with the much-maligned and personally beloved Splinter of the Mind's Eye. It seems incredible in the age of instant information and communication in which we live, but in the days and months after Star Wars was first released in the late 70s, there was a big blob of nothing out there waiting if you wanted to get more of the Star Wars universe — especially if you lived in rural Tennessee, as I did.

You could:

Read Starlog — This godsend of a magazine debuted right around the time of Star Wars' release, as I recall, and contained articles about all things geek. My favorite memory was Starlog nailing the Blue Harvest ruse by Lucasfilm. It was the closest thing we had to regular news about the things we loved, and it was a lifeline back in the day.


Build models — Back before video games and DVDs, plastic model kits were both a way to get into the minutia of the Star Wars/Star Trek universe, and to fly your freak flag to any unsuspecting friends who happened to come over. My wife still talks about the shrine to Capt. Kirk I had built over my bed in college, including a picture of the man himself in the TOS-era captain's chair, framed by a collection of bugles and swords, and set off by a model of the TMP version of the Enterprise that I still regard as the high water mark of my model-making skills.

Talk to friends — This is still the heart of fandom, to me; listening and talking with someone who loves the things you love as much as you do, or maybe even more. Pretty much every friend I made in high school and college — notably my future wife and my two closest male friends — shared one or more of my great passions. Still, this had its drawbacks. For starters, the ratio of geeks to normal people in the 70s was still pretty low, and communications being what it was back then, it was pretty tough to find them. And I still remember my failed attempt to start my own Star Trek fan club while living in Ohio; it folded unceremoniously after the first meeting after the loud guffaws, giggles and constant interruptions from a boy who's name I can't recall cause me to give up 10 minutes in.

Write your own adventures — I have never been terribly productive at writing fiction. My first attempt was in my tweens, and I made another attempt a few years later. Both tries were seriously hampered by the fact that the word processor hadn't been invented yet, and I seem to be dependent on the much more malleable nature of digitized writing. But writing has always been a very popular way to dwell in the world of your choice; it is only since the birth of the internet that it has taken on the name Fan Fiction.

Read books —At last we come to it; the reason for the E.U.s of Star Trek, Star Wars and a few dozen other fandoms. The two big franchises are essentially story-telling mediums, albeit ones using very different narrative techniques. So if you really want to live in the galaxy far, far away (or the final frontier), and you don't have more canon to look forward to, what better way that through novels, comics and role-playing games that expand on that universe?

I wish that that were so. At its best, the E.U. novels do just that; they allow us to live in that world a little longer, visit with our favorite characters more, and have more adventures with them, and learn about how the world works. It gives you that little bit of extra time in a place where the Force works, space travel is how you get to work, and life is a little more black and white. They are, in a word, fun.

At their worst, they take beloved characters and turn them into something unrecognizable in the name of dramatic license; they carve off whole sections of a character's backstory to make what they're doing seem more important, and they create new characters that usually make the core characters look life buffoons. As I have observed elsewhere, Timothy Zahn did most of these in his widely-beloved Thrawn trilogy, which is widely credited/blamed with starting the whole E.U. business in the first place.

I should mention at this point that all of my knowledge comes from reading the E.U. in the mid-to-late 1990s, prior to the release of Phantom. From what I can infer on this rather good take on what the E.U. has become on fangirlblog.com, what I was reading then was actually the golden age of the Expanded Universe. Since then, there have been several multi-book sagas, one of which committed the cardinal sin of killing off Chewbacca, and none of which sound like very much fun.

I've mentioned fun twice, because at the end of the day, that is what Star Wars and Star Trek ultimately need to be for me; fun. Fun is my yardstick when it comes to Star Wars; I need to feel a sense of enjoyment. I don't go to those universes to get caught up in an angst-ridden soap opera with lightsabers. Drama is fine, but Star Wars is, first and foremost, an adventure story. It is, to use a crude analogy, Jules Verne, not Shakespeare.

That aside, I will tolerate not fun as long as George Lucas is the one dishing it out (witness Revenge of the Sith — grand and sweeping? Certainly. Riveting? Of course. Among the best of the saga? Possibly, depending on your point of view. Fun? Not so much). George is The Authority in his universe. But lately, because the content of the E.U. is so much larger than the core films themselves, it has, in the minds of many, become the main event; this multi-headed hydra, composed by a hundred different authors, all with different takes on the Star Wars characters and story, is, because of its sheer bulk, what is important, while the films themselves are, occasionally, made to conform to the product of the week to legitimize it. The tail is attempting to wag the dog.

A recent, and to me, rather infuriating example: One of my favorite vessels in A New Hope has always been the Tantive IV, also known as the Rebel Blockade Runner. Adopted from an early Ralph McQuarrie design concept for the Millennium Falcon, it is the first starship we see in the saga, as well as the site of the first battle. She never appeared again, and if anyone ever went anywhere near her history, I never saw it. I always wanted to know more about her, and when the ship made a glistening new appearance in Sith, I was thrilled to see the old girl again. It was, for me, an important link between Episode III and Episode IV.

