Star Wars, Geek Culture, and Power Converters
Brian and I weren’t able to attend the Rebels panels at Celebration, but Bria was there covering for White Hot Room and a bunch of other Twitter/blogger/podcaster friends were also in attendance.
Not only did Celebration give us a taste of what’s to come in Season 2 in the form of a fabulous trailer, but some lucky folks also got to see the season premiere. No spoilers for the episode here, but we’ll do our best to recap the trailer and speculate about what we might see in Season 2.
Didn’t get enough Star Wars last weekend? Good news: Star Wars #4 by Jason Aaron and John Cassaday is out today! Our heroes were successful (albeit just barely) in their mission to destroy the weapons factory on Cymoon 1 but what now for both the Rebels and the Empire?
I usually discuss the art after the plot but Cassaday drew such a gorgeous panel of Luke in his pilot helmet towards the end of the issue that I have to mention it right away! I actually paused for a minute just to take in every detail. A lot of gorgeous work went into that one panel between Cassaday’s lines and Laura Martin’s colors. There are also some other very nice pages for Luke fans but wow did that other panel just blow me away. John Cassaday will certainly be missed when he leaves the book.
On the story front, this main Star Wars book and the Darth Vader book definitely seem to be intertwined. It would be interesting to see a more detailed timeline of where each issue falls in relation to the others as this is now the second time we the readers have seen Vader dealing with Jabba. As far as plot goes, this is definitely a transitional set-up issue. Aaron is moving his characters into position for the next arc but it all feels very organic and not like a place holder issue where everyone’s treading water.
Speaking of characters! You can attribute it to either great characterization or wonderful coordination by the story group or both but the Leia featured in Aaron’s book is definitely on the same page as the Leia who is in the pages of Mark Waid’s book. In both, she’s very proactive and trying to do more than the Rebellion will let her. It’s great in terms of both continuity and who Leia Organa is as a person.
Oh yeah. And there’s a character return that’ll definitely have some fans fist pumping the air.
(As a side note, please tell me that someone else out there read the last few lines of the opening scroll and immediately heard Katara’s voice from the Avatar opening…)
Star Wars #4 gets another solid recommendation from me but you’re already reading this book, right?
Kathleen Kennedy is my master now.
Before Celebration Anaheim, it was cool to be a fangirl. Last Thursday morning, Kathleen Kennedy made it respectable.
I was already super excited for The Force Awakens panel, which opened Celebration Anaheim in the most explosive manner possible. But I didn’t realize how excited I was about the future of the franchise until I saw Kennedy walk onstage in a Star Wars t-shirt. And not just any shirt, but the new Her Universe lightsaber shirt that debuted at Celebration, which she purchased with her own money because she wanted something to wear for the panel. She rocked it with a white blazer, and you’re stupid if you don’t think millions of women are going to copy that look.
This is a huge deal. Kennedy has been a fixture in Hollywood for decades, and George Lucas entrusted her ahead of lots and lots of qualified individuals to take over the reigns of Star Wars. One of her first actions as head of Lucasfilm was to decide that the franchise would move forward as one story while respecting its vast history. She’s a hugely respected producer and brings a ton of credibility as Lucas’s successor. I’m more confident than ever in her ability to help tell great stories and be a steward for this varied, diverse, wonderful fandom.
The most important thing isn’t that Kennedy herself is a woman, but rather the fact that she accepts this fandom is so diverse. She understands it, and embraces it. She insisted on purchasing a Her Universe shirt with her own money just so she could support the business. During The Force Awakens panel she specifically mentioned the lack of female representation in the franchise’s history, and assured everyone there would be lots more women characters going forward. I can’t overemphasize how important it is to have the panel host, director J.J. Abrams, and Kennedy discuss the negative reaction to the first cast photo and say they’ve heard those arguments and agree with them. And Kennedy isn’t someone merely looking to take advantage of an untapped demographic, or bow down to “the feminists”. She’s part of that demographic, and wants to rectify the lazy, incorrect assumption that women and girls don’t like Star Wars. (If you believe that, you obviously weren’t in attendance at Celebration Anaheim, because women and girls were everywhere.) As far as Kennedy is concerned, everyone likes Star Wars, and she wants to make sure they feel welcomed and represented in fandom and the franchise.
I’ve never felt more comfortable with the future of Star Wars than after that panel. You could feel the excitement in the air just watching from the overflow room, not to mention the unadulterated happiness at seeing BB-8, the new cast, the old cast, the new stormtroopers, and finally, the teaser trailer. The crowd was so enthusiastic they had to show the teaser twice. I laughed, I cried, I got goosebumps, I clutched hands with my neighbors, I kissed my husband. And in the back of my mind I was thinking thank you, Kathleen Kennedy. Thank you for understanding that Star Wars is for everyone. Thank you for making us so happy with the greatest teaser trailer I’ve ever seen in my entire life. Thank you for agreeing to be a part of the Star Wars family. Thank you for making it accepted and respected to be a fangirl. Thank you for being someone I can look up to.
Thank you for helping make Celebration Anaheim the best one yet.
Chewie, we’re home.
In addition to giving you a chance to be a part of the podcast, we’ve got a few more reasons you might want to show up to the live recording of Tosche Station Radio at the Celebration podcast stage at 10:30AM on Sunday. Fabulous prizes!
