#i bought my dad a new set of the trilogy and the prequel a few months ago

[alfvaen]

This will probably be partly spoilery for my May book roundup post, but whatevs.

1) Last book I read:

Honor's Knight by Rachel Bach, second book in that series, since I finished her (as Rachel Aaron) Eli Monpress series and wanted to read this series before going on to her other stuff.

2) A book I recommend:

Hellspark by Janet Kagan is a great book about linguistics, cultural differences, first contact, and sentience, with a great AI character and an alien ecosystem.

3) A book that I couldn’t put down:

It's very rare for me to start reading a book that I just bought, and the last time that happened was with The Curious Incident of The Dog In The Night-Time by Mark Haddon. Finished it in one day and lent it ton my dad, and haven't seen it since.

4) A book I’ve read twice (or more)

So many of those, it's hard to choose...so I'll just pick an easy one, like The Warrior's Apprentice by Lois McMaster Bujold.

5) A book on my TBR

According to Goodreads I've got 185 of those, so it's hard to pick...screw it, let's try random. Looks like it's Empire of Sand by Tasha Suri, one of several books I put on to try new diverse authors.

6) A book I’ve put down

I used to do this very rarely, but in recent years I've given myself permission to do it with books from new authors that I'm giving a try. Though even from before that, I did not make it through Kushiel's Dart by Jacqueline Carey. I found it alternately a little squicky and too much "things happening elsewhere that the POV character was only hearing about".

7) A book on my wish list

Not nearly as many of those these days, but I did enjoy the first book in Cecilia Dart-Thornton's Bitterbynde series, and I'm looking for the second one, The Lady of The Sorrows.

8) A favourite book from childhood

I read Watership Down a lot a lot.

9) A book you would give a friend

Tricky. It should probably be one I could find a second copy of, you know, which can be a problem these days. I guess I could maybe give away my physical copy of The Steerswoman by Rosemary Kirstein since I have all the other ones as digital...

10) The most books you own by a single author

I think the last time I checked it was probably C.J. Cherryh, since I have pretty much every book she's ever written. (Though I may not have kept some of the earliest ones.)

11) A nonfiction book you own

Tricky one, since quite frankly I've heard people talking shit about the authors of many of the books I've enjoyed (Yuval Noah Harari, Jared Diamond, Malcolm Gladwell, Steven Pinker, etc.) so I'm not sure what to say. I haven't heard anything against Ed Yong yet, though, so I guess I'll mention his I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us And A Grander View of Life.

12) what are you currently reading

One of the big thick fantasy books sitting on my TBR that I've been avoiding because of a perhaps misguided attempt to do a 100-book Goodreads challenge every year. And because I might have some sitting-around-reading time coming up this week. It's Forge of Darkness, first book of Steven Erikson's prequel Kharkanas Trilogy; it's been a few years since I finished the Malazan Book of The Fallen and I felt I needed a bit of a break, and I've also been reading the Ian Esslemont books set in the same world.

13) what are you planning on reading next?

I have a mildly systematic schedule, and the next book will be a reread...actualy, it won't really be a book, because I've been rereading the Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan Saga and the last one was A Civil Campaign, so next will be the "Winterfair Gifts" novella. (Which may help me make up some time after the Steven Erikson book, ha!)

13 books tag game, tagged by @amemoryofwot

1) Last book I read:

Starter Villain by John Scalzi, in an effort to 1) get back on my Hugo nominee completionist bullshit and 2) give him a second go, since I was deeply unimpressed by the first one a few years ago. It was...you know the thing about how badly-written books can help you learn more about writing than well-written ones? That!

2) A book I recommend:

I am metaphorically grabbing everybody I know by the collar and telling them to read Some Desperate Glory, unless the subject matter isn't for them which is fair, but it's so good.

3) A book that I couldn’t put down:

I distinctly remember finishing Gideon the Ninth at like 11pm because I couldn't wait until morning, which must be seen in the context of me being asleep by 10pm every night of my life I get a choice in the matter.

4) A book I’ve read twice (or more)

I went through a solid decade of reading Hogfather every Christmas and I've probably got a few more left in me.

5) A book on my TBR

I've got Mary Beard's latest book, Emperor of Rome, on reserve at the library.

6) A book I’ve put down

Tried The Bone Shard Daughter by Andrea Stewart last year because it was blurbed well and I was in a fantasy mood, and got like...twenty pages in. It didn't leave enough of an impression for me to remember exactly why, just a general 'I don't care about these characters' vibe.

7) A book on my wish list

Kate Elliott is being very kind about progress updates in her newsletter and I want her to have the time she needs...but I am also chewing at the bit for Lady Chaos.

8) A favourite book from childhood

I was SO into Redwall as a kid. First fanfic I ever wrote.

9) A book you would give a friend

This is hard because I always want to rec specific books to specific people, I sincerely believe there's no generic book which is good for everybody. Um, maybe All Systems Red since Murderbot seems to resonate with a wide audience?

10) The most books you own by a single author

(Physical books only) An ACTUAL single author? Anne McCaffrey for sure. An alleged single author? I own 36 Trixie Belden Mysteries books.

11) A nonfiction book you own

Storm over Mono, which is a really interesting account of the fight to save Lake Mono in California, a scientifically interesting and historically and ecologically unique place.

12) what are you currently reading

Technically between books but I'm about to start The Imposition of Unnecessary Obstacles by Malka Older. I liked the first one fine but it didn't grab me grab me, so we'll see how it goes.

13) what are you planning on reading next?

My mostly-science book club is going retro and reading Surely You're Joking, Mr Feynman which I have been putting off because I have Heard Things about Richard Feynman...but also I gotta gird my loins and get onto it.

I have not been around Tumblr enough lately to think of who to tag but with 100% sincerity, if you see this and it starts the wheels turning in your head about books you've read lately and so on, you're it!