I have only recently learned that in order to bring the ship into line with established E.U. continuity  — a vulgar practice apparently known as retconning — that ship has been stripped of its status as the Tantive IV, and is, instead, a similar ship from the Star Wars: Empire at War video game called the Sundered Heart. Apparently, this is the ship that Captain Antilles commanded when he wasn't aboard the Tantive IV. So when Obi-Wan lands on Bail Organa's ship, it's actually something from a video game I've never even heard of (and published a year after RotS) that's clawed its way into the films. It is not, as I've long believed, a beautiful bit of continuity and revealed backstory of one of the most iconic ships of the Star Wars story; it is some game designer's creation being forced into the main story. This was actually confirmed last year by Leland Chee, who has the unenviable task of making all of the myriad story lines in the Star Wars universe from the past 34 years seem like a continuous epic.

One point made often by the crew of The ForceCast is that the Star Wars story is ultimately what George says it is. It belongs to him, both as an artist, and in a very real, and legally binding sense. He is the master storyteller; he created the characters; he is, to use a fan nickname for him, The Maker. If he told us all tomorrow that Han Solo was actually Palpatine's half-brother, I wouldn't like it (as I didn't like the revelation that Luke and Leia were brother and sister back in the day), but I would have to live with it. And while I have nothing against Leland, his five-years-after-the-fact declaration isn't enough to change my mind. The fact is, there were toys from the time of the movie labeling the ship as the Tantive IV, which pretty much ends the debate for me.

I've gone far afield here, and probably muddied up the place with my griping about the E.U., when all I wanted this post to do was state my official position — my creed as a Star Wars fan when it comes to canon. And that, simply said, is this.

1. I believe that the six Star Wars films are the only truly canonical sources.
2. I believe that the Star Wars novels written from Splinter of the Mind's Eye onward should be regarded as professionally created fan fiction; fun, and occasionally edifying and instructive, but not authoritative.
3. I believe even more strongly that all of the Star Wars video games and comics should be taken with several grains, or perhaps an entire shaker, of salt.
4. I believe if you personally wish to adopt any or all of the novels, games, comics, cartoons, holiday specials or other fare, into your understanding of the Star Wars universe, you are free to do so. You are not free to tell me what pieces of the novels, games, comics, cartoons, holiday specials or other fare that I am allowed to adopt for my understanding of the Star Wars universe, and vice-versa, even if you work for a company George owns.

George Lucas said that for him, the end of the Star Wars story came with the final scene of Return of the Jedi. I quote from the Official Site:

"But there's no story past Episode VI, there's just no story. It's a certain story about Anakin Skywalker and once Anakin Skywalker dies, that's kind of the end of the story. There is no story about Luke Skywalker, I mean apart from the books. But there's three worlds: There's my world that I made up, there's the licensing world that's the books, the comics, all that kind of stuff, the games, which is their world, and then there's the fans' world, which is also very rich in imagination, but they don't always mesh. All I'm in charge of is my world. I can't be in charge of those other people's world, because I can't keep up with it."

I find this comment to be liberating. I don't have to like the E.U. (or the licensing world, as George calls it). I can accept it on an item-by-item basis, or not accept it at all — it is a different creature entirely. If I want to read a Star Wars novel, or play a game, I can enjoy it, but I don't have to find some way to rationalize something as being canonical if I personally don't want to. Star Wars, for George, and for me, is the films.

Exactly which version of the films is a can of worms I will crack open at another time.

Postscript: I want to give ample credit to an excellent discussion on E.U. and canon between Fangirl  and the TheForce.net crew in the May 27 edition of The Weekly ForceCast, for inspiring and informing this post.

Of Norse gods and flannel Jedis

Friday night, the wife and I went on a long-overdue date to the local movie house. We live in a somewhat rural part of West Tennessee; yet I am happy to say that the local theater now runs 3-D movies. And while I still think the whole 3-D movie thing is a bit overblown, and in no small degree a gimmick by Hollywood to keep traffic flowing to the theaters, I think this is a good thing, in the main — mostly because I no longer have to drive to Nashville to see a film in 3-D, which was the case as recently as two years ago.

On the downside, the local theater isn’t large enough to offer 2-D offerings of the same film for those who don’t like the new format (a non-existent complaint for me — if I care enough to go to the theater at all, it will likely only be for a ‘big’ picture, which I would probably want to see in 3-D in the first place). 

A greater concern is that two tickets to the Friday night 3-D showing of Thor nearly obliterated a $20 bill, leaving only a whimpering portrait of George Washington in its place — which explains nicely why I only rarely go to the movies these days.

So the wife and I have now seen the first of the big summer movies — Thor. I am no one’s comic book geek, as a general rule, but as a fan of stories with at least some element of the fantastical (Star Trek, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, ect.), I find myself following them rather regularly, and consequently, have a passing familiarity with the comic, and the Norse mythos it was based upon. Also, I’ve always been a fan of Kenneth Branagh’s work, so there’s that.

It was, in a word, fun, from start to finish. Chris Hemsworth, whom we last saw as James T. Kirk’s father, is more than up to the task of bringing the son of Odin to life; he is, in equal parts, strong and vulnerable, infuriating and likable, and heroic and flawed. Natalie Portman’s performance was a surprise; she is, for the first time, cute. Thor’s brother, whose name I will not repeat in a nod to superstition, was deftly played by an actor whose name I cannot recall, and am, at the moment, too lazy to look up. In all, it was well worth sacrificing Mr. Hamilton, and I recommend it to anyone interested in an evening’s fun.

