"Apology Accepted, Captain Needa."

It was announced today that veteran British actor Michael Culver passed away on February 27th at the age of 85, ending a career of over 50 years of stage, television and motion picture performances - the best known of which was perhaps his brief 1980 appearance in The Empire Strikes Back as an apologetic Imperial Captain.  Thank you for your service, Mr. Culver.

- Sid

Disney 2024: Kuqqa Kulaa?

My previous posting told a slight lie. I did in fact purchase another souvenir item during our time at Disneyland - I finally succumbed to temptation and invested in the Black Spire outpost version of a Coke.  Hmmm...I wonder how much it costs Disney to have the Coca-Cola Company manufacture a custom product which is presumably only for sale at two refreshment carts on opposite sides of the United States?

- Sid

Disney 2024: "I am no Jedi."

No light sabers this trip, no helmets (although I noticed that there was now an alternate version of the X-Wing pilot's helmet that I purchased on our last Disneyland visit for sale) - my only souvenir shopping was the impulse buy of an Ahsoka t-shirt from a vendor located in one of the underpass tunnels that lead to Galaxy's Edge. 

I hate to say it, but after watching the Ahsoka series on Disney+ that provided the graphics for the t-shirt, I found myself siding with Team Ashley regarding the casting for the titular character.  

No offense to Rosario Dawson's performance, but after you've painted someone orange, stencilled marks on their face, and covered their hair with montrals and striped lekku*, their voice suddenly becomes a strong point in the character's presentation. In this case, Ashley Eckstein's extended run as Ahsoka's voice in the Clone Wars and Star Wars: Rebels series would have cemented the connection in the character's transition to live action, much as with Mark Hamill and Kevin Conroy's move from the animated Batman series to video games.  

And who knows, she might not have been so grim all the time - I know that Ahsoka's history weighs her down, but I also think of the adult version of the character in Rebels as having achieved some emotional balance, although perhaps through the Force rather than weekly counselling sessions.

- Sid

* In case you'd been wondering what the horns and fleshy head-tails were called.  (Never forget, in the Star Wars Universe, EVERYTHING has a name.)  

Disney 2024: Games Without Frontiers.

As you get older, it's harder to really play, or at least play publicly in the way that children do. A lot of that desire gets sublimated into activities with a sort of grown-up veneer of acceptability: cosplay, paintball, tabletop and video gaming, D&D, LARPing, and all the other loopholes that allow us to say "let's pretend" as adults.

For a lot of people, Disneyland is that urge to play writ large, and for me, Galaxy's Edge is the perfect venue to fully experience that. It's a testament to the detail and consistency that Disney's creative people have put into this little alien outpost so that, when I'm there, I feel like I'm actually on another planet, even when surrounded by people in mouse ears and sweat pants. 

Part of me wants to explore Galaxy's Edge all on my own, because it would leave me free to enjoy it as if I were part of that world, to quote Ariel. As it is, Karli sometimes worries that I’m not having fun when I'm there, whereas the joke is that I couldn't be enjoying myself more.  However, being a dangerous rebel who could be in a life-or-death confrontation with storm troopers at any moment tends to make me look a bit grim - after all, we're not playing around here, this is serious stuff.

Smuggler's Run is another good example.  I tolerate the lines and waiting and so on in order to get to where I want to be, but when I sit down at the controls of the Millennium Falcon, I'm not having a simulated experience, I'm flying a starship. As such, when the controls prompt me to perform an action such as take off, go to hyperspace, or steer the ship through an asteroid field, I do it with a certitude, confidence, and gravitas that's appropriate to what I'm doing.

And, hopefully, with a certain degree of style - after all, even if you're just playing at being the Falcon's pilot, you're still playing in the big leagues.

- Sid

P.S. Welcome to the future - the boots and background alien heads in the above photo were created by the Photoshop AI. However, the AI won't accept certain prompts, so I had to do the gun belt and weapon the old-fashioned way.