[bookwyrminspiration]

Kotlc could be considered Lord of the Rings fanfiction if you’re willing to stretch what the definition of fanfiction is far enough. I just think it’s funny (and kind of cool) that Messenger saw Lord of the Rings, said “I want to write about that one species.” and then proceeded to write nine books about it. That takes dedication. (I know there’s more to Kotlc’s elves than the elves in Lord of the Rings, I’m just referencing how it began.)

that would definitely be a very stretched out definition, as in all the interviews Shannon has done she's said that the Tolkein elves were very very early inspiration for her own elves. I think she mostly wanted the like...vibe? Like the poise and the elegance. Not the other aspects of them. Then again I have not read the whole LOTR series. I read The Hobbit and got like 1/3rd of the way into fellowship and my brain said No.

But you are very right! They were initial inspiration! She somehow took this species from this one series and put her own very glittery twist on them and went "you can make a career outta this" and then did. Given how much time I've dedicated to kotlc you could even argue that you could make a religion out of this /ref.

And! She's not just writing nine books about it! So far she's published nine, but there are two more that are undoubtedly going to be very thick. Imma do some internet searching real quick hang on. The first book was around 100k words, the second around 120k, third 125k, fourth was 135k, fifth 139k, sixth is 164k, seventh has conflicting numbers, eighth at least 200k. My point is that the number of words has been consistently increasing as Shannon goes, so there could very well be over 400,000 words still left unpublished in just the last two books. Like she went all out on that. It isn't some short 11 book series, it is a chonky 11 book series.

(also looking up the word counts has made me realize that the wings au is longer than nearly every book in the series. So. I guess this is good practice for when I write my own book?)

I don't know where I'm going with this but honestly what is writing if not finding a very specific thing and turning it into and entire personality. Like she put everything into these elves based very very loosely around lotr elves and somehow build an entire world so kudos to her for that one.

What are all those quotes about art being like recycling or something? How originality doesn't exist but it's the presentation and creativity to make the same thing interesting despite not being that makes it art and makes it worthwhile? It might be the "good artists borrow, great artists steal" one but I do not remember which specifically had the vibes.

Is all art not just fanfiction of each other? does keeper being lotr fanfiction mean that I am...writing lotr fanfiction fanfiction?

[neoduskcomics]

What Star Wars Means To Me

I was twelve years old when I saw Star Wars end. I was sitting between my dad and my brother at a screening of Revenge of the Sith, a movie that my prepubescent mind had convinced itself was the greatest thing it’d ever seen.

The movie’s climactic battle had come to an end, and as I watched the final scenes play out, I could feel the film’s looming departure steadily but surely setting in. In the movie’s last moments, Owen and Beru looked out into the binary sunset, cradling their new baby nephew, with John Williams’ score emotionally building toward the final credits, and a hollow emptiness began to overwhelm me. Episode III was coming to a close, and with it, so too would end the saga of Star Wars. Something that had brought so much happiness, so much excitement, so much magic into my life was now ending before my eyes. Everyone knew that there wouldn’t be another prequel or sequel or anything else. This was it—these final frames all-too-quickly spinning past the projector. In just a few seconds, it seemed that Star Wars would be gone forever.

As I left the theater with my brother and my dad, they started up a discussion about what we had just watched, but I was too emotionally drained to join in. It was hard for me to come to grips with the fact that the Star Wars movies were really done with. Sure, Star Wars itself would still go on in some form. The Clone Wars cartoon was enjoyable. And they started making those cool-looking Force Unleashed games, too. Plus, there were the comics and the books and all sorts of other stories being made.

But it just wasn’t the same. You could write a thousand books, make a thousand TV shows and develop a thousand video games filling in whatever nooks and crannies the films overlooked in the Star Wars canon, but they would never, ever be a substitution for sitting in that theatre and seeing the quiet fade-in of the words “A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away...”

When the movies left, it was like a bit of magic had left the world, too. And between the ages of seven and thirteen, that magic inspired me. It made me read and create and imagine more than any time I spent at school ever did. Whenever a new movie came out, I fantasized about what the next one might be like. And when the movies ended, I fantasized about what a whole new Star Wars trilogy might be about. Maybe it would follow Luke creating a new Jedi Order, or maybe it would take place thousands of years before the prequels and show us the origins of the Jedi and the Sith. I hoped and dreamed and wondered, but I knew how unlikely it all was. Lucas would never make another movie, let alone give Star Wars to someone else so that they could go on to make an Episode VII. And so, Star Wars, as much as I continued to love it, slowly faded from my life. There was no use crying over spilt blue milk. Star Wars was done, and it wasn’t coming back.

And then I heard that Disney bought Star Wars and that they were going to make an Episode VII.

At this point, I’d like you to recall the scene at the end of Ratatouille where the evil food critic Ego takes a bite of Remy’s titular cuisine, and then suddenly he’s transported back in time to a moment in his childhood when he could still feel the warm embrace of love and happiness, and the cold, melancholic ice that once encased his withered heart melts away in a matter of seconds, restoring life and wonder to his old, bony body. Do you remember that scene? Because that is exactly what I felt like when I heard this news.

And I am not hyperbolizing here; I was literally shouting with jubilance when I heard that there would be an Episode VII. I can scarcely recall another moment in my life when I felt that level of genuine, startling happiness. It was like throughout all those years of Star Wars’ absence, all those years of resignation, a repressed excitement for the franchise was building up within me, never surfacing, never finding the right opportunity to ignite, but steadily rising and rising in pressure. And then, on that day, at that moment, upon hearing those words, all of that pent-up excitement just exploded out of me like a volcanic eruption. I didn’t know who was making this supposed Episode VII or what it would be about or when it was happening or even if it would be any good. None of that mattered. Star Wars was back, and I was going to celebrate like the Empire had just fallen.