Earlier that morning, I had a happy accident when I accidently opened the Disney Parks Blog , which happened to be running a live stream of the opening ceremonies for Star Tours 3-D. I came in just in time to see Bob Iger and George Lucas making a few remarks in front of the attraction. When I went back later (when I wasn’t working), I found a picture of Iger and George standing next to Darth Vader, holding lightsabers.

I think this is the first time I’ve ever seen George with a lightsaber, and I have to say, it doesn’t really suit him. To be sure, no one has earned the right to actually carry a saber more than George, but on him, it looked a bit out of place. I think what threw me off was what he was wearing; jeans and a long-sleeved button-up flannel shirt. Now I know that George has developed a rep for rocking the flannel shirt as his default daily dress, but I’m sorry — lightsabers demand to be paired with a certain look, and “I’m heading down to IKEA to pick up some bookshelves” isn’t it. 

Of course, when George gave himself a Hitchcock moment and appeared in Revenge of the Sith, he didn’t appear in Jedi regalia, but instead dressed as a barely-recognizable blue-skinned alien. So I suppose if he didn’t do it when he had the full might of the Lucasfilm costuming and makeup departments behind him, he can hardly be expected to rise to the occasion for a theme park opening. 

But I’ve got to say, I expect more from a member of the 501^st — even an honorary one.

You say it's your birthday

I was just strolling through TheForce.net, and found this cool fan commemoration of George Lucas' birthday by a fan artist named Steven Hayford. Apparently, he's known for things like this, and I intend to find out more about his work. In any case, Happy Birthday to The Maker. You can find the original story, as well as a link to the full-size image, here.

The circle is now complete

I thought that I would dash off a hasty note to acknowledge that the thing has been accomplished: After six years of talking about it, I have succeeded in watching all six Star Wars films in chronological order, in a fairly rapid period of time — six films in slightly over six days. I started Phantom last Friday, but was called away early on (before the Jedi had even landed on Naboo), and carried on with the bulk of it the next day. I finished Return of the Jedi yesterday (Thursday) afternoon around 5:45 p.m. Watching with we was my wife and daughter. So what was started with The Phantom Menace as a solitary act became, by the end of the project, a family affair.

I was surprised by how engrossing I found some films (my top three were Empire, Sith and Clones, in that order). I was equally surprised how detached I was for others; particularly the original Star Wars, which has always nipped at the heels of Empire as my all-time favorite. There's always another day, however, and I expect the next time I see Phantom, A New Hope and Jedi, I'll get more out of them.

One thing that was reassuring was how very much I enjoyed the experience overall. If you are a Star Wars fan, and you have not watched the Saga as a cohesive whole, then you owe it to yourself to do so. There are things in the prequels that seemed like mere imitations of elements from the Classic Trilogy when the prequels were first released. When placed in the context of the whole saga, they take on the feel of recurring themes and elements.

The great surprise for me was how easily I was able to accept James Earl Jones/Dave Prowse's Darth Vader and Hayden Christensen's Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader as the same person. While I was watching the prequels as they were released, I saw flashes of Vader in Christensen's performace, but when I would watch the Classic Trilogy, and I saw Vader, I saw what I had always seen — the shell. The black breath mask, the helmet, the cape. All of the accoutrements I've come to love, but no trace of the living being beneath.

This time, with the Prequels under my belt, I was able to imagine, in glimpses, the man trapped inside the armor. I would see Anakin in a gesture, or hear him with a line. I could almost literally see the younger Anakin's face. It was, for me, the essential piece of the puzzle I needed to meld the two trilogies together into one complete story. Before, I never quite believed that the Jedi Knight in Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith was the Sith Lord from The Classic Trilogy. Now, I kind of do; or at least, I'm starting to.

Now if I could only convince myself that Jake Lloyd's Anakin could conceivably look anything like Hayden Christensen when he grows up...

We could be stuck here for a very long time

Well, I’m fresh from listening to TheForce.net’s commentary on A New Hope, which, by the way, I recommend highly. It was nothing, more or less, than four devoted Star Wars fans watching the classic trilogy together, albeit in separate living rooms, and just talking about what they love about the Saga. There was no negativity, no overt bashing of anything — just lots and lots of enthusiasm. Once again, my perceptions of TheForce.net being entirely staffed by collectors has been challenged.

I’m writing so soon after this morning’s post (nearly all of which I wrote last night) because I inadvertently passed along some false information, in the form of a bit of harmless speculation about George’s 3D plans. And I’d be a lot less depressed if it wasn’t true.

I had assumed that, given the February 2012 date of the 3D release of The Phantom Menace, that George was going to follow the same release strategy he did for the Special Editions — i.e., about one a month. Sadly, according to my new contacts at TheForce.net tell me that it will be more like one a year.

Let’s say that again: One a year.

That means that Return of the Jedi will be released in 2018. My daughter will be in college, and I’ll be uncomfortably close to the legal retirement age. This is most certainly not soon enough for my tastes, and I’m fervently hoping that their information is incorrect.

If it is true, at least I’ll have gotten my full mileage out of the Blu-ray box set. And who knows? I may even have a 3D TV by then.

Hey — it could happen.

A final note before I retire. I have just, moments ago, finished Revenge of the Sith, and by extension, the Prequel Trilogy. The tiny candle flame of detached indifference I began Phantom Menace with has grown over the three films. By the time I finished Sith, I was absolutely riveted, and it was some moments after the credits stopped before I could bring myself to speak. As I said in my last post, I'm definitely back.