Disney 2024: Ridin' dirty.

 

Maybe not the perfect ride for a rainy day on Batuu (or in Anaheim), but I like it.

- Sid

Disney 2024: Silver Lining.

For Karli's 50th birthday this year, she decided that there was no place she would rather go than Disneyland. Planning was simple - Karli has become a seasoned veteran in terms of Disney visits - and we invited Karli's best friend John and her sister Stefanie to join us.  John had never been to Disneyland, so he was eager to take advantage of our collective experience to introduce him to the park.

We had all been checking the forecasts for the weather during our upcoming visit, but it was only when I took a look at CNN the day before we left that I discovered that California was currently in the midst of the most serious storm that it had experienced for quite a long time. Record-breaking rains closed airports and caused flooding and mudslides, there had been four fatalities, and a state of emergency had been declared in Los Angeles and seven of the surrounded counties.  Even more ominously, Disneyland had experienced closures due to the emergency.  Obviously not an ideal time for travel, but it was too late to cancel, so we decided to carry on and hope for the best. 

Surprisingly, we experienced no delays as a result of the chaotic weather conditions.  Our flight left on time and landed without any problems, our Uber seamlessly delivered us to our Disney-adjacent hotel, and Disneyland was scheduled to be open over the course of our three-day passes (although rain was on the forecast for the first day and part of the second day).

Fortunately, Karli had the foresight to purchase rain ponchos for the group just in case, which turned out to be the ideal garment for the weather.

As forecast, rain was definitely the theme for our first day at the park - not quite torrential, but certainly a steady solid downpour.

The result?  Limited attendance at the park, and far shorter lines than the norm. 

We all got a bit wet - even the best rain gear will only keep you so dry over the course of a full day - and we obviously couldn't go on any outdoor rides, but we were generally comfortable, and the lack of crowds allowed us to visit favourite rides like Smuggler's Run and Indian Jones multiple times.

It was one of those rare occasions when clouds actually had a silver lining.

- Sid

Anangong Miigaading.

Obi-Wan: Anakin, Chancellor Palpatine is evil!
Anakin Skywalker: From my point of view, the Jedi are evil!

Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith

Lucasfilm has announced that they have come to an agreement with the Dakota Ojibway Tribal Council and the University of Manitoba to release a dubbed Ojibway version of A New Hope, the original Star Wars movie. (If you happen to be a fluent speaker of Ojibway and have theatrical ambitions, now is your chance: you can apply at http://starwarsojibwe.com/)

The producers chose Ojibway because it is one of the most widely spoken indigenous languages, with approximately 320,000 speakers in North America.  The Ojibway version of the film will see theatrical release across Canada, and will eventually be broadcast on Canada's Aboriginal Peoples Television Network.

It's interesting to imagine an indigenous re-write of the entire series, with the Empire recast in the model of a colonial power that has undertaken a program of ruthless conquest across the galaxy. In this version, Anakin Skywalker becomes a Lost Generation child, swept up in the equivalent of the 60s Scoop and stripped of his aboriginal identity.  His romance with Amidala then becomes a double secret, not just due to the strictures of the Jedi code but because of prejudice and discrimination against his indigenous background.

But where do the Jedi fit in this retelling of the story?  It's an easy out to have the Sith stand in for the Catholic Church, but a stark examination of the prequel trilogy makes it just as easy for the Jedi to be guilty of the same sins - let's face it, Qui-Gon Jinn essentially takes Anakin away from his mother and drops him into residential school at the Jedi Temple.  

With the narrative changed to an indigenous perspective, Anakin turns out to be correct when he tells Obi-Wan that the Jedi are evil, and his conversations with the Supreme Chancellor about similarities between the Sith and the Jedi gain a new resonance. The good news is that in the aboriginal retelling, Anakin is no longer guilty of killing the younglings that he encounters at the Jedi Temple - instead, he rescues them.  And after that, it's a whole new story...