Flash forward to the holiday season a couple years later, and even the non-geeks could see that the franchise had been reawakened in full force (get it, awakened, force, see what I did there). Star Wars logos, T-shirts, cups, toasters, mugs, toys, Lego sets and waffle irons filled the stores and display windows. Star Wars really, truly was back. What a fucking exciting time it was. I couldn’t help but just let all that giddiness get to me. There was magic in the air, and it wasn’t the magic of Christmas, but rather the magic of mystical techno samurai flying across solar systems to murder each other with glow sticks. Holy shit. Star Wars was back. STAR WARS WAS BACK. The hype was real, and it was everywhere.

But with that hype came an extreme and sustained spike of nervousness and skepticism. Criticisms of every new bit of information spread like fire throughout the interwebs. Did you see that weird new lightsaber? Is that another Death Star? Doesn’t that character just look like a rip-off of this other character?

After all, people loved Star Wars, and they couldn’t stop themselves from asking if this revival would live up to their expectations. Would The Force Awakens be a worthy successor to the franchise—a true return to form after decades of waiting for a real sequel to Jedi? Or would this simply be another prequel trilogy to dash the fans’ expectations and burn everything they loved about the series to the ground, buoyed only by the parallel stories of fans and creators determined to make sure Star Wars lived on? Lucas had failed us for the last time. People needed something GOOD.

The Force Awakens destroyed at the box office. Unadjusted for inflation, it became the highest-grossing film ever to hit American theaters, and the third highest-grossing film ever to hit the world. It was released to critical acclaim and massive audience approval. Abrams had done it. He had made a new Star Wars movie that both he and the fans could be proud of. All that hype was justified. All that waiting paid off. Star Wars wasn’t just back, it was good again. Great, even.

But as people celebrated Episode VII’s monetary and critical triumph, and as memes and excited chatter spread across the web, a notably large group of people simply did not feel that The Force Awakens met the standards they had set for it. To the point that they began to convince others that it was actually a bad, perhaps the worst ever, Star Wars movie.

And I’ll be honest—even I wasn’t sure how to feel about The Force Awakens when I first saw it. There was so much pressure on it to be good, and I was spending so much of the film’s runtime questioning whether or not I liked it, that I don’t think I was really, genuinely experiencing it. The movie felt like such a self-contradiction. It was so weirdly, at times even jarringly similar to the Original Trilogy, and at other times it was so strangely and uncomfortably different from it. The Resistance? That’s just the Rebellion. Starkiller Base? That’s just the Death Star. Kylo Ren? He’s not as threatening as Vader. Rey? She’s not as relatable as Luke. Part of me thought it was great, but another part of me felt terribly, soul-wearingly conflicted. I had to search my feelings about this film long and hard before I would be ready to draw a final conclusion about how it fit into the series.

It wasn’t until I saw it again a week later—when the crushing weight of all that pressure and anxiety and anticipation had time to dissolve—that I felt as though I was truly watching the movie for the first time. I was relaxed, passive, and ready to be entertained. I already knew what the movie was. I already knew what was going to happen. There was no more nervously waiting and watching to see what would become of my beloved franchise, what new things they were introducing to it, what old things they were keeping, and whether any of it was any good. I could just sit back and accept the film for what it was. And this time, I absolutely adored it.

The Force Awakens is in no way a perfect movie—far, far from it. But it was a miraculous work of Star Wars storytelling that won over both audiences and critics with its skillful direction, clever writing, compelling characters, great sense of humor and warm spirit.

Yes, TFA was closely and purposefully tailored to the original movies, but it was so, so much more than just another adventure film about a desert-inhabiting youth taking off to explore the galaxy and blow up giant space stations. It was a tale of friendship, hardship, humanity, and facing your darkest fears. It was about Rey struggling to look beyond the unknown terrors that lied before her—to confront her destiny and take up the lightsaber so that she could protect her new family. It was about Finn embracing his own humanity and working up the resolve to fight that which he spent the whole movie trying desperately to get away from. It was about Han reaching the culmination of his character’s growth from self-absorbed, smarmy money-grubber who ran from danger to a damaged and guilt-ridden father who renders himself both physically and emotionally vulnerable in order to save his son’s very soul.

Every relationship feels meaningful. Every dramatic revelation feels earned. Every joke hits. Every effect is dazzling and eighty percent of the time completely practical, which is why this movie will look far better in ten years than the prequels do now.

Poe and Finn are two of the most likeable characters to ever grace Star Wars cinema, and it’s no wonder that everyone wants them to be a couple when they had such an amazingly fun first date. Kylo Ren freezes a fucking blaster bolt in mid-fucking-air with the goddamn Force. BB-8’s thumbs up made every audience I saw the movie with burst into laughter. Poe blows up, like, fifteen TIE fighters in a row, followed by Finn shouting “That’s one hell of a pilot!” not even knowing at this point in the movie that Poe is still alive. The scene where Rey touches Luke’s lightsaber and is thrust into an acid trip of Force visions is both terrifying and mesmerizing. The two guards steadily backing away from Kylo Ren’s temper tantrum is adorable and hysterical. That moment when an emotionally distressed Kylo Ren struggles to pull Luke’s lightsaber from the snow, only to see it zoom past him and be dramatically caught by Rey as John Williams’ iconic score begins to build is fucking fantastic. And Han’s final confrontation with his son is so horrifically tense, and so well-executed and fitting as a conclusion to Han’s story that the internet, as liable as it was to do so, miraculously did not explode with blinding rage when it found out that Abrams had killed off one of the series’ most beloved characters.

Is there reason to be skeptical about the direction of the franchise? Yes. Is Disney perpetrating some worrisome behavior with their successive hiring and subsequent firing of every prospective director they get ahold of? Yes. Will Star Wars just become another MCU where we get two to three new movies every year and they all kind of begin to just meld together without any sense of consequence or meaningful continuity between installments? Maybe.

But I just can’t bring myself to think about that sort of thing right now. And maybe it’s not even really useful to think about it like that at all. Because regardless of what I or anyone reading this thinks, all that stuff is basically out of our hands. Maybe Star Wars will become stale and burned out after a few years of sequels and spinoffs. Or maybe, after establishing their new claim to the franchise with a few safe movies, the company will start to be more willing to experiment with new styles, stories and characters. I mean, with that completely new trilogy on the horizon, it does appear to be where this ship is headed.