I’m working tomorrow night; after that, I intend to wade into the Original Trilogy (the Special Editions, in a concession to George — we’ll let him have it his way this time). If all goes well, I hope to reach Jedi by Sunday at the latest.

I’ll keep you posted.

Well, I’m back

You’ve probably figured out by now, or soon will, that the part of me that’s a Star Wars fan has roared back into life in the past week. I have been eating, breathing and sleeping the Saga since Wednesday. That’s right, the same bit of vulgar fanbase manipulation that caused me to rip on Lucasfilm/Fox in my last post also reminded me of why I’m a fan in the first place. So, the old axiom that good can come from bad is once again proved true.

Since Tuesday, I have returned to a project I have long vowed to accomplish; a viewing of the complete saga, in order. I finished off The Phantom Menace yesterday afternoon, and finished Attack of the Clones just a few moments ago. After reacquainting myself with all six, I plan to go back and linger over each for a time — kicking the tires and so forth. 

It’s been a long time since I watched the films, and my viewing of Phantom yesterday brought home just how long it had been. I have always liked Phantom, even as I was aware of its flaws. I was surprised to find I didn’t enjoy it as much as I have in the past; I had a sense of detachment that was a little disquieting, and I didn’t get caught up in the story the way I once did. In short, I was very aware I was watching a movie, and was unable to lose myself in the story. Clearly, I have fallen far from the faith. But I found Clones to be much more engrossing than I expected, so all is not lost.

I have also returned to watching The Clone Wars on Cartoon Network. I have made the complaint in the past that the reason I don’t follow Star Wars more closely is because I don’t have new things to keep feeding the fire. Well, Clone Wars isn’t a full-blown live-action film, but it is at least something new. Thanks to the Official Site and the blessings of high-speed Internet, I can now get caught up on the second and third seasons, assuming this new interest in the saga doesn’t burn out too quickly.

I suspect that part of the reason for falling back in the habit, apart from the fact that it was simply just time, is that it is summer, or soon will be.

Most of my best memories of Star Wars take place during summer. Obviously, this is because Star Wars films get released in the summer. So when I weathered my first week away from home and family as a Boy’s State delegate, buttressed by a cassette version of The Empire Strikes Back soundtrack and the Brian Daley Han Solo novels, it was summer; when Entertainment Weekly published a cover story on the “new” Star Wars movies being made on the exact day of my daughter’s birth, it was still summer; when I drove to Virginia to see Phantom with my nephews (and fellow Jedi), it was summer again; and when I returned there six years later to attend the midnight screening of Sith in full Jedi regalia, it was, not too surprisingly, summer. In fact, for many movies — Phantom and Jedi in particular, I sort of lived in Star Wars leading up to summer, and well through it. It was, as they say, good times.

So welcome to summer a month or so early! I don’t think we’re in for as deep a journey as I’ve had in the past, but for now, I’m content to saddle up this bantha and ride it as far as it will take me. Next time, I will try to have actual Star Wars content, for you, my patient readers, and a little less about yours truly.

Wish me luck.

Forgive and forget

Well, the madness that was today has subsided, and, as predicted, my frustration has gone with it. Yes, the announcement was about the Blu-ray releases. Yes, it was both overblown, and poorly handled. And while what George has in mind isn't what I'd call a dream release, it looks like it will do nicely.

Does it have the original versions along with the Special Editions? Probably not. (And for the record, I'd like both, please — I think each has their place). Nor will it have From Star Wars to Jedi, which was a dandy little "making of" that was released back in the old VHS days, and to my knowledge, never made it to digital. There seems to be a fair amount of special features, but I won't speculate as to their quality yet. Some of the scenes are promised at Comic-Con in July; the 1976 Comic-Con was the first public promotion of Star Wars, and George is apparently still very grateful for that first public exposure. We'll just have to wait until then to see of what quality it is.

What surprises me is my reaction — despite my annoyance earlier today, I'm actually excited. I've been taking an extended sabbatical from Star Wars, and after nosing around the Official Site today, the old juices are starting to flow once more. In fact, I plan on popping at least one of the films in as soon as I get some time — it's simply been too long.

Star Wars? What's That?

Welcome back! Hail and well met, all. I have returned after a long absence to throw out a few crumbs of Star Wars news, and maybe — just maybe — get out in front of a Star Wars related story. This post should be good deal shorter than my usual musings, but, I hope that it will be the first in a renewed effort at regular posts. I realize that my past performance of roughly two posts in a year probably doesn't bode well for my future efforts, but what are we if we don't try?

First, I must confess that I am fresh from watching the Royal Wedding this weekend. This was somewhat hypocritical on my part, since, like a lot of folks, I scoffed at the incessant media coverage leading up to the event. But when my wife, a veteran of the 3 a.m. brigade for Charles and Diana's wedding, expressed disappointment that she hadn't been able to watch, we found a repeat of the coverage of BBC America Friday, and gleefully made a night of it. As it happens, I enjoyed myself immensely, from a historic, Anglophilic and (gasp) fashionista standpoint, not to mention the always very great joy of being able to share an experience with my wife. Oddly enough, I still find myself trolling the internet for little informational nuggets on the occasion, and will likely continue to do so for the next week or so. In any case, the whole affair was great fun, and I shall probably look back on it fondly for some time.

