#captain canada's flying pony | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

all-my-books · 7 years ago

Text

2017 Reading

262 books read. 60% of new reads Non-fiction, authors from 55 unique countries, 35% of authors read from countries other than USA, UK, Canada, and Australia. Asterisks denote re-reads, bolds are favorites. January: The Deeds of the Disturber – Elizabeth Peters The Wiregrass – Pam Webber Homegoing – Yaa Gyasi It Didn't Start With You – Mark Wolynn Facing the Lion – Joseph Lemasolai Lekuton Before We Visit the Goddess – Chitra Divakaruni Colored People – Henry Louis Gates Jr. My Khyber Marriage – Morag Murray Abdullah Miss Bianca in the Salt Mines – Margery Sharp Farewell to the East End – Jennifer Worth Fire and Air – Erik Vlaminck My Grandfather Would Have Shot Me – Jennifer Teege Catherine the Great – Robert K Massie My Mother's Sabbath Days – Chaim Grade Not the Israel My Parents Promised Me – Harvey Pekar, JT Waldman The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend – Katarina Bivald Stammered Songbook – Erwin Mortier Savushun – Simin Daneshvar The Prophet – Kahlil Gibran Beyond the Walls – Nazim Hikmet The Dressmaker of Khair Khana – Gayle Tzemach Lemmon A Day No Pigs Would Die – Robert Newton Peck *

February: Bone Black – bell hooks Special Exits – Joyce Farmer Reading Like a Writer – Francine Prose Bright Dead Things – Ada Limon Middlemarch – George Eliot Confessions of an English Opium Eater – Thomas de Quincey Medusa's Gaze – Marina Belozerskaya Child of the Prophecy – Juliet Marillier * The File on H – Ismail Kadare The Motorcycle Diaries – Ernesto Che Guevara Passing – Nella Larsen Whose Body? - Dorothy L. Sayers The Spiral Staircase – Karen Armstrong Station Eleven – Emily St. John Mandel Reading Lolita in Tehran – Azar Nafisi Defiance – Nechama Tec

March: Yes, Chef – Marcus Samuelsson Discontent and its Civilizations – Mohsin Hamid The Gulag Archipelago Vol. 1 – Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn Patience and Sarah – Isabel Miller Dying Light in Corduba – Lindsey Davis * Five Days at Memorial – Sheri Fink A Man Called Ove – Fredrik Backman * The Shia Revival – Vali Nasr Girt – David Hunt Half Magic – Edward Eager * Dreams of Joy – Lisa See * Too Pretty to Live – Dennis Brooks West with the Night – Beryl Markham Little Fuzzy – H. Beam Piper *

April: Defying Hitler – Sebastian Haffner Monsters in Appalachia – Sheryl Monks Sorcerer to the Crown – Zen Cho The Man Without a Face – Masha Gessen Peace is Every Step – Thich Nhat Hanh Flory – Flory van Beek Why Soccer Matters – Pele The Zhivago Affair – Peter Finn, Petra Couvee The Stories of Breece D'J Pancake – Breece Pancake The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared – Jonas Jonasson Chasing Utopia – Nikki Giovanni The Invisible Bridge – Julie Orringer * Young Adults – Daniel Pinkwater Jonathan Swift: The Reluctant Rebel – John Stubbs Black Gun, Silver Star – Art T. Burton The Arab of the Future 2 – Riad Sattouf Hole in the Heart – Henny Beaumont MASH – Richard Hooker Forgotten Ally – Rana Mitter Zorro – Isabel Allende Flying Couch – Amy Kurzweil