But, who knows. Speculation is all we have. And all I can really say for absolute certain right now is that, for the moment, I have Star Wars in my life again, and I’m going to cherish it for as long as I can. Because I spent ten years in a world without Star Wars, and I have a lot of love left in me to give the franchise before I burn out, as a lot of other people seem to have already unfortunately done. I’d rather not go into the future of this series revival already prepared to hate the new Han Solo movie or Rian Johnson’s new trilogy or whatever else might come our way.

Because at the end of the day, despite the way many fans and even some past creators have treated it, Star Wars, pure and simple, is about joy. And when we live in a world that’s so filled with dread, fear, corruption, terror, hatred and downright tragedy, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to just let yourself give into something like Star Wars. I don’t mean to say we should just unconditionally love everything with the Lucasfilm logo on it, but maybe just recognize that sometimes it’s more valuable to be open and understanding and willing to love something than it is to be skeptical, critical, nitpicking and pessimistic, especially with something that is so widely adored and cherished the world over.

Maybe people won’t like The Last Jedi. Maybe they won’t like the Han Solo movie, either. Or maybe they’ll love them. But Star Wars isn’t any individual film. It’s a part of our culture, a symbol of the human spirit’s fascination with adventure, mysticism and the battle between good and evil. It means a billion different things to a billion different people and spans generations.

My dad once told me that when he used to take my brother and I to the toy store—years ahead of The Phantom Menace being unveiled—he was shocked to see that Star Wars toys still lined the shelves when a new movie hadn’t been made in well over a decade. But that’s what Star Wars is. It might have peaks and valleys, and there might be times when it feels like it’s all but left us, but in reality, it never really ends. It’s an invaluable part of human history whose effects will be felt for generations to come, and right now, it’s thriving in a way that nobody has seen in years.

We owe it not just to the franchise but to ourselves to enjoy every moment of it. Because Star Wars is the very embodiment of love, joy, hope, humor and adventure. Because Star Wars is a reminder that sometimes it’s okay to just let yourself be a kid again. Because while everything can be going wrong in the real world, Star Wars will always see to it that the light triumphs over the dark. Because while life is tragically short and full of hardship, Star Wars is forever.

[jayne-hecate-writer]

My Star Wars DVDs...

Hello there my Darlings, I have asked you here today so that we can discuss something that is rather close to my heart, so much so, that rather than just write this blog as I think it up, like I usually do, I have actually researched this one. Now before we get going, I will assume that you have all seen Star Wars...

Oh fuck yeah! I am going to talk about Star Wars and so now all of you nerds reading this are no doubt are sharpening your Wolverine claws, in readiness to tear me a new one for mixing up the basic facts. If that were not bad enough, you purists are then going to bite my head off for coming out and saying proudly that Jar Jar Binks was really not that bad and I actually quite liked him! Go on hate me.

If you are still reading this, then be warned, what I am about to discuss may contain spoilers, particularly if you have not seen all of the Star Wars content available.

However, before we get there; this blog is not me trying to work out the story of episodes eight or nine, nor is it me looking for hidden meanings in the stories. Instead, this piece is about my love of Star Wars, my personal journey both with and within the franchise and how I discovered some surprising things about myself and the world, as I explored the Star Wars universe.

My first real memory of Star Wars was seeing The Empire Strikes Back, upon its release, when I was probably no more than eight or nine, which would have been around 1982. The memory is hazy and to make matters more interesting, I saw the film in a British Army cinema while living in Germany, so it is anyone's guess how long after official release that was. Upon release of this movie, I can recall utterly falling in love with the Empire and in particular the AT-AT walker. The nerds among you will now be wondering if I call these great beasts at-ats or Aye Tee Aye Tees. This is by itself a complex question and one that I believe both Dave Filoni and Pablo Hidalgo have given ambiguous answers too, so I can hardly give an opinion, can I?

With the release of Return of the Jedi; I was again in a foreign country and I did not see this movie until it was shown on television! This is almost a blasphemy, but in my defence in lived in a country that was not English speaking and I do not know if the army cinema was still going at that point.  

My Dad did of course show us all of the movies when they came out on VHS, but these were rentals rather than bought movies when back in the days of our youth, we rented the movies that we wanted to see, rather than collected vast sets of tapes, like we do now with DVD.

The next step for me came when I met another Star Wars fan and we house shared for a few years. At least once a month, we would go through the movies, starting with good old VHS and then moving into DVD when they became more common. My friend at the time also introduced me to the idea of collecting real movie props and well made replica props. Genuine prop blasters used in the Star Wars films were made from real guns, modified with added on parts. I seem to recall that the Storm Troopers used blasters modelled on the Stirling SMG, a gun I recognised because my Father was issued one while in the Army. My friend had a plastic replica toy, full sized and painted white with a bright orange tip. I was super impressed by this gun, even more so because it had Star Wars printed on the side in the the iconic logo font. These days I would be less impressed by such a toy, but this is only because I am now familiar with the replica props made by many You Tube users, that look screen ready.

In 1999 I got my first really good job on an activity centre in North Wales, working as a climbing instructor. On my first day on the job, I stood in my very first staff meeting and in front of a group of about twenty people, none of whom I knew, I laid my nerd credentials on the table for all to see. In my strong and determined voice, I informed my new team that I very much needed a day off in the middle of the summer season to go and see the new Star Wars movie: Episode One - The Phantom Menace. There was a lot of laughter from my new colleagues, but their laughter quickly faded until the summer and the movie came up in conversation once again, on the day it was released. My manager had forgotten that he had agreed, months in advance, for me to have the day off to see the movie; until I reminded him of his decision of course.