- Sid

May the 4th: A Star Wars Trilogy, Episode 2.

The Phantom Menace.

We were recently heading out to Steveston with Karli's sister Stefanie on a covert fish and chips run, and the topic of COVID-19 vaccinations came up.  During the conversation, Stefanie mentioned her concerns about getting sick from being vaccinated.

It's an understandable concern, but misplaced in this case.  In the case of traditional vaccines, they do work by injecting a small piece of the target virus, called an antigen, into your body.  Your immune system recognizes that it's been infected, albeit in a minor fashion, and produces virus-specific antibodies that give you resistance in case you're exposed to the full version of the virus.  

RNA based vaccines, like the Pfizer product that I've recently received, provide the body with instructions on how to build the antigens, so that the immune system can prepare T-cell and antibody responses all on its own that provide resistance without being infected.

Extremely simplifying something that I'd seen on the XKCD webcomic,  I offered the following by way of explanation:

 "No, it's more like the injection gives your body the plans to the Death Star."

A short silence ensued.

Karli, sensing the problem, said, "It's from Star Wars - you know, the big globe thing."

"Well, maybe if it was more of a pop culture reference."

Another short silence ensued.

I cautiously said, "Ummm...Star Wars isn't pop culture?"

"Well, okay, maybe if it was more of a family drama."

"It's literally nine movies about one family," said Karli. 

More silence - and by the time we'd arrived at Steveston, by unspoken mutual agreement we'd moved on to less sensitive topics. 

Regardless of the relatability of the simile, it pleases my science fiction fan heart to imagine tiny little X-wings preparing to do battle with the evil coronavirus - perhaps even a little Luke Skywalker, and the tiny voice of a miniature Obi-Wan Force ghost directing him to turn off his targeting computer and trust his feelings.  And when the pandemic's finally all over, I think that we will all definitely deserve a medal from a princess.

- Sid

 

The Star Wars.

Until the recent GREAT REBELLION, the JEDI BENDU were the most feared warriors in the universe. For one hundred thousand years, generations of JEDI perfected their art as the personal bodyguards of the emperor. They were the chief architects of the invincible IMPERIAL SPACE FORCE which expanded the EMPIRE across the galaxy, from the celestial equator to the farthest reaches of the GREAT RIFT.

Now these legendary warriors are all but extinct. One by one they have been hunted down and destroyed as enemies of the NEW EMPIRE by a ferocious and sinister rival warrior sect, THE KNIGHTS OF SITH.

Scrolling introduction to The Star Wars, 1974

To celebrate this year’s May the Fourth and Revenge of the Fifth, I took a look at the original script for The Star Wars, an early 1974 draft by George Lucas for what would eventually turn into A New Hope.  This is also the script that concept artist Ralph McQuarrie read before creating the classic paintings that helped Lucas sell the movie to Twentieth Century Fox.

The Star Wars has the same broad canvas as A New Hope: a struggle against an evil Galactic Empire whose gigantic space fortress provides them with overwhelming tactical power. A rebel princess, an aged warrior-mystic and a young apprentice save the day with the help of two comic-relief robots and someone named Han. But it’s not as similar as it sounds…

In the 1974 script, Kane Starkiller, a Jedi-Bendu master who is more machine than man, is father to “ruggedly handsome” 18-year old Annikin and his 10-year old brother Deak.  After raiding Sith Knights kill Deak in a savage attack, Kane and Annikin leave their home on the fourth moon of Utapau, which fans will recognize as the name of the rocky planet where Obi-Wan duels General Grievous in Revenge of the Sith, and travel to the independent Aquilae system, ruled by King Kayos and Queen Breha.  They have three children: two sons, 7-year old Biggs and 5-year old Windom, and a daughter – Leia, the eldest at 14 (which finally explains why she’s a princess in A New Hope – her father was originally a king.)