May: The Bite of the Mango – Mariatu Kamara Mystic and Rider – Sharon Shinn * Freedom is a Constant Struggle – Angela Davis Capture – David A. Kessler Poor Cow – Nell Dunn My Father's Dragon – Ruth Stiles Gannett * Elmer and the Dragon – Ruth Stiles Gannett * The Dragons of Blueland – Ruth Stiles Gannett * Hetty Feather – Jacqueline Wilson In the Shadow of the Banyan – Vaddey Ratner The Last Camel Died at Noon – Elizabeth Peters Cannibalism – Bill Schutt The Handmaid's Tale – Margaret Atwood A Fine Balance – Rohinton Mistry The Food of a Younger Land – Mark Kurlansky Behold the Dreamers – Imbolo Mbue Words on the Move – John McWhorter John Ransom's Diary: Andersonville – John Ransom Such a Lovely Little War – Marcelino Truong Child of All Nations – Irmgard Keun One Child – Mei Fong Country of Red Azaleas – Domnica Radulescu Between Two Worlds – Zainab Salbi Malinche – Julia Esquivel A Lucky Child – Thomas Buergenthal The Drackenberg Adventure – Lloyd Alexander Say You're One of Them – Uwem Akpan William Wells Brown – Ezra Greenspan

June: Partners In Crime – Agatha Christie The Chinese in America – Iris Chang The Great Escape – Kati Marton As Texas Goes... – Gail Collins Pavilion of Women – Pearl S. Buck Classic Chinese Stories – Lu Xun The Return of the Soldier – Rebecca West The Slave Across the Street – Theresa Flores Miss Bianca in the Orient – Margery Sharp Boy Erased – Garrard Conley How to Be a Dictator – Mikal Hem A Thousand Splendid Suns – Khaled Hosseini Tears of the Desert – Halima Bashir The Death and Life of Great American Cities – Jane Jacobs The First Salute – Barbara Tuchman Come as You Are – Emily Nagoski The Want-Ad Killer – Ann Rule The Gulag Archipelago Vol 2 – Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

July: Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz – L. Frank Baum * The Blazing World – Margaret Cavendish Madonna in a Fur Coat – Sabahattin Ali Duende – tracy k. smith The ACB With Honora Lee – Kate de Goldi Mountains of the Pharaohs – Zahi Hawass Anna Karenina – Leo Tolstoy Chronicle of a Last Summer – Yasmine el Rashidi Killers of the Flower Moon – David Grann Mister Monday – Garth Nix * Leaving Yuba City – Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni The Silk Roads – Peter Frankopan The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy – Douglas Adams A Corner of White – Jaclyn Moriarty * Circling the Sun – Paula McLain Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them – Al Franken Believe Me – Eddie Izzard The Cracks in the Kingdom – Jaclyn Moriarty * Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe – Fannie Flagg * One Hundred and One Days – Asne Seierstad Grim Tuesday – Garth Nix * The Vanishing Velasquez – Laura Cumming Four Against the Arctic – David Roberts The Marriage Bureau – Penrose Halson The Jesuit and the Skull – Amir D Aczel Drowned Wednesday – Garth Nix * Roots, Radicals, and Rockers – Billy Bragg A Tangle of Gold – Jaclyn Moriarty * Lydia, Queen of Palestine – Uri Orlev *

August: Sir Thursday – Garth Nix * The Hoboken Chicken Emergency – Daniel Pinkwater * Lady Friday – Garth Nix * Freddy and the Perilous Adventure – Walter R. Brooks * Venice – Jan Morris China's Long March – Jean Fritz Trials of the Earth – Mary Mann Hamilton The Bully Pulpit – Doris Kearns Goodwin Final Exit – Derek Humphry The Book of Emma Reyes – Emma Reyes Freddy the Politician – Walter R. Brooks * Dragonflight – Anne McCaffrey * What the Witch Left – Ruth Chew All Passion Spent – Vita Sackville-West The Picture of Dorian Gray – Oscar Wilde The Curse of the Blue Figurine – John Bellairs * When They Severed Earth From Sky – Elizabeth Wayland Barber Superior Saturday – Garth Nix * The Boston Girl – Anita Diamant The Mummy, The Will, and the Crypt – John Bellairs * Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are? - Frans de Waal The Philadelphia Adventure – Lloyd Alexander * Lord Sunday – Garth Nix * The Spell of the Sorcerer's Skull – John Bellairs * Five Little Pigs – Agatha Christie * Love in Vain – JM Dupont, Mezzo A Little History of the World – EH Gombrich Last Things – Marissa Moss Imagine Wanting Only This – Kristen Radtke Dinosaur Empire – Abby Howard The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents – Terry Pratchett *