There was a lot of concerned faces and then a few happy grins as our conversation was remembered. My manager and I then set out in the company Land Rover, with half of the other instructors along for the ride to the cinema in Bangor just to see a brand new Star Wars film. The prequels came out over the next few years, but that first film remains strong in my mind for the memories it brings. Especially as a few days after seeing it for the first time, the Boss and I escaped again to watch the movie for the

second time. Yes, I know that many of you disliked this movie, but I enjoyed it and I actually thought that little Jake Lloyd was rather cute as Anakin.

After the release of Revenge of the Sith; things on the Star Wars front went quiet for a while. True, there was the Clone Wars cartoon, but the very first season of this was a stylised set of war movie shorts that never really gave us the strong characters whom we knew and loved. Later revamped seasons used a different style of animation that was more story oriented; but I am still trying to gel with the seasons as they are. Sadly and according to the Lead Star Wars Story Group writer, Dave Filoni, the Clone Wars came to an end before he was able to finish the story.

With the Sale of the Star Wars franchise to Disney, things looked bleak. A close friend of mine messaged me via Facebook to inform me that just like him and all of his favourite super heroes; Disney now owned my soul. At the time I felt like it was a sad day indeed. How wrong I was. George Lucas appointed Kathleen Kennedy to head of Lucas Film as he retired and she took the franchise to a whole new level.

Most recently Rogue One came out and for the first time in my adult life, I found myself sat with my girlfriend at a midnight showing, on the opening night of a movie so powerful, I spent most of the final act weeping. As the titles rolled at the end, the audience as one mind stood and they clapped a furious applause. As I wrote at the time, it felt as if I had found my people. 

Which now leads me to this time, when as I write this, I have The Force Awakens playing on Blu-Ray, having worked my way through the whole fucking set set. Some time ago, I discovered within the forums of Star Wars fans that there is a suggested play list for all of the movies. Now obviously, our Great Holy Father Lucas says that we should watch them in numerical order. But if we do this, it leads us to some uncomfortable moments in the story, moments that Star Wars fans like Seth Green used to great effect in his TV show Robot Chicken.

We start with Episode One - The Phantom Menace

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMG2PQ7oIr0

Second comes Episode two - Attack of the Clones.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DFOE0td1Yw

Third is Episode three - Revenge of the Sith.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7FMh3YtK_w

That is the official prequels in all of their slightly hammy goodness and I love them. They do however lead us as intended into the original trilogy.

The fourth movie is Episode Four - A New Hope.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cizlx6ODhuE

Fifth comes Episode Five - The Empire Strikes Back

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VMMVrYly73k

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpE_xMRiCLE

Sixth in the list is Episode six - Return of the Jedi.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvfp5l7kgo4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qAKXK_aLeA

That is the original child pleasing trilogy with all of the goofiness of stone age technology teddy bears bringing down the vast industrial complex of the empire with just logs on ropes.

Up next is the newest trilogy, only one of which has so far been released.

The seventh movie is Episode Seven - The Force Awakens.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FaOSCASqLsE

Later this year comes Episode eight - The Last Jedi.

In 2019 we can expect Episode nine – which is as yet still untitled.

Before you even start to think it, I am not here to theorise along lines of

what these movies are going to be about or how the death of our Princess Carrie Fisher will affect them. What I will add though is the thought that the other films and TV shows in the saga have to fit into this story line somehow, but where and when? If we insert them into the time line, we can put The Clone Wars after episode two and then rebels after episode three. At the end of rebels we can insert Rogue one and somewhere in here will be the new Han Solo movie, due out in summer 2018 (forty one years after Han Solo first hit the big screen). When asked if we should watch them in this order, it seems that official opinion is that the main films are in order with the other films and shows can be put in around them, pretty much when you fancy. But this does not work for me, I want see the progression of our characters. I want to see the story arc played fully.

This brings us onto the now famous Ernst Rister order, named after the man who developed it. His playlist puts them in a strange order so that the big reveals can be kept. After all, what good is it learning that Anakin and Padme had children, when the big reveal of episode five is that Luke is Vader's son? So with that in mind, his order goes as follows.

Episodes four and five in order. Flash back to episodes one, two and three in order. We then finish up with Episodes six, seven, eight and nine. Again the other films and shows can be watched when you like without upsetting the basic story too much.

For all of you baby Anakin haters, there is also the Machete Order. A dirty playlist which removes episode one all together, but still puts the rest roughly in the Ernst Rister order. The big difficulty with this dirty playlist is that when you watch the Clone Wars series and then Rebels, some of the plot makes no sense, especially if you are a fan of Maul in those later stories. Seeing the terribly sad closing of Maul's storyline in Series three of Rebels did once again move me to tears. Not bad for what is in effect a kids cartoon show. Don't judge me too harshly though, Father Lucas does get a little freaked out by us hardened Star Wars fans and he does remind us all from time to time that he did make them mainly as kids movies!

Now with the release of the breath taking Rogue One and the fabulous Rebels, I wanted to put them into the time line and the viewing schedule. Oh yeah, did I not say that I was a bit of a Star Wars nerd? Given that I own most of these on DVD now and with my being physically rather broken thanks to illness, I have the means to try to sit down and watch these things  

in one go. I have since discovered much to my consternation that it is no longer possible to do all of Star Wars in a single day. Using an adaptation to the Ernst Rister method, I fitted Rogue one, Rebels and The Clone Wars into the set too and this was the watch order that I experimented with, along with my darling partner and it led to some serious discussion between us over whether it worked.

Jayney's viewing order.

Rebels season 1 - 3.

Rogue One.

Episode Four.

Episode Five.

Episode One.

Episode Two.

The Clone Wars Season 1 - 6.

Episode Three.

Episode Six.

Episode Seven.

I will add episodes eight and nine along with the Han Solo movie to this list as soon as they are released.

So what have I missed out? Well to start with there is the infamous Christmas Special... That horror is available on You Tube (I am not linking to it, if you want to look for it, that is up to you) and I have watched it. Well some of it, well I had to and I can confirm that it is nasty! I can see what Father George has disowned it!