Once on Aquilae, Kane and Annikin meet with another Jedi-Bendu, the elderly but powerful General Luke Skywalker, who leads the Aquilaean Starforce.  Kane reveals that he is dying and leaves his remaining son to become a Padawan Learner to Skywalker - we don't hear the term padawan in the movies until the first prequel.

Meanwhile, the New Empire plans its final assault on Aquilae, under the control of the grim General Darth Vader and spearheaded by the Empire’s masked Sith Knights, led by Valorum, the First Knight of the Sith.

Aquilae receives advanced warning of the imminent attack from Clieg Whitsun, their agent on Alderaan, the capital of the New Empire, which allows Aquilaean Starfighters to launch an attack on the space fortress.  During the chaos of the battle, a pair of panicked Imperial construction robots, See Threepio and Artwo Detwo, abandon ship in a lifepod and crashland in the planet's desert wastelands, only to be picked up by Annikin as he returns to the capital after forcefully collecting Princess Leia from her classes at the Academy.

King Kayos is killed in the assault, and his senate surrenders to the New Empire. General Skywalker kills the craven council member responsible for the surrender, and Queen Breha abdicates in favour of Leia – Lucas later revives the idea of a 14 year old planetary leader with Queen Amidala in The Phantom Menace.  

Luke, Annikin and Clieg smuggle the new queen and her brothers off the planet with the assistance of rebel agent Han Solo, an Ureallian who is described as “a huge green skinned monster with no nose and gills”. 

Kane Starkiller sacrifices himself by taking the power source from his cybernetic body to power one of the stasis packs used to conceal the two boys, and after a brief tribute to the old Jedi Bendu, they board a Baltarian freighter headed off-planet.

Unfortunately, the freighter is a trap.  The fugitives are split up and captured by Valorum, who threatens to use gas to subdue the Jedi, a strategy reused by the Trade Federation against Qui-Gon Jinn and Obi-Wan Kenobi at the beginning of The Phantom Menace.  Skywalker and Solo escape from their guards, free their companions, and make their escape with the assistance of the two robots.

They steal an Imperial ship and flee the spaceport, pursued by hunter-destroyer spaceships. As they prepare to fight off the Imperial fighters from twin lazer cannon turrets, Annikin confesses to Whitsun that he has fallen in love with Leia, who loves him in return. (A wise move by Lucas to change this up - it's cute when a 9-year-old Anakin falls in love with 14-year-old Padme in The Phantom Menace, it's a bit creepy when he's 18.)

Overmatched by the hunter-destroyers, Skywalker takes the ship into an asteroid belt* in a desperate attempt to lose their pursuers. The Imperial ships turn back, but the asteroids destroy the hijacked vessel, and its passengers board the lifepods as the badly damaged ship goes into orbit around nearby Yavin, one of the Forbidden Planets - forbidden by whom or why never seems to come up.  Clieg and Leia's pod refuses to eject, so Clieg bravely remains on the ship and manually jettisons the pod, only to die in the explosion that follows.

The three escape pods land safely on the jungle-covered surface, but Leia is captured by deformed aliens who are hunting and trapping the primitive Wookees** who inhabit the planet.

Annikin attempts to rescue the princess, but after killing most of the trappers he's knocked unconscious by explosive lazer fire as the survivors flee.  Chewbacca, one of the native Wookees who has been accidentally set lose by Annikin during the fight, frees his companions, one of whom picks up Annikin, and they vanish into the jungle. 

Annikin recovers at the Wookee villages, and after proving himself to the Wookees in ritual combat, he heads off into the jungle with R2, followed by Chewbacca.

Meanwhile, Skywalker, Solo and the two boys have found a scientific outpost occupied by a pair of helpful anthropologists, Owen Lars and his wife Beru, who reappear as Luke's adoptive uncle and aunt in the films.