September: First Bite by Bee Wilson The Xanadu Adventure by Lloyd Alexander Orientalism – Edward Said The Lost Crown of Genghis Khan – Carl Barks The Island on Bird Street – Uri Orlev * The Indifferent Stars Above – Daniel James Brown Beneath the Lion's Gaze – Maaza Mengiste The Importance of Being Earnest – Oscar Wilde * The Book of Five Rings – Miyamoto Musashi The Drunken Botanist – Amy Stewart The Turtle of Oman – Naomi Shahib Nye The Alleluia Files – Sharon Shinn * Gut Feelings – Gerd Gigerenzer The Secret of Hondorica – Carl Barks Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight – Alexandra Fuller The Abominable Mr. Seabrook – Joe Ollmann Black Flags – Joby Warrick

October: Fear – Thich Nhat Hanh Fall Down 7 Times Get Up 8 – Naoki Higashida To the Bright Edge of the World – Eowyn Ivey Why? - Mario Livio Just One Damned Thing After Another – Jodi Taylor The Yellow Wallpaper – Charlotte Perkins Gilman Blindness – Jose Saramago The Book Thieves – Anders Rydell Reality is not What it Seems – Carlo Rovelli Cranford – Elizabeth Gaskell * The Witch Family – Eleanor Estes * Sister Mine – Nalo Hopkinson La Vagabonde – Colette Becoming Nicole – Amy Ellis Nutt

November: The Golden Notebook – Doris Lessing The Children's Book – A.S. Byatt The Fire Next Time – James Baldwin Under the Udala Trees – Chinelo Okparanta Who Killed These Girls? – Beverly Lowry Running for my Life – Lopez Lmong Radium Girls – Kate Moore News of the World – Paulette Jiles The Red Pony – John Steinbeck The Edible History of Humanity – Tom Standage A Woman in Arabia – Gertrude Bell and Georgina Howell Founding Gardeners – Andrea Wulf Anatomy of a Disapperance – Hisham Matar The Book of Night Women – Marlon James Ground Zero – Kevin J. Anderson * Acorna – Anne McCaffrey and Margaret Ball * A Girl Named Zippy – Haven Kimmel * The Age of the Vikings – Anders Winroth The Spanish Civil War: A Very Short Introduction – Helen Graham A General History of the Pyrates – Captain Charles Johnson (suspected Nathaniel Mist) Clouds of Witness – Dorothy L. Sayers * The Lonely City – Olivia Laing No Time for Tears – Judy Heath

December: The Unwomanly Face of War – Svetlana Alexievich Gay-Neck - Dhan Gopal Mukerji The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane – Lisa See Get Well Soon – Jennifer Wright The Testament of Mary – Colm Toibin The Roman Way – Edith Hamilton Understood Betsy – Dorothy Canfield Fisher * The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse - Vicente Blasco Ibanez Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH – Robert C. O'Brien SPQR – Mary Beard Ballet Shoes – Noel Streatfeild * Hogfather – Terry Pratchett * The Sorrow of War – Bao Ninh Drowned Hopes – Donald E. Westlake * Selected Essays – Michel de Montaigne Vietnam – Stanley Karnow The Snake, The Crocodile, and the Dog – Elizabeth Peters Guests of the Sheik – Elizabetha Warnok Fernea Stone Butch Blues – Leslie Feinberg Wicked Plants – Amy Stewart Life in a Medieval City – Joseph and Frances Gies Under the Sea Wind – Rachel Carson The Red Virgin and the Vision of Utopia – Mary and Brian Talbot Brat Farrar – Josephine Tey * The Treasure of the Ten Avatars – Don Rosa Escape From Forbidden Valley – Don Rosa Nightwood – Djuna Barnes Here Comes the Sun – Nicole Dennis-Benn Over My Dead Body – Rex Stout *

#books #reading #2017

9 notes · View notes

irishsaints · 6 years ago

Text

I reblogged someone doing a q&a ages ago but here have some things about me.

