Sacred Shaaks – Eleven-ThirtyEight Goes Negative

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Despite all the hay I’ve made over wanting this site to be a source of positivity, I belong to the school of thought that says if you’re not making anyone angry, you’re doing something wrong. Between my natural contrarianism and a nagging aversion to treading the same ground as every other fan blog under the suns, now and then I’ll go out of my way to highlight a point of view purely because I don’t hear it very often. Even if I don’t personally agree with something, if I feel like there’s a fair point to be made that’s being denied a seat at the table due to nothing more than aggressive common consensus, I consider it our responsibility as a soapbox to expand that conversation rather than condense it.

While that philosophy has poked its head out at least a handful of times already, its most blatant expression on this site is one I haven’t really addressed overtly before—the phrase “no sacred shaaks” in our tagline up top. Totally aside from whatever my actual opinions are, nothing gets my back up more than a reasonable person being shouted down because their opinion is unpopular. One of the things I love about Star Wars is that it can be interpreted in so many different ways; nothing about it is wholly good or wholly bad, and to orthodoxically condemn or defend any one element is to reduce it by definition—but ask some fans and you’d never know it. Read More

Episode VII Marketing: What’s Taking So Long?

The San Diego Comic Convention has come and gone. An expo celebrating everything nerdy and some things that aren’t, SDCC has become an ideal location for many companies to announce projects and give one of their primary audiences a taste of things to come. Marvel, Warner Brothers, and Legendary Pictures, among others, brought bits and pieces of upcoming films to build hype and help them put butts in seats. But one major filmmaker was notably absent from the proceedings. I’m speaking of course of Lucasfilm.

I exaggerate, however, because Lucasfilm was present at SDCC. They brought the cast of their new TV show, Star Wars Rebels, along with a closed-door look at the first two episodes, to follow up the show’s heavy promotion at this year’s Star Wars Weekends at Disney World. But, while cool enough, that was not all fan were hoping for. Perhaps the most anticipated movie of the decade, the as-yet-untitled Star Wars Episode VII, had no presence at the convention at all. The cast remained on set at Pinewood Studios, the crew remained hard at work, and no one in the Executive Producers’ seats deigned to give con-goers so much as a video message. Read More

Escape Pod: Winter

winterDespite the Prequel Era being off-limits during the heyday of the Expanded Universe, a few details did sneak through here and there that served to color in the pre-Republic period we would eventually see on screen, and while most of them were intentionally vague, for every outright error, there was a lucky guess. One of the best examples of this comes in the form of Winter, a character introduced alongside Thrawn and Mara all the way back in Heir to the Empire.

Winter was a close childhood friend of Princess Leia’s while growing up on Alderaan, who had also functioned as her attendant and decoy during state (and Rebellion) business. In the parlance of the prequels? She was Leia’s handmaiden.

In addition to her convenient physical resemblance to Leia (though her natural hair color was a stark white), Winter had a photographic memory, which led to her also becoming a highly effective, and notorious, intelligence agent for the Rebellion under the code name Targeter. Many an Imperial upper-cruster would recall sharing a delightful conversation with the beautiful young Alderaanian princess at a gala or banquet or what have you, when in reality they were being picked clean of intelligence and added to the flawless holocron that was Winter’s mind—all while the real Leia was likely off getting into trouble herself somewhere else. In fact, it’s reasonable to assume that Winter’s role as “backup Leia” played no small part in the princess’ status as a Rebel agent staying under wraps for as long as it did. Read More

Marvel’s Star Wars: Initial Comment

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One of the more notable news announcements from the San Diego Comic-Con was the announcement of what Marvel would be doing with the Star Wars license. The immediate response over the next couple of days from the fans was dependent on which fans you talked to. Comic fans were intrigued by the creative teams announced, SW fans far more disappointed with the chronological placement of all stories announced. There was indeed a sense of: The EU-that-was got swept away for this?

What stands out most from Marvel’s announcement is the level of resources they are applying to SW. Canonicity or no canonicity, Marvel know Dark Horse held the license for twenty years and did a hell of a lot with it. They know a lot of stories were told, thus they have to start off big. At the same time Marvel may not have absolute freedom to act as they see fit. Certainly that would explain the apparent timidity of opting to set all their books after the first SW film, when Marvel have a sustained record of being considerably more daring and innovative. This is particularly so when you factor in that JJ Abrams, a very spoiler-averse director, is in charge of Episode VII. It may be, after his involvement with SW ends, that we see a more risky approach by Marvel but that’s eighteen months away. Read More

Phineas and Ferb Star Wars: A Reaction

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“And none of this is canon so just relax…”

Disney Channel’s Phineas and Ferb Star Wars was a delightful take on A New Hope that kids and adults can enjoy. With little in jokes like the quote above even a pretty serious Star Wars guru will be able to find enjoyment in this cartoon. In classic Disney fashion they include some fun songs like “We Love Tatooine” and “In the Empire” that also include some pretty clever references and some hilarious rhymes if you listen closely. I will admit that I have watched quite a bit of Phineas and Ferb before I saw there was going to be a Star Wars episode so it is possible that I found more enjoyment in their take on Star Wars because I know the characters involved on both sides. I can’t guarantee that if you’ve never seen an episode of Phineas and Ferb that you’ll enjoy this as much as I did but really this is worth watching for the songs alone.

The basic premise follows A New Hope by intertwining the Disney channel characters into the story. Three of the young characters are in the Empire, one is a smuggler, Agent Perry is part of the Rebellion, Phineas and Ferb play their usual selves only they are force sensitive friends of Luke Skywalker. This spread of characters allows the show to cover all aspects of A New Hope. Phineas and Ferb run into R2-D2 and the death star plans fall out of him. The two heroes then decide to embark on an adventure to get the plans back to R2-D2 and the Rebellion. Read More