All this goes to show what I have long suspected; that my opinion on any given subject cannot be trusted, since I am such an innate snob, and my tastes are so very malleable. Indeed, I have a long history of reversing myself on a number of what I had thought were strongly-held opinions, ranging from my distaste of large churches as a young man (I am currently a member of what just happens to be the largest church of its denomination in my county, which encompasses a building roughly one side of a city block long) to my musical tastes (I initially rejected several bands on first hearing which later became staples of record collection, including Jethro Tull and Pink Floyd). In short, I'm still rather a fool, but am still trying to at least become an open-minded fool.

But I promised short and sweet, didn't I? Very well; to the point. I noticed this morning that on Feb. 10, 2012, George Lucas will be releasing Star Wars: Episode 1 in the theaters — in 3-D, no less. No doubt, this will be followed by Episodes II in March and Episode III in April, leading up to the inevitable release of A New Hope on Friday, May 25 — 35 years to the day after it was originally released in theaters. If this is, in fact, George's planned schedule, then I think we can expect Episodes V-VI in June and July, respectively, which would give us arguably the three best films during the summer blockbuster season.

As a further point of conjecture, I think we can then look forward to a 3D blu-ray release of all six films in time for Christmas. If true, this will annoy me just a teensy bit since George has made rather a habit of milking re-releases of the films in new mediums; witness the multiple VHS versions (at least four different releases of the classic trilogy); two different DVD versions, Laserdisc set, and now, the upcoming Blu-ray release in September.

Before you ask, yes, I am planning on buying the full Blu-ray set when it comes out. Herein lies my problem. I am a "bonus features" junkie, and George has been very sparse with his behind-the-scenes content since hitting it out of the park with the Phantom Menace DVD. In fact, the follow up to Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones, re-set the bar to an all-time low by using a collection of video press releases featuring the main actors being interviewed about the story as the core of its behind-the-scenes content. Revenge of the Sith got better marks for imagination, showing the roles of the different departments in producing one shot of the film. But the fly-on-the-wall stuff I love so much was nowhere to be seen.

When you add to this the paltry one disc of special features for the entire classic trilogy, I must admit my hopes for George to finally crack open the vaults for some top-notch bonus features are rather high. We will see if he delivers on Wednesday, May 4 (a date yielding the atrocious pun "May the fourth be with you"), when Lucasfilm promises some big news on the subject. That is the story that I have tried to get out in front of, and I will try my best to post some kind of reaction, no matter how short, on the day.

So far so good; on to my teensy problem. There is always going to need to be more stuff to for George to release, simply from a revenue standpoint. So knowing in advance that there will be a 3D version of the films, and knowing that there will inevitably be a demand from the 12 people who own 3D televisions for a home game version, will George follow the lead of films like Tron: Legacy and re-release a Blu-ray box of the 3D films? Likely. Will it have additional content to make compulsives like me need to buy it again? Ah, there's the rub — all indications (i.e. George's previous track record) say yes. Will it make me grumpy if he does? Absolutely.

Be that as it may, we will cross that bridge when we come to it; life is troublesome enough without borrowing more, and there is enough negativity in modern society without me throwing more on the fire — especially about something I purport to love. So, let me end you with the following daily affirmations: I am looking forward to the news on Wednesday, whatever it is, and I am excited about the possibility of being able to finally take my daughter to see all six Star Wars films in the theater.

That's all for this week campers. I doubt that life will allow me the time to make similarly lengthy posts in the future. But at the least, let's all meet back here Thursday — or more realistically, a week from today — and we'll sift through next week's announcement.

Time Out, Part II

"I'm going to do a lot of nothing this weekend," I told my coworkers on the way out the door Friday afternoon. And God, in His wisdom, must have agreed; less than an hour ago, I bent to give the dog a forkful of catfood for her breakfast, and felt the familiar dagger in my spine of my back going out.

Since then, I have tried moving to work the kinks out, but a quick walk up the road got me no further than the neighbor's house. I followed that with a return to the middle of my living room floor, where I intend to pass the morning, at least, before trying additional physical therapy.

I'm not terribly worried about this; although I've been pain-free for some time, my back was in no wise cured, and will likely be an ongoing condition until I have no other option available but surgery. I was told when I got my last round of shots that they could last as long as a year and a half; it has been, by my reckoning, about three months shy of that. I will see what a regimen of rest and low activity does for me this weekend. But if all else fails, all I need do is make an appointment for another round of shots with my surgeon in Nashville.

I must admit, though, the entire process would be a lot more palatable if I wasn't also fighting my way through a sinus headache.

On to other matters; I had intended to touch base this morning in any case, if for nothing else than to say hello. Life has been good lately, and I have much to be thankful to God for. For starters, I am writing again. The outline of a particularly troublesome chapter in my long-neglected novel fell into place as I was commuting to work two days ago, and so I have had a reason to break into my freshly-updated version of my Apple Pages word processor.

I'm also putting a toe in the water when it comes to some old friends. I have been so inspired by the news that "The Hobbit" movie has been greenlit that I have returned to my abandoned promise to re-read the whole "Lord of the Rings" series. This time, my goal is to finish reading the trilogy by the time filming begins in February. I am still a bit anxious about whether or not the movies will, in fact, be filmed in New Zealand, but I am enormously cheered by the news that Martin Freeman will be our Bilbo. He doesn't look as close to the Bilbo in my head as Elisha Wood looked like my Frodo, but it's still a very near thing, and I am greatly cheered.