The general and Solo go to scout the nearby Imperial base, leaving 3P0 to watch over the two princes.  They encounter Annikin at the site of the struggle with the trappers, and follow their trail to the base, which is under siege by the Wookees, who have been unable to overcome the Empire's more advanced technology.

While they plan their strategy, an Imperial squad discovers the two children and 3P0 at the outpost and takes them into custody.

Led by Skywalker and Solo, the Wookees successfully defeat the Imperials using a variety of primitive boobytraps and deadfalls (as repeated by Ewoks in The Return of the Jedi).  Once inside the base, they learn that Leia has been taken back to Aquilae.

Skywalker and Starkiller study plans of the Empire's space fortress from R2's construction database - the first and only time it's referred to as the "death star" in the script - and Annikin disguises himself as an Imperial pilot and leaves with R2 in a daring attempt to rescue the princess, as the general and Solo begin training the Wookees to fly the Imperial starfighters.

The Imperial squad returns to the base with Biggs, Windy and 3P0, where they are ambushed by the Wookees and the captives freed.

As Annikin lands on the space fortress, Vader is torturing Leia before placing her in detention. R2 locates her cell in the Imperial database, but the two are separated and Annikin is captured.  Valorum, the Prince of the Sith, who has somehow been demoted to a regular stormtrooper (perhaps due to the earlier escape?), turns his back on the Empire and helps Annikin to escape. They rescue Leia from her guards, and the trio is forced to escape through a garbage chute.  Vader attempts to crush them using the trash compactor, but they escape after the power is cut off by damage from the attacking Wookee pilots. They reunite with R2 and once again take to the escape pods.

The Wookee space fighter assault is successful, and General Vader dies in the cataclysmic destruction of the space fortress as Annikin and Leia kiss in their lifepod.

 
In the final scene, Queen Leia, "in all of her grandeur" and in front of a crowded throne room, gives Chewbacca a medal, upgrades the robots - no, really -  and declares Annikin the Lord Protector of Aquilae as Skywalker, Solo and Valorum look on approvingly from the sidelines.

Credits roll.

The good news is that Lucas was able to step back and take a second look at the story, resulting in a much tighter script for A New Hope: more dramatic, fewer main characters, a simplified plot revolving around the Death Star plans, and a lot fewer escape pods.

It's interesting to look at how the characters go back into the blender in order to return as the principals of the final version.  General Luke Skywalker is reborn as Obi-Wan Kenobi, and his name goes to the adopted farm boy who replaces Annikin Starkiller as the hero of the story.

Lazerswords, used by soldiers on both sides in The Star Wars, become light sabers, a more evocative name for a more elegant weapon that's used solely by the Jedi and the Sith, and the force of others, a meaningless bit of dialogue in the script, becomes the Force, the energy that holds the universe together.

Leia wisely becomes a more mature princess with serious attitude, Darth Vader gains a mask and membership in the Sith, and Jedi-hunter Prince Valorum of the Sith One Hundred vanishes, only to have his name reused for the Supreme Chancellor of the Galactic Republic in the prequel trilogy.  Han Solo goes from being green and gilled to human and hot, thereby creating the potential for a new romantic storyline, and Chewbacca retains his status as pilot - well, copilot, but still.

The Imperial City of the New Empire, located on the gaseous planet Alderaan and perched on a long spire that descends into the clouds, reappears as Cloud City, the tibanna gas mining city administrated by Lando Calrissian in The Empire Strikes Back.  The "death star" space fortress gets some capital letters to officially become the Death Star, and the Starkiller family is commemorated by Starkiller Base, the First Order planetkiller from The Force Awakens.

Speaking of the First Order, there's even a casual reference to a First Order trooper in The Star Wars, without any explanation of what the First Order might be.

I couldn't find any evidence as to whether or not the writers of the final trilogy derived the name of the Empire's successor from that one line. It's not impossible - Lucas was a creative consultant on the final trilogy, and apparently shared his rough scripts for the three movies. Based on the number of things that were recycled from The Star Wars, he may have suggested the name of the First Order, but my god, if that’s where it came from, what a small thread from which to weave such a large tapestry!