I have also missed out the Ewok Movies. After all, in their day the Ewoks were considered to be as popular as Jar Jar became in the prequels. I have also missed out the animated series Droids, mainly because I don't think that it is considered cannon any more. According to my research it is available on DVD, but some of the less scrupulous cartoon networks on line also have it available. Now that you know this, be warned. If you want to show this series to your kids, the on line experience is likely to expose you and your kids to the sort of hardcore porn that is frankly frightening. This is after all how these unlicensed websites pay for their bandwidth. I have also not included the new animated series of short individual stories, called Forces of Destiny. This because at the time of writing, they are not officially  

out yet out.

My biggest omission by far though is the written word, those stories of the expanded universe (known in Star Wars circles as the EU, probably the only EU half of Britain will allow discussion of!) of star wars, books that introduced us to fabulous characters such as Grand Admiral Thrawn, who later became a central part of Rebels. There are so many books, comics and shorts here, that it is all but impossible to fit them all in, let alone read them all in one lifetime. Unfortunately, The Star Wars Story Group have also stated that many of the original books are no longer considered cannon. They no longer fit into the Star Wars Universe, removed like a bad cutting in a row of vibrant plants.

Finally, I have also ignored the impossible viewing experience of the Time Machine Order, which takes the movies back to how they were when Jedi came out and before father George fiddled with them. My reason for this is simple. Face it people, that time has passed. From now on, Solo shoots second, Young Anakin appears as a Force Ghost in Return and Vader when revealed beneath his helmet, will always have lost his eye brows. So my fellow fans, wipe your tears away and move on. It is not the 1980s any more! More importantly, when I checked my old VHS editions of the original trilogy, it is the widescreen revamped version from the early 2000s. Bugger!

So you may ask, what was like like watching Star Wars in such a complicated and comprehensive way? Did it fulfil my viewing needs? Was the great reveal still a resounding shock? Did it work?

Well, ahhhh… No.

Now I can maybe see the point of viewing them like this if you have never seen them before. As a story teller myself, I can see the benefit in the mechanism of the flashback, I really can, but for me, it made the whole story too much of a mess. Flitting about in the time line made it a pain to follow. It also put some of the more boring elements of the saga right in the middle of the story. Namely following the terrifying end of Empire, where we witness the power of Luke’s failure on Bespin, we dived straight into a low grade trade dispute and encountered the jelly brained Jar Jar Binks. The lesson here is this, do as the Holy Father says, watch them in order.

Now on the subject of Jar Jar, I must say that I was genuinely taken by the theory that he was a secret Sith Lord. The evidence was there for Jar Jar turning out to be on the Dark Side, but it appears that the story was changed following criticism of the character by fans. The only person who knows the truth of what the Holy Father wanted to do with Jar Jar is the Holy Father himself and Lucas has been less than keen to discuss it as fully as I (and many others) would like. Instead, several members of discussion forums and even You Tube have dissected the theory, examined the evidence and stated their conclusions. Maybe Dark Jar Jar would have been an interesting way to go, but when you look at what we have in the story arc, it is Jar Jar who creates the special laws that put Palpatine in place. What bigger hint towards his fall into the darkness is there than that? I like to think of Jar Jar afterwards, once the Jedi are all but gone, with him sat alone in his world of empty rapidly fading power, lamenting on the choices he made. It is so sad and it was this type of thinking that gave me a new sympathy for him as a character.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rHyf0FBvt4

Meanwhile another development has occurred in the franchise that also appeals to me and it is something that comes up time and time again. If Anakin was destined to bring balance to the force, how was he to do it if he had to pick a side? By choosing between the light and the dark; he created an imbalance that Luke carried on into episode seven. Maybe this is why the Jedi order collapsed around him and why Ben Solo became Kylo Ren and followed Snoke? Maybe this is what is meant by Luke in the trailer for the new film when he says that the Jedi must end? Sadly I am not going to explore that line of thought. When the new film comes out this winter, I do not want to have spoiled it for myself by concentrating on theories and trying to work out the story. Instead, I prefer to wait and find out. Only then can I discuss it.

However, there is another area for clues that we can discuss and that lies within the story of Kanan Jarrus, in series three of Rebels. After he is blinded during his duel with Maul, Kanan escapes from the Sith temple with the help of Ezra and they take the Sith and Jedi holocrons to the new Rebel Base. It is here that Kanan sits in combined self pity and misery until, that is, until he encounters the fabulously interesting being called The Bendu. The Bendu is neither a creature of the light nor of the dark, but rather something else. He states that he is of the Grey. Thus The Bendu is

balanced in the force, he sees both the light and the dark, the Ashla and the Bogan and I would love to see the story take this arc. This is clearly preferable over the moralistically easier writing of “good over comes evil and everyone lives happily ever after”. As a plot device this vagueness is far more interesting. This is especially so when given that The Bendu is barely understood by Kanan or Esra and is capable of so much more than either Vader on the Sith side and Kanan on the Jedi.

When you look at Rogue One, there are again these moments of grey, acts of good carried out by the Empire and acts of evil carried out the Rebels. Neither Jyn Erso or Cassian Andor have led lives free of the dark side, Cassian pretty much admits as much towards the final act of the film as they prepare to take the Imperial transport. The result is that this film is darker, grittier and more believable. As we see Cassian and Jyn give up everything that they are to make the universe safer, maybe they have moved more into the light? But in doing so, they have walked through an awful lot of dark to get there. It is for this reason that I think that the stories should be viewed in Time line order

Maybe when Yoda states that there is another, when talking to Obi-Wan as he fears for the loss of Luke in episode five, he is referring to Kanan training Ezra? Providing of course that the Rebels of Lothal survive the final season of Rebels as it leads into Rogue one.

Of course, The Bendu is not the only Force wielding being not to follow so blindly the doctrine of the Jedi or the Sith. There is also Ahsoka Tano, Anakin’s former apprentice from the Clone Wars. She leaves the Jedi order and yet still wields the force and a pair of white sabres. Her loss in the Sith Temple was another moment that brought me to tears as I watched Rebels. The same Rebels that appear in Rogue One, with the Ghost appearing in several scenes, Chopper rolling through one scene and a PA call for Hera. Could they make it any more obvious that the Rebels end up in the world of Episode Four?  This is why the Ernst Rister Order does not work for me, it leaves out far too much important detail.