By the way; I fully expect Peter Jackson to take some of the new footage from "The Hobbit" — particularly Bilbo's finding of the ring — and insert it into the flashbacks in "Lord of the Rings" where he used Ian Holm in a curly wig as a much younger Bilbo. Personally, I think this is an altogether sensible idea, but some of you may be a little squeamish about it (despisers of Hayden Christianson's disembodied head, I'm looking at you). Either way, you've been warned — it's going to happen.

On the music front, I have returned to my track-by-track comparisons of The Beatles stereo and mono recordings. I just finished Sgt. Pepper last night, and will no doubt find some time today to make some headway into Magical Mystery Tour. My sonic forays have been accompanied by readings in a couple of Fab Four-related birthday presents; The Complete Beatles Chronicle by noted Beatles historian Mark Lewisohn, which is a day-by-day account of The Beatles' entire professional lives; and The Beatles: Anthology book; an impressively-detailed first-person history of The Beatles, by The Beatles, and the last piece of the Anthology project I had yet to own. There's also Beatle Gear, a well-researched book examining all aspects of The Beatles' instruments — probably boring as watching paint dry to many folks, but irresistibly fascinating to an old guitar slinger like me.

On the Star Wars front, I am very close to a long-overdue viewing of the Original Trilogy. I have two yet-to-be-achieved goals in my DVD-watching life; watching all three Lord of the Rings movies back-to-back, and an uninterrupted viewing of all six Star Wars films. I may try the former sometime before the first "Hobbit" movie is released (or immediately after seeing the second one), but have no firm timetable for Star Wars. I only know that I want to remember what I liked about the Saga. In order to do that, I have to begin at the beginning, which is the original three movies, without the special edition treatment, thank you kindly. I still intend to sit down and watch all six movies, in numerical sequence, as George intends them to be seen. At the moment, though, I'm not in a place where I can watch The Phantom Menace without wishing I was watching Empire instead.

Finally, we come to Disney. I am pleased to report we just obtained the BluRay/DVD combo pack of Beauty and the Beast. Since we don't own a BluRay player yet, I can only report on the DVD content, which is bare-bones compared to the BluRay stuff. As someone who decided, back in the day, that they needed Beauty and the Beast on DVD a couple weeks after the company put it "back in the vault" (a forced-scarcity policy on Disney's part that I heartily loathe), though, it was nice just to have it again. Happily, the new DVD contains everything that was on disc 1 of the original release — namely the original theatrical release, special edition version and "work in progress" version. The budding Disney animation geek in me loves this last version, since it gives a peek behind the curtain at the animation process in real time. The polished, final animation periodically drops out, to be replaced by rough-outs, storyboards, pencil sketches and other steps in the hand-drawn animation process. It can be a little jarring if all you want is to get caught up in the story. But if you're a fan of the movie-making process, as I am, it's great fun.

A little later, my daughter and I are going to do a little theme-park planning. This isn't the logistics and pricing exercises I spoke of in my last post. Instead, it will be a simple comparison of what attractions we want to see in what park; a little 'let's pretend' exercise that may help us narrow down what we want to do when we finally do arrive at the parks. All in all, fodder for a good, relaxing afternoon at home.

So that's life this week. I may be sidelined, but at least I'm not bored. And, God willing, I'll be back in the line up sooner rather than later.

A matter of priorities

This is going to be an off-the-cuff post, prompted by my disgust at a recent bit of Spam I just received from Lucas and company.

I've been subscribing to "The Homing Beacon," the official Star Wars e-mail newsletter, since — no lie — issue one. Once upon a time, in a galaxy far, far away, there used to be actual news content in the Beacon; especially when George was making the prequel trilogy.

Sadly, those days died long ago. For the better part of a couple years, THB has been nothing more than a place for George & Co. to shill new Star Wars-themed Beanie Babies, or whatever the latest bit of Saga-related merchandising is.

This week, THB hit a new low — at least for this reporter.

In news, we designate the most important item in a news story, or laid out on the page, as the "lead." In a story, the lead is the most important bit of information that appears in the story, or the item that will impact the most number of people. We use a similar ethic ethos when choosing the lead story to go at the top of the page; what is going to affect the most readers. The question "what's the lead going to be?" is a question that I wrestle with every single time that write the most trivial of stories up to those times when I've acted as news editor for that day.

I don't own this, or much of anything else,
so don't bother sueing me, George.

So it was a great offense to me when THB's lead story in the wake of Celebration V was "Celebration V Merch Now At StarWarsShop!" I'm long since used to this sort of behavior from Lucas Inc., but what set me off the way the "real" news of George announcing that the Saga would be coming to BluRay next fall was buried "below the fold," as we say — you had to scroll down past the hawking of Yoda hats and similar dreck to find it. In news terms, this is worse than burying the lead. It is putting a car advertisement in place of an interview with the mayor on what his administration plans to accomplish this year.

Now, from an advertising standpoint, I understand this; the merch is here now, rotting in the warehouse. Likely, George's minions have just begun the work of compiling the material that will appear on the BluRay versions. So from a strictly business standpoint, the Celebration V chotskies are "now," with the BluRay announcement a distant "then."

But from a "news" standpoint, this is laughable and offensive at the same time. People have been clambering for the movies to be released on high-def DVDs since the HD-DVD/BluRay format wars of a few years ago. The movies are the single most important facet of Lucas' Empire — in my mind, they are Star Wars. That the long-awaited BluRay box is on the way was the single most important piece of real information to emerge from Celebration V.