The bad news is that even after such an epic rewrite, the dialogue is still a problem. One of the key elements in science fiction story telling is the creation of a distinctive vocabulary and nomenclature that helps to establish the world in the story takes place, and although you can see what Lucas is trying to do, it just never quite rings true.

In the words of Jedi Bendu General Skywalker, may the force of others be with you.

- Sid

* The odds of successfully navigating an asteroid field are not discussed first.

** That's not a typo, Chewbacca was a Wookee before he was a Wookiee.

But if you really feel that you have to, I'll be polite about it.

I realize that the holiday season is upon us, and that clothing can be a popular fallback as a gift choice, but I'll be honest, no one needs to knit me a Star Wars sweater.

- Sid

How can I describe it?

My family didn't have much money when I was a kid, and as a result we didn't do a lot of the things that most families did. We never went anywhere on vacation (in fact, I don't recall my father ever taking a week off), I wore a lot of hand-me-down clothing from my three older brothers, and so forth. We lived about 23 miles from the nearest real town, and that, combined with our lack of spare cash, meant that going to the movies certainly wasn't on the list of family activities. 

However, time went on, and as I got older, went into high school and got a part time job, the combination of a little extra money and the guaranteed ride into town on the school bus meant that a slightly larger world opened up to me. However, not having had access to a lot of the finer things in life as a child left me a little cautious, if not nervous, about taking advantage of some of the new options available to me. 

When I was 15, I decided that I would take the proverbial bull by the horns and go to a movie, the very first movie that I would ever see on a big screen. We did have a battered old TV at home, and our makeshift antenna allowed us to get two TV stations, so I had seen movies, albeit marred by poor reception and static, but never at the theatre. As luck would have it, that summer there was a lot of buzz about this new science fiction film that was being released - unhampered by worries of spoilers I had already purchased the novelization and was eager to see the real thing. 

Because it was the summer, the option of using the school bus to cover that 23 mile gap wasn't available, but even at the age of fifteen I was a fairly accomplished hitchhiker. (I figured out once that I hitchhiked something over 20,000 miles altogether before I gave it up, including a trip from Ontario to British Columbia.) So I hitched into town, had a banquet burger at Rombo's, and made my way to the theatre. Paid my money (I have no memory of what the movie cost) but didn't get popcorn, you have to go into these things one step at a time. Found a seat, and waited. 

The lights went down... ...and another new world opened up, as a desperate little spacecraft fled across the screen in a hail of laser bolts, followed by a gigantic pursuer - what seemed like miles of its underside ponderously filling the view. 

It is impossible to describe what it was like to see Star Wars that very first time. I have no idea what other people thought of it, people who had the experience cushioned by years of moviegoing - for me, it was as if the entire movie had been made expressly for my 15-year old science-fiction fan wishes, like some benevolent genie had chosen that moment to fulfill a need that I didn't even know existed. It was an epiphany of teenage experience, and I left that theatre feeling like a different person. 

In the thirty years since, a lot has changed: my view of the world is a little less limited, and to a certain extent I've become jaded by repeated exposure to the media's visions of the future. My honest opinion is that as George Lucas has made his way through the series, each movie has been a little worse than the one before. 

I stand in awe of the breadth of the vision behind the entire story, but it's not a perfect vision - much has been written about the flaws in the various Star Wars movies that I won't bother repeating here.  Star Wars is now an entire industry of action figures, toys, movies, games, TV shows, comics, novels and web sites, far removed from the beginnings of the phenomenon. 

And all that means nothing to that memory from thirty years ago. Nothing will ever change the magic of that first viewing in the dark of the Parkview Cinema, that first view of a galaxy far, far away. Thank you, Mr. Lucas - nothing else has ever been better.

- Sid