By showing up, you’ll receive a raffle ticket and may just win one of these awesome giveaways:
Again, all you have to do win one of these prizes is show up at room 208A at 10:30AM on Sunday. We look forward to seeing you!
Ever ask a Star Wars fan to rank their favorite Star Wars movies? If you have, you’ve probably gotten a variation of the above response. And then you’ve probably tried to rank them yourself and kept changing your answer depending on your mood, or because you just saw one of the movies on TV, or read a certain book, or whatever.
Star Wars Celebration is next week and we’re all pumped and ready to go and frankly out of brain space for intelligent column ideas. Not to mention the entire six movies were just released digitally for the first time ever. So I thought it would be a great idea to do the impossible and rank our favorite Star Wars movies! And not just rank them, but explain the rankings, too.
Okay, maybe this won’t be as brainless as I thought…
Mental hand-wringing under the cut! (Soon to be made null and void with the release of The Force Awakens.)
We’re less than a week until the start of Star Wars Celebration Anaheim, and we’ve been getting a bunch of updates just in time to finalize all your plans.
From Her Universe, a sneak peek of exclusives coming to Celebration, including dresses, cardigans, and t-shirts for women and girls.
Think Geek exclusives, including:
Finally, Amy Ratcliffe has tips and tricks regarding general convention-going, Celebration, and the Anaheim Convention Center.
Back in February Brian and I visited family near Seattle, which is home to Starbucks, Amazon, Microsoft, grunge music, and the EMP Museum. We’d planned this trip long before the announcement of the opening of a new costume exhibit — Rebel, Jedi, Princess, Queen: Star Wars and the Power of Costume — and once we heard about it we grew even more excited to return to Brian’s home city. We’d been to the EMP once before and visited this time specifically for the exhibit. It did not disappoint!
Brian and I really enjoyed Rebel, Jedi, Princess, Queen; I especially loved seeing Luke’s Return of the Jedi costume, various handmaiden dresses, and the evolution of Palpatine. I do wish the exhibit had more Original Trilogy costumes, though, and was disappointed that some of my favorite costumes (Luke’s Dagobah outfit, Leia’s Endor and Hoth gear) weren’t included. While the focus on the prequels is understandable, at times the exhibit seemed incomplete.
That said, the exhibit had a lot of insights about how the costumes were designed and constructed, and gave me an even greater appreciation for Trisha Biggar (how that woman wasn’t even nominated for an Oscar, I’ll never understand). I consider myself pretty well-informed about the making of the saga, and the signage included lots of trivia I’d never heard before. I definitely recommend attending if you’re in the Seattle area, especially if you’re a costumer.
The exhibit is open through October 4, 2015, and your ticket includes access to the rest of the EMP galleries, so be sure not to miss out on those. Entrance to the exhibit is done via timed tickets, so it is recommended that you purchase tickets in advance in order to secure your preferred viewing date and time. It took about an hour for Brian and I to stroll through the costume exhibit, and we probably could have spent a lot more time in there!
We’ve met Doctor Aphra, Triple-Zero, and BT and now they have their mission to further Darth Vader’s need for a secret personal force. In Darth Vader #4 by Kieron Gillen and Salvador Larroca, the “team” is off to Geonosis… a place that Vader knows well.
Interestingly enough, the star of the issue, in my eyes, is Triple Zero. While he’s obviously an inversion of Threepio, it works surprisingly well and doesn’t come off as an evil parody. He’s still got the fussiness of a protocol droid but Triple Zero is also definitely fine with both murder and torture. It’s a great way to take the premise and build off of it in a way that doesn’t feel boring.
On a similar vein of character moving past their concepts, Doctor Aphra continues to be a fantastic addition to the Star Wars universe. She’s a smart and capable woman of color who may babble when she’s nervous but doesn’t have any illusions about how this galaxy works. This is a galaxy that needs more realists and I definitely look forward to seeing how the working relationship between her and Vader evolves.
This is definitely a great book for some good old-fashioned Vader violence. Larroca draws a great Vader and he definitely has fun with all the action sequences. Edgar Delgado’s colors compliment his line work nicely. It’s also a testament to the work of both the artist and writer that the art of Vader still manages to be expressive and tell a story with his body language even though you can’t see his face.
Speaking of Vader, I haven’t discussed him much yet in a review of his starring book. This is definitely a great read for those who love the character. I find that Gillen’s allusions to Anakin are certainly obvious but they don’t feel out of place for the situation. It’s nice to see that despite Vader’s efforts, Anakin isn’t completely gone.
Oh. And that last page cliffhanger? I can’t wait until next month’s issue. It has the potential to be fantastic.
Darth Vader #4 gets another 4/5 from me this week.
In news surprising to no one thanks to rumors over the past few days, Disney announced tonight via a commercial during this big deal college basketball game that the six films will be available in Digital HD starting on Friday, April 10th.
“Since the debut of the first film nearly 40 years ago, Star Wars has become a worldwide phenomenon with legions of fans from every generation,” said Alan Bergman, president, The Walt Disney Studios. “It’s only fitting that audiences enjoy this legendary saga and its many fascinating behind-the-scenes stories on a wide variety of platforms, and we’re very excited to finally bring all six films to Digital HD for the first time.”
The digital releases will also contain bonus material although that will apparently vary by retailer. You can read the full press release on the official site.
A review of Kanan: The Last Padawan #1 in 7 gifs:
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