I long for the days when we used to be able to get stuff like this from starwars.com. I loved getting new bits about making the new trilogies, or the frequent behind-the-scenes stuff about making the original trilogies. Not just archival photos; real articles and web documentaries.

Sadly, those days seem to be past. These days, starwars.com and the Beacon are all about product releases, and interviews with 'celebrity' fans. Don't getta me wronga — I'm glad that x bass player from y up-and-coming band grooved on Return of the Jedi when it came out. But I can only read so many such articles before acute boredom starts to set in.

I know. So they missed the lead? Big deal. And you'd be right. I guess what bothered me the most was that they had a bit of news that actually excited me, that woke up the slumbering Star Wars fan in me for just a moment. I haven't been interested in Star Wars for a while now; I've been busy with The Beatles and Apple Inc. of late, and haven't had much of a reason to find the goings-on in the Star Wars mythos remotely interesting — until now.

The BluRay release poses interesting questions; what archival stuff are they going to put on it? Are they going to include the "THX" versions as well? Is George going to go back and tinker with the films yet again? And is this just going to be "quickie" release, the first of a series of "new" BluRay editions, each just different enough from the last to justify a buying these films yet again for the upteenth time?

The first part of this question is genuinely interesting. You can cram a lot of stuff on a BluRay disc, and George has got a lot of stuff to use. As a teaser, he showed a long-documented scene from Return of the Jedi of Luke assembling his lightsaber at Ben's house (That little tidbit didn't make it onto THB either, BTW, although it is at least mentioned in this news item on starwars.com).

I liked Empire of Dreams, but it doesn't get a lot of repeated viewings — unlike the bonus material in the Extended Lord of the Rings DVDs, which I practically have memorized (can anyone say "bring the partridge?"). Heck, the stuff on The Phantom Menace DVD would be a step in the right direction. Say what you will about Episode I, it was the single best DVD release today as far as being a total package. The other two prequels were sadly lacking in extra features (none more so that Attack of the Clones), and to have a single disc of extra features for the entire Original Trilogy was kind of insulting.

Personally, I'd love to see the inclusion of From Star Wars to Jedi: The Making of a Saga, or something similar. George has got to have miles of behind-the-scenes footage and unreleased scenes that he's been sitting on for just such an occasion. Surely, this is that occasion.

The cynic in me is ready for George to use this release as a way to hype something new; say the live-action TV series we haven't been hearing much about lately. He's done that before, with several past releases: the plugs for video games on Episodes I and III, for example. And it would be very in keeping with Lucasfilm Inc. to use the weight of the Saga to drive interest in a new game for the PS3, or something similar.

But the optimist in me is trying to stay, well, optimistic. George has talked in the past about doing a "pulling out all the stops" box set of the Star Wars movies. A 10- or 12-disc set with lots of new goodies would go a long way toward regaining the confidence and, dare I say it, interest of fans like me. Like as not, we'll get six movie and a max of two discs of mediocre special features, with the promise of the better set yet to come "when he has time."

George has come through in the past — Revenge of the Sith may not have been what fans had envisioned in the early 80s when we first learned of the falling out of Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi. But I think you have be pretty picky indeed to have walked away from that movie thinking that he didn't deliver on everything that was expected of him.

So, in the end, it's going to be up to George; is he going to try to keep milking us for another twenty years, stringing us along with weak reissue after weak reissue? Maybe. But he might also come through in the end, and give every fan — not just the hardcore collectors — something they genuinely want.

Time will tell. But in the mean time, I have greata faith in the boy. We shall see.

Rumor confirmed

You can tell this isn't one of those blogs where people go for up-to-the-minute updates on fan topics. Last week (which is a horrible delay for someone who makes his living as a newsman), the president of Disney Parks confirmed several rumors, including a major princess-themed addition to Fantasyland at Walt Disney World. This is really good news for my readers who might be raising princesses-in-training. You know who you are.

At the same time, they confirmed that Star Tours II will be opening in 2011. It will include 3D technology, which I can attest that Disney rocks at. The promotion they did for the announcement naturally included a garrison from the 501st (who are becoming a bit too ubiquitous for my tastes), and an appearance from Darth Vader. The footage they showed included a first-person view of a podrace in 3D, which, I have to admit, would be incredibly awesome.

So, with a new Star Tours opening in 2011, and an expansion to Fantasyland in 2012, I think another trip to the Magic Kingdom is definitely going to fit into my travel plans within the next few years. As if it wasn't already...

ASWC — Actual Star Wars Content

As I try to wake up this morning, I am going to do something unprecedented for a blog called "The Padawan Pause" — I am going to put in a little Star Wars content. I am also going to be brief, which is something else I'm not too good at. I hope to do more of both in the future.

So, here we go — this just in! Our friends over at The Force.Net have a post stating that Celebration V has been confirmed for 2010. Why this is good news for anyone other than Star Wars collectors is, I believe, this — George tends to have the Celebrations around times when fan interest is the highest. In the past, this has meant right before the release of all three Prequel movies.

There has been very little coming down the Star Wars pipeline lately, so what this is about — other than an opportunity for GentleGiant to sell minibusts of characters whose names you don't know — is open to question. My current theory is that it will be part of the buildup for the new live-action television series, which I have heard from other sources (which I lack the time to document now) is gearing up in Australia at the moment. This may also explain the rumors of an upcoming announcement of a StarTours refresh that a lot of Disney geeks have been speculating about lately.