— 1. Who was the last person you held hands with? hmm. good question. might be my ex. 2. Are you outgoing or shy? you know, i used to think i was shy, but i think i’m actually kind of outgoing. 3. Who are you looking forward to seeing? my best buds in the world, k & j- k when she comes down for pride in the spring, j when i fly down to dc for a fellow hockey friend’s wedding 4. Are you easy to get along with? yep! 5. If you were drunk would the person you like take care of you? woof i don’t know my heart is in ten different directions right now haha. probably yes though 6. What kind of people are you attracted to? kind people. also broken people. funny people. warm people. honest people. people with different perspectives than mine. 7. Do you think you’ll be in a relationship two months from now? almost certainly not. 8. Who from the opposite gender is on your mind? nathan dales, at the moment. 9. Does talking about sex make you uncomfortable? not particularly 10. Who was the last person you had a deep conversation with? ooh, connor, from the party. we talked about what it’s like being a cop in brooklyn, and what the perspective of a cop is on a stranger reaching for an unknown object in their pocket looks like. 11. What does the most recent text that you sent say? “y’all have been SLEEPING on letterkenny i’m telling you” 12. What are your 5 favorite songs right now? mm- thinking of you, kesha; 11 minutes, halsey & yungblud; dont call me up, mabel; love me, forest blakk; high hopes, panic! at the disco 13. Do you like it when people play with your hair? yes absolutely 14. Do you believe in luck and miracles? sometimes? i think luck and miracles happen, but i think they’re sort of dictated by fate- they happen when they’re MEANT to happen, no sooner, no later. 15. What good thing happened this summer? this past summer? hm. i got to jump ponies again. i ran farther than i had ever run before. i pushed past my own limits. i found my courage again. 16. Would you kiss the last person you kissed again? yes i would. he was pretty. 17. Do you think there is life on other planets? given the size of the galaxy and the universe outside of earth? almost certainly. 18. Do you still talk to your first crush? my first crush? fuck no, i wouldn’t know where to find that kid. i’ve TRIED to find him on facebook haha. 19. Do you like bubble baths? yes, i adore them. 20. Do you like your neighbors? for the most part, they’re not awful. 21. What are you bad habits? i bite my nails. i pick at scabs until i leave scars. i gnaw on the insides of my lip. i drink until i either pass out or black out (when i do drink) 22. Where would you like to travel? iceland. back to ireland. australia, new zealand. back to india. cote d’ivoire. bangladesh. kenya. mozambique. canada. 23. Do you have trust issues? off and on. not as much as i used to, but still in some ways. less in others. 24. Favorite part of your daily routine? right now, a toss up between doing my eyeshadow and brewing my morning coffee. 25. What part of your body are you most uncomfortable with? my tummy at the moment. 26. What do you do when you wake up? blearily stumble to the bathroom to determine how much product i need to put in my hair that day, and then pee. 27. Do you wish your skin was lighter or darker? probably a smidge darker, then i wouldn’t burn so much i don’t think. 28. Who are you most comfortable around? my best friends. 29. Have any of your ex’s told you they regret breaking up? not so far. but i broke up with all of them so *shrug* 30. Do you ever want to get married? i think one day, yes 31. Is your hair long enough for a pony tail? no it is not 32. Which celebrities would you have a threesome with? oh no. this is not a fair question! in fact i really hate this question. uhhhhhhhhhhhh. UHM. FUCK. assuming this threesome doesnt ruin a perfectly good celebrity marriage or relationship- putting jared keeso on this list bc something tells me he’d be down for a threesome- and uhhhh- tessa thompson, i think. 33. Spell your name with your chin. nellie 34. Do you play sports? What sports? hockey is the one i still “play”- i used to play rugby too. i still ride ponies sometimes. i run a lot. and i row. 35. Would you rather live without TV or music? without tv. 36. Have you ever liked someone and never told them? probably 37. What do you say during awkward silences? i usually revert back to the weather or talk about something funny on the internet 38. Describe your dream girl/guy? no because i don’t have one right now 39. What are your favorite stores to shop in? oddly? anthropologie even though it’s not really my style at all?? 40. What do you want to do after high school? ??????? after high school????? i’m not in high school anymore but okay?????? i want to go to college and then get a job????? 41. Do you believe everyone deserves a second chance? most of the time, yep 42. If you’re being extremely quiet what does it mean? hm either i’m thinking, busy, or i have a migraine. or i’m listening. 