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The Force Awakens

forceawakens

♥ Drew Struzan

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Film

Just one more thing

Will Yoda reappear as a force ghost? If so will he be puppet Yoda? If not, why not?

And that’s probably enough Star Wars for now.

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Design Film Technology

That lightsaber

I loved the trailer, every bit of it, even the bit I really wasn’t sure about: that lightsaber.

fa-lightsaber

The idea of a crossguard isn’t a bad one but if if one saber slides down another (something we don’t often see) it’s just going to hit the emitter and slice through handle (and now the Holocron has been Order 66-ed I imagine a cortosis-weave is out of the question). Then again, I could be wrong:

(There’s also the issue of self-harm, though presumably if you’re going with bonus blades you’re going to be competent enough not to nick yourself.)

Apparently in some quarters it’s getting called a Laser Claymore but the idea of a lightsaber as a big two-hander gets a bit weird too. The trade-off in a two-handed weapon is weight/power for speed/finesse. Surely a lightsaber weighs no more than the handle irrespective of the length of the blade? If so could you just have a really long blade and not have to worry about actual swordplay, just swing/poke from