More news as I hear it.

Always in motion is the future

I've spent a bit of time wandering the Internet this morning, and I've picked up a couple of useful tidbits about the future of Star Wars. This is an important topic to me, since for Star Wars to live as a product, there always has to be something real and tangible to look forward to. And by real and tangible, I mean screen product; video games and EU novels aren't going to do it. The Clone Wars is an acceptable stop-gap for now. There are a lot of stories to be told about the two-and-a-half years between Geonosis and Mustafar, and although we saw some nice battle sequences from this period in Clones and Sith, there is a lot more to tell. Granted, I would have preferred a live action, and one that was a little less kid-friendly, but since the current show is helping my daughter become a more enthusiastic fan of the Saga, I officially have no complaints.

The scuttlebutt I read today had to do with the coming live-action series, which is set in the much more promising time of the years between the Clone Wars and Episode IV. There are a lot of characters here that I want to see more of, like every rebel general and leader shown in the movies, as well as some Imperials. Ackbar, Piett, Tarkin — there's a lot of ground to cover here, and I'm much more interested in the stories that will be told here than I am in the Clone Wars saga. 

Beware: Mild Spoilers Ahead

So the news is that production for the new series is starting to ramp up, which means that pretty soon the Lucasfilm PR machine will start posting tidbits on the website about what is to come. As I alluded in my previous post, the folks at Lucasfilm are masters at building up anticipation for new screen product. Far from faulting them for it, I'm actually counting on it. So I am officially beginning to follow posts about where they might be filming (current rumors include Czechoslovakia and the old Mos Espa set in Tunisia, but nothing has been confirmed), and which actors will be cast. Again, the current news here is the actor who played Captain Typho may have a role. I'm just fine with this as long as it doesn't involve his uncle, Captain Downer…er, Tanaka. I didn't like his character, and from what little I heard in interviews, liked the actor playing him even less.

The other rumor I encountered was that production was beginning on Episodes VII-IX of the Star Wars Saga. Now, while the post I read quoted "very reliable" (but safely anonymous) sources, I have to chalk this one up to fan boy wishful thinking. George has said he will not make any more films, and wants to devote himself to other projects. So far, this means Red Tails, the story of the Tuskegee airmen, which is long overdue for a big-screen treatment. I really think that George is content to let others mine the gold of the Star Wars universe for a time, both literally and figuratively, and concentrate on other projects, albeit at a leisurely pace.

But this got me thinking: if it were true, would we even want to see Episodes VII-IX? Granted, I have always wanted to see what Master Skywalker, General Solo and Premier Organa-Solo (or would it be Master Organa-Solo?) would look like. Of these, I am most intrigued by what Han would have become in the years after the fall of the Empire. Although originally not a fan of the character, I have lately been very intrigued by the journey that Han Solo undergoes in the original trilogy as originally released. I am very interested in what would become of him in later years. In my mind, I see a distinguished but still somewhat cynical figure with a greying goatee, but that's just me.

Next would be Leia; I have always wanted to see what she would look like as a Jedi, and have always wanted to know how her own Jedi education progressed. Oddly, the EU canon never got around to exploring that except in the most intangible, peripheral way (at least in the books that I read), which is another reason I don't like the EU. They are much more interested in portraying Leia as a galactic soccer mom who runs the New Republic on the side, which is decidedly not the direction Lucas intended for the character as laid out in Return of the Jedi. Of course, given the whole Jedi non-attachment doctrine he laid out in Clones, neither she nor Luke could ever have families anyway.

Finally, Luke, one of my favorite characters. I really don't need to see Mark Hamill as a wizened Yoda figure, since I can already see it in my head so clearly. It would be fun, but for me, actually a little redundant.

Which brings us to the main reason for this post: do we really need any more Star Wars films? The rabid fan boy in me is screaming "YES! OF COURSE!  WHAT, ARE YOU KIDDING!" But given the Saga as a whole, are there any more stories that need to be told? We have seen the fall of Anakin Skywalker, and we have seen his redemption. Anything further would mean that one of the classic trilogy characters falls to the Dark Side in one way or another — a possibility I am vehemently against, dramatically  — or the drama would have to come from offspring. I do not need to see a movie about Jacen and Jaina Solo — I'm not even sure that they exist, outside of Timothy Zahn's imagination. I do not need to see the characters that made Star Wars work to begin with relegated to sidekick status in someone else's story; although seeing Luke in the New Hope Obi-Wan Kenobi role would be fun. And most especially, I do not need to see the characters become caricatures of their former selves, a la William Shatner's Kirk. 

So if there are to be new films, which I very much doubt, they need to be done for the right reasons, dramatically. They need to fit in with the existing movie canon. There needs to be a real reason to make them, and a real story to tell. If so, I'll be the happiest man on the planet. But I do not think these films need to be made, save for the fact that they would add to George's already abysmally deep pockets. 

I will be returning to work tomorrow, so this may be my last post for a time. I have enjoyed writing these posts immensely, and I very much hope I'm wrong, and that I will continue to be able to dabble in this world. But my time is about to come under normal, human constraints, rather than the extended vacation hours I've been enjoying, and I don't know what the fallout will be yet. Hopefully, I'll see you soon.