43. Do you smile at strangers? sometimes. 44. Trip to outer space or bottom of the ocean? outer space. the bottom of the ocean is horrifying. things down there fall into the “put that thing back where it came from or so help me” category. 45. What makes you get out of bed in the morning? my alarm, mostly. and panic about being late to work. 46. What are you paranoid about? being late to work, despite the fact that i am an hour earlier than most of my coworkers. 47. Have you ever been high? ...yes? i’m in my mid 20s? 48. Have you ever been drunk? yes...? again, in my mid twenties? 49. Have you done anything recently that you hope nobody finds out about? not recently, no 50. What was the colour of the last hoodie you wore? gray, i think 51. Ever wished you were someone else? once in a while, sure 52. One thing you wish you could change about yourself? my nose. 53. Favourite makeup brand? e.l.f. right now 54. Favourite store? didn’t you ask me this not that long ago? see #39 55. Favourite blog? oh for real? do you know how many friends i have on here, and how many awesome blogs they have? i don’t have just one favorite okay 56. Favourite colour? deep green- like a forest green 57. Favourite food? risotto, probably 58. Last thing you ate? microwaved chicken enchilada 59. First thing you ate this morning? smoothie and bagel 60. Ever won a competition? For what? uh i’ve probably gotten a blue ribbon at a horse show before 61. Been suspended/expelled? For what? you know, i don’t think i ever have 62. Been arrested? For what? nope! 63. Ever been in love? yep 64. Tell us the story of your first kiss? oh! we were on our annual school walk through the local state park, and we got to to top of the mountain in between two big groups, so we had the very top all to ourselves and could see out over the valley, and he pulled me close to him and kissed me right on top of the mountain in the early autumn air in new england, surrounded by orange and red and yellow leaves, with the river rushing below us. it was nice. 65. Are you hungry right now? yep. i should go make dinner probably 66. Do you like your tumblr friends more than your real friends? i don’t think i like them more, but i’d say i like them equally 67. Facebook or Twitter? mmm facebook i guess 68. Twitter or Tumblr? tumblr i guess 69. Are you watching tv right now? no? i’m here? 70. Names of your bestfriends? this seems very personal about my friends, i’m going to pass on this one. 71. Craving something? What? pirate’s booty. and sleep. like ten years of sleep. 72. What colour are your towels? one is navy blue and two are green. 72. How many pillows do you sleep with? two. 73. Do you sleep with stuffed animals? yep, just one, a stuffed buffalo 74. How many stuffed animals do you think you have? here in boston, just the one. at my parents’ home/where i grew up, an entire chest full- at least 20, if not more 75. Favourite animal? horses 76. What colour is your underwear? red 77. Chocolate or Vanilla? both 78. Favourite ice cream flavour? mint chocolate chip 79. What colour shirt are you wearing? black and yellow and blue 80. What colour pants? black 81. Favourite tv show? currently, letterkenny 82. Favourite movie? well for a long time it was the silver stallion: king of the wild brumbies; now it’s mad max fury road 83. Mean Girls or Mean Girls 2? what the fuck are you on about, mean girls 2? that shit ain’t real. that’s a copy cat. Mean Girls, all the way. 84. Mean Girls or 21 Jump Street? mean girls. 85. Favourite character from Mean Girls? janice ian. 86. Favourite character from Finding Nemo? well nemo, duh. 87. First person you talked to today? my co worker, mara. 88. Last person you talked to today? well, it’ll probably be my roommate, katie, but if not, it’ll be the gal who waxes my eyebrows, aly. 89. Name a person you hate? my ex-ex. not my most recent ex, but the one before that. that bitch i fucking hate. she’s goddamned garbage. 90. Name a person you love? my mom! 91. Is there anyone you want to punch in the face right now? i could probably name a few 92. In a fight with someone? not that i can think of 93. How many sweatpants do you have? hm maybe 8 pairs? 