Well there you go. This must be one of the longest posts I have written and it has taken me days of research, days of watching Star Wars and hours of thought to compile my argument. Was it worth it? The answer to that is obvious. I was watching Star Wars, of course it was worth it.

[esandcasg]

Star Wars – The Force Awakens revisited – A Big A Review

It’s on Netflix. I’d just finished a Cost Benefit Analysis (my first proper one at work) and thought I’d whack this on and put down my thoughts, especially given recent (and less recent) discussions about The Last Jedi.

Speaking of which, another prompt for this was that in our post-viewing debrief of the Star Wars sequel, my brother said to me ‘Come on, if Han Solo hadn’t have died it would have been a good film’. My bias towards Harrison Ford is well known; so was my general view of TFA clouded by the smuggler’s death?

It should be said at this point I’ve not seen the film from start to finish since I saw it at the cinema, making it the only Star Wars film (well, TLJ is the same actually) that I’ve only seen once. I watched the prequels a number of times – though I think with less frequency as the trilogy progressed – and have obviously seen the original trilogy ad infinitum.

Anyway – let’s not digress too much before we’ve even got to the bones of the piece. I’m intended this to be a general commentary on the film itself before diverging into a general mulling over the direction of the newer Star Wars films in general.

TFA starts with a focus on new characters – Poe, Finn and Rey. There are a few others dotted about – Lor Van Sekka (I have undoubtedly got that name wrong, but the character played by the bad guy from Minority Report), BB8 and, of course, Kylo Ren, Hux and Cappy Phasma. The feel of the film is immediately Star Wars. There’s an earnestness about Poe that tonally fits and I actually like the brutality of the Stormtroopers here; it harks back to A New Hope, when Obi Wan and Luke come across the slaughtered Jawas. Stormtroopers developed into figures of fun throughout the Original Trilogy and this sort of had them back as actually nasty pieces of work.

That said, this idea of brutality is undermined by two First Order figures – Hux and Phasma. Kylo Ren is supposed to be this vaguely immature, hot-headed bad guy. He has moments of rage and uncontrolled reactions to things, but he’s not supposed to be in charge. Unfortunately, both Hux and Phasma seemed to be being portrayed almost tongue in cheek. Hux is pulling ‘I’m a bad guy’ faces throughout, and Phasma’s voice is too much like someone who has spent their entire career in rep, giving overblown performances, and are suddenly given a spot on TV and are unable to play it down. Look at the Imperial officers in the Original Trilogy. There’s one sneery guy who gets throttled by Vader in A New Hope, but the rest of them – Tarkin and Piett particularly – are just fairly normal, cold, straightforward people. They are almost business-like in their manner, whereas Hux and Phasma are almost cartoony (both would be worse in TLJ). I wonder whether casting familiar-ish names in both roles made that likelier.

So you’ve got, in the First Order, a childish main bad guy (necessarily so) and two cartoony sub-villains. There’s a problem right off the bat. And that only gets compounded when we meet…

Rey.

I have a problem both with the characterization of Rey and the performance. Let’s start with the performance. It’s too on the nose. It’s not helped by all the exposition she has to do (more on this anon) but there’s something sort of stilted about the way the lines are delivered. It’s almost too earnest (despite my comment about this earlier on). It’s… it’s the sort of performance I would give; too affected, lacking subtlety unless she has people to bounce off. Ridley is good in later scenes when she has to be upset but the sort of earlier, day to day stuff seems pretty bad – it’s the same when she’s being enthusiastic with Han Solo on the way to Maz’s place.

The characterization doesn’t help. Rey is both wistfully looking for a way out (seeing the ship leaving Jakku) and yet determined to stay. She’s both self-reliant and desperate to be liked. And yet the performance isn’t conflicted AT ALL to start off with.

Anyway. So I have an issue with the first order, and Rey is a little jarring. But otherwise I think the story works and I’m enjoying it. I enjoy it even more when Han Solo and Chewbacca come in.

I remember watching Six Days, Seven Nights with my older brother at the cinema and there’s a scene where Ford’s character, Quinn, is drunk at a bar. My brother leant his head close to mine at this point and said “He’s acting now”. He didn’t mean it as an insult or a compliment but as a comment. A couple of years later I read an interview with Ford where he bemoaned the lack of opportunity he’s had in some respect in terms of the roles he’s offered. Referencing The Mosquito Coast (which is a great film, and he gives a great performance in it) which performing poorly at the box office, Ford said something to the effect that as soon as he tries something outside the parameters of his usual Ordinary Guy put in Extraordinary Situation role, people say “He’s acting now”. As my brother had.

I suspect that given the type of roles Ford has enjoyed success in, there’s been an element of maybe not considering him that good an actor. We could argue this point back and forth, but I think one of the reasons this manifests is he has – undeniably – screen presence. There is a complete ease at being on camera, being on a film set, that I don’t think is that natural anymore for a lot of actors. Actors from an older generation had it – Streep, Julia Roberts, Tom Cruise, Clint Eastwood, Jack Nicholson – but maybe younger actors don’t in the same respect. Perhaps that’s because back in the day you used to go and see a film because a certain actor was in it. I’m not so sure that’s the case anymore.

Anyway, my point in all of this was that there’s a sense of ease in the way Han Solo and Chewbacca come into the film. The familiarity helps (you’ve seen these characters loads before) and the relationship between the two helps as well.

Unfortunately, the arrival of Solo and Chewbacca triggers two things which will eventually begin to make the film less enjoyable.

The first is exposition. All the dialogue starts being weighed down by it. What happened to Luke. What happened to Kylo Ren. What happened between Han and Leia. What happened to R2D2. On and on and on. It doesn’t really let up. And it makes the dialogue a lot more boring. The exchanges between Han and Leia are particularly bad in this respect. Same for the exchange between Han and Kylo Ren. It’s all just exposition.

I understand the need for explaining some things but Abrams and Larry Kasdan should have had more faith in people sticking with the films because they’re Star Wars. You didn’t need to explain that Kylo Ren was Han and Leia’s son until the last confrontation. You don’t need to have both Han and Leia talk about what happened to Kylo Ren on a number of different occasions.

The second bad thing is fanboyism. The maguffin of the film is Luke, so there’s a certain amount of wistfulness baked in, but as soon as Han comes in, everything becomes about worshipping the original trilogy. Rey and Finn are amazed to meet Han. Kylo Ren is a Vader fan boy. They compare the planet to the Death Star. Everyone wants to find Luke.

The film starts on its own two feet but seems to become less and less secure of itself and more and more reverential to the past as time goes on. Why? There’s really no need. You are going to have a certain amount of Star Wars fans regardless. You don’t need to constantly revere the past. In fact it’s more interesting not too, I would argue. This may seem an odd reference, but I like how Ghostbusters 2 starts, with Ray and Winston as children’s entertainers. How in a fictional world heroes can be forgotten as the world moves on (in that case, New York). I think that’s partly why I liked TFA to start off with. You’ve got Luke, Han and Leia who have, to some extent all fallen on hard times, and a world that has sort of moved on.

Except it hasn’t, really, because of the fact that everything still revolves around the three of them, and becomes more about them as the film goes on.

That then brings me to the ending of the film. There are some glaring errors here; Han’s death, the tone of the subsequent remainder of the film and the appearance of Luke.

Let’s start with Han’s death. It’s pointless, and here’s why. The only reason that Han should die at that point is either to save his friends or to allow Kylo Ren to become something else.

Does his death save his friends? No. At that point there’s something of a bond beginning between Rey/Finn and Han but not worth talking about. But Kylo Ren isn’t getting in their way. Han could plant the bombs and leave quite happily but is compelled to confront his son, presumably because a) he’s his Dad and hasn’t written him off and b) Leia told him to. Neither are about saving his mates.

So then we’re down to character development for Kylo Ren. The obvious thing is that the patricide allows Ren to choose the dark side. Except there are a couple of problems here. Firstly, where’s the conflict? It’s not as if up until this point he’s been struggling with the choice between the two. There is one real point where this is referenced and that’s the bit where he’s talking to Vader’s mask. There’s nothing else in the film that shows his struggle. There’s stuff that shows he’s immature or incompetent but nothing to say he’s struggling between the light and the dark

So suddenly there’s a need as far as the writers go to make him choose the dark side?  

Fine, so let’s go with that. Except that there’s no difference in his character in The Last Jedi! None! He’s still a whiney, impulsive, slightly incompetent bad guy. So you’ve gained nothing and have lost a character that a) all the fans loved and b) could have actually bought more time for the new characters to establish themselves without the films having to live or die based on who they are.

Ren should have had a scene early on in TFA that shows he is still struggling. His first appearance needs to show his struggle, when he kills that guy. Maybe afterwards you see him take off the mask and look down at the lightsaber in disgust? Something that says this guy isn’t quite dark side yet. The problem is that the writers wanted him to be a bad guy from the off, to be scary from the off. And then almost reverse-engineer this struggle.

Ok, to point no. 2. The tone of the rest of the film.

Han’s death should have been an opportunity for Rey/Finn and, especially, Chewie to lose it. To absolutely lose it. Rey sort of does but sort of doesn’t, and it’s hinted at in her fight with Ren but that should have shown her almost being pulled to the dark side in her rage, and she should have been prevented from killing him by something else. Maybe that earthquake. I know that sort of happens anyway, but there’s no real rage in her performance. There’s no real sense that she would have killed him if she could. Then there’s the obvious Chewie/Leia non-hug, and how there almost seems to have been no impact on anyone that Han had died. And you have Rey going to see Luke, Luke not saying anything, R2D2 and Chewie not leaving the falcon – all this has been done to death. The tone is confused. They’ve blown up the new death star – good. But Han died in the process – bad. I know Obi Wan Kenobi dies in A New Hope but there’s a crucial difference, or a crucial set of differences. 1) He does so knowingly. 2) His voice appears later on so he’s still there. 3) Luke et al get a chance to get revenge. Han’s death, however, mars any achievement of blowing up the death star. It makes it unfulfilling as an achievement. For me, anyway.

And then Luke at the end. For a film to gradually get more and more about one character, to build up this character’s appearance, to have him do and say nothing is a really, really crappy payoff. There’s way too big a build up for nothing to happen. And the ending isn’t even interesting, because we know she’s going to see Luke. We know it’s going to happen. What would have been more interesting is that when they landed they say the broken X Wing, Rey and Chewie and R2D2 go up to the temple except it’s been destroyed. It’s in ruins. And then from out of the shadows comes a darkly-dressed Luke who pulls the lightsaber from Rey’s hand and ignites it. End film.

It starts really well, as a Star Wars film. The universe is true to what has come beforehand and I like the ruined nature of the place. The war was over but it took a toll on the world, and the peace allowed the first order to rise. That’s all cool. And say Luke has disappeared, and Han has fucked off somewhere, and Leia is holding it together. And have the new characters basically have to reunite them in some way, that shows the new characters to be taking the lead. And then gradually have the old dudes fade into the background as the films go on. I think that could be a plausible way of developing a new franchise.

Unfortunately they seem to have flipped between extremes – JJ Abrams almost too in love with the past. Rian Johnson then feeling that it needs to be jettisoned (along with most Star Wars traits). And so we’re left with Abrams again to try and tie up what has become a mess. There’s no single vision (for better or worse) and no real momentum going from one film to the next.

I’ll still watch the next one, as I’ve watched them all so far, but my appetite is diminishing to the point I’m questioning how much I liked Star Wars in the first instance.