94. How many sweaters/hoodies do you have? oooh probably like 10 or 12 pairs 95. Last movie you watched? Captain Marvel 96. Favourite actress? Charlize Theron probably 97. Favourite actor? oh no. Tom Hardy is at the top of the list for sure 98. Do you tan a lot? HAH. i have irish (read: VERY PALE) skin. i do not tan. i just burn, and then go back to being VERY PALE. 99. Have any pets? yep! a dog and a horse. 100. How are you feeling? tired. emotionally exhausted. mentally exhausted. 101. Do you type fast? yep. 102. Do you regret anything from your past? in some ways, yes. in some ways, no. i firmly believe everything i’ve been through has shaped who i am now, but i wish like hell i didn’t have to go through some of it 103. Can you spell well? yep 104. Do you miss anyone from your past? yeah there’s a few people 105. Ever been to a bonfire party? yes indeed 106. Ever broken someone’s heart? yep 107. Have you ever been on a horse? HAHAHAHAHAHAHA yes, yes i have 108. What should you be doing? cooking dinner probably 109. Is something irritating you right now? probably 110. Have you ever liked someone so much it hurt? probably 111. Do you have trust issues? sort of ? 112. Who was the last person you cried in front of? my therapist 113. What was your childhood nickname? nellie sort of is a childhood nickname? but i also went by nell bell a lot, and nelly fertado, which i hated. 114. Have you ever been out of your province/state? yes i have 115. Do you play the Wii? nope 116. Are you listening to music right now? nope 117. Do you like chicken noodle soup? yes! i love it! 118. Do you like Chinese food? yes! 119. Favourite book? oh this is hard. The Stand, by Stephen King, is a classic 120. Are you afraid of the dark? not anymore 121. Are you mean? i can be sometimes. 122. Is cheating ever okay? NO. 123. Can you keep white shoes clean? i mean yeah, but not for forever. 124. Do you believe in love at first sight? mmm. i don’t think so. 125. Do you believe in true love? yes. 126. Are you currently bored? kind of? 127. What makes you happy? running. food. a good tv show. a great movie with incredible cinematography and music to match. 128. Would you change your name? um. maybe? idk. i try not to wander down that path too often 129. What your zodiac sign? sagittarius 130. Do you like subway? like...the fast food chain? no. god no. ew. hard no. 131. Your bestfriend of the opposite sex likes you, what do you do? hm. i feel like this has happened to me/is happening to me/happens to me? i sort of ignore it and pretend it’s not happening? 132. Who’s the last person you had a deep conversation with? errrr. either my best friend or my therapist. 133. Favourite lyrics right now? probably the entirety of thinking of you, by kesha. 134. Can you count to one million? i mean can i? yeah sure i CAN. do i WANT to or have the time, patience, or energy? likely not. 135. Dumbest lie you ever told? honestly would not be able to tell you because it was probably that dumb. 136. Do you sleep with your doors open or closed? closed 137. How tall are you? 5′1′’ 138. Curly or Straight hair? straight 139. Brunette or Blonde? naturally brunette but currently blue, or as my stylist says “a color that is not naturally appearing in the world” 140. Summer or Winter? summer 141. Night or Day? daytime 142. Favourite month? october i think. or maybe may. 143. Are you a vegetarian? hard no. 144. Dark, milk or white chocolate? milk chocolate 145. Tea or Coffee? coffee 146. Was today a good day? eh, it was alright. long, mostly. 147. Mars or Snickers? snickers i guess 148. What’s your favourite quote? The full quote is “But for everyone, surely, what we have gone through in this period - I am addressing myself to the School - surely from this period of ten months this is the lesson: never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never-in nothing, great or small, large or petty - never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.”- Winston Churchill, at the Harrow School in 1941. My favorite bits are italicized. 149. Do you believe in ghosts? mmm. spirits. forces that might still exist on this planet, long after their bodies are not. souls that haven’t moved on yet, for whatever reason. i don’t think they’re here to haunt us. but they haven’t found their way on to whatever’s next yet, either. 150. Get the closest book next to you, open it to page 42, what’s the first line on that page? good morning.

#about me #here find some things out about me #questions and answers

0 notes

trendingnewsb · 6 years ago

Text

How Fans Helped Hasbro Build Its Biggest Star Wars Ship Ever

Toys and Star Wars are inextricably linked forever and ever. Star Wars creator George Lucas famously waived part of his directing fee and retained the insanely lucrative rights to Star Wars merchandise in a deal that has gone down in history as a catastrophic blunder on the part of 20th Century Fox. The studio was skeptical this oddball space movie would resonate with audiences, even if its critters, spaceships, and memorable villains seem like obvious toys in hindsight.

After the first film hit, everything changed. Famously, licensees had to scramble to meet demand for Star Wars goods after the movie became a surprise sensation. Christmas 1977 saw Kenner hawking empty boxes full of promises instead of action figures. Since then, Kenner's 3-3/4-inch scale toys, and yes, the vehicles, have become highly collectible icons of pop culture for nostalgic, well-heeled adults.

Hasbro, which acquired Kenner in the early 1990s, is now turning to the same nostalgic fanbase to fund its future Star Wars ambitions. Using a crowdfunding campaign back in March, Hasbro raised $4.5 million to build what might be the most impressive Star Wars toy ever—a molded plastic recreation of Jabba the Hutt's sail barge from Return of the Jedi.

3-D Printed Childhood Dreams

Tackling Jabba's barge (known as "The Khetanna" in the Star Wars universe) is a move few would have expected. In February, Hasbro debuted a rough, early version of the craft at the New York Toy Fair. All unpainted white plastic with 3D-printed components, the barge was nowhere near what the finished product would look like. That didn't matter—fans were flabbergasted.

"When we announced it at Toy Fair there was this audible gasp in the room … they just couldn't believe it," says Hasbro senior marketing director Kristin Hamilton. Sized to fit the traditional 3-3/4-inch tall action figures, the barge is not quite correctly scaled, but at 80 percent of the correct scale, it's still a whopper.

This 49-inch-long toy is by far the biggest Star Wars ship Hasbro has ever made. And it has a pedigree too—it's designed by veteran Kenner and Hasbro employee Mark Boudreaux.

If you ever zoomed a Star Wars ship around your house as a kid, you probably have Mark Boudreaux to thank. "Mark is one of a kind. He is the 40-year history of Star Wars toys at Kenner and Hasbro," says Steve Sansweet, chief executive at Rancho Obi-Wan, the Guinness Book-ranked museum with the largest Star Wars collection in the world.

The campaign rules were laid out: 45 days, $500 each, 5,000 backers or bust.

The attention to detail on the ship is superb. Under the removable side panels, it hides details not even seen on screen, like a cockpit with two captains' chairs, a kitchen, and a jail cell (complete with the corpse of an Ithorian). Jabba sits tall on his dais, surrounded by alien trophies. Up top, cloth sails fly in a brilliant orange-red just like in the movie.

The Kickstarter-style campaign rules were laid out: 45 days, $500 each, 5,000 backers or bust, with the countdown starting on February 17th. If the Khetanna wasn't funded within the six-week window? "We would have had a very rare single prototype," says Steve Evans, Hasbro's Star Wars development director. Hasbro branded the initiative HasLab, making it clear the company hopes to fund other, non-Star Wars toys in the future.

Unlike the crowd-designed, democratized Lego Ideas project, HasLab has one mission: to create the wildest, craziest toys fans would die for.

"[Crowdfunding] was a natural way for us to bring those dream products to life that our fans have been clamoring for," says Hasbro's Hamilton.

Sansweet, who has penned books about Hasbro's past action figure efforts, was impressed by the the ambitious first HasLab project. "I'd never conceived of anything like that. It was a way for them to do something that they ordinarily would not have dared to do because of the risks involved," he says.

youtube

The expectation for any crowdfunded product is that backers aren't just buyers—they're encouraged to participate in the process and give feedback. Despite its long reputation for secrecy, Hasbro gave backers a peek behind the curtain, and the opportunity to watch a prototype sail barge inch closer to production. "This was a partnership between us and our community. We needed them, they needed us. It was a symbiotic initiative," Hasbro's Evans told me.

Stay on Target

Even the most compelling Indiegogo or Kickstarter campaign has a lull at some point. In the case of The Khetanna, the 45-day run had one hell of a fallow period, petering out after a solid initial burst. Many, myself included, felt like this campaign might share the fate of the barge's movie counterpart—blowing up in spectacular fashion.

"If it didn't succeed, I don't know that we would have heard anything more about HasLab."

Steve Sansweet of Rancho Obi-Wan

"I kept looking every couple of days and frankly, I was sure this was not going to work," Sansweet says. "I was very pessimistic about it. It's a fairly high price, limited to North America. It looked to me like it wasn't going to make it."

That's when Hasbro upped the ante, showing off more images of The Khetanna, this time fully decked out in screen-accurate paint. The company also announced that each toy would get a limited-edition action figure, and one with significance to collectors.

"Yak Face was a background character in Jabba's Palace and on the sail barge," Sansweet says. "The figure was released in Europe, Australia, New Zealand, and even in Canada on a card with a coin. Yak Face was never released in the United States."

Hasbro's Evans waxed nostalgic about the pick. The team could have picked from dozens of other creatures, he says, "but there was something so pure and magical about Yak Face that we couldn't not do it. Yak Face was impossible to get as a kid and we carried that with us through our lives as collectors. Because we were delivering the impossible vehicle, it was a no-brainer."

With the campaign's window closing, Hasbro was still falling far short of the 5,000 backers required—and much more than just a gigantic, expensive Star Wars toy was hanging in the balance.

"About a week before, they were still, gee, 1,500 short," Sansweet says. "Frankly, this was a very important one. If it didn't succeed, I don't know that we would have heard anything more about HasLab." Fans and toy blogs helped spread the word via social media using the hashtag #BacktheBarge, but the needle barely budged.

Hasbro's Hamilton confessed the sail barge was "a nail-biter" of a project. "I think we would have all cried if it didn't make it," she says. "There was a lot of passion for this product internally."

LEARN MORE

The WIRED Guide to Star Wars

A New Hope

Like in any Star Wars story, the middle chapter is when the heroes are at their lowest point and a triumphant ending is almost inevitable. In late March, barge watchers noticed a sharp uptick in backers. "All of a sudden, the numbers started climbing dramatically. Adding hundreds in half a day." Steve Sansweet was ecstatic—it meant the two Barges he bought for the Rancho Obi-Wan collection might actually materialize. By March 30, Hasbro welcomed its 5,000th backer.

Once HasLab crossed the threshold required to make the product, thousands of additional backers quickly jumped in. "It shot past 5,000 and past 8,000. It warmed my heart and really shocked me," says Sansweet. He and 8,809 other fans were guaranteed to get toys once HasLab reached its end date of April 3.

Steve Evans expressed his relief that, like Luke Skywalker's one-in-a-million torpedo shot, backers won the day. "There was a sense of elation certainly within Hasbro and on the fan sites. It was like a perfect 45-day roller coaster ride. It was emotional!"

Hasbro plans to ship the finished product to backers in 2019, and has taken fan feedback into consideration when finalizing the design. "We introduced it to the fans earlier than we ever would normally," Evans says. "The discussion at conventions, online, and in forums informed how we're finishing off the product, purely because we were able to show it early. That's something new for us."

With one success under its belt, Hasbro is free to tap into its other beloved franchises to give fans products they otherwise couldn't. Whether it's Transformers, My Little Pony, or GI Joe, there are plenty of opportunities to come up with even crazier products. It has yet to be seen whether or not we'll get a banquet table-sized recreation of the USS Flagg or an epic die-cast Optimus Prime.

Sansweet has one dream Star Wars product he'd like to see in a future HasLab: a giant Death Star toy he once saw in prototype form.

"Hasbro asked me to bring a bunch of fellow collectors to chat about the future of Star Wars and how to move forward," he says. "This was 1995 or so. They had this modular Death Star. And of course, [when I picture it] in my mind's eye it was just an incredible piece. I can't even give you the diameter—maybe three or four feet in radius. It had different levels, and each level had scenes from a movie … we were all going, 'Oh my God! That's amazing! When are you gonna make that!?' Those of us who were there talked about that for years afterwards. If they can do the sail barge, they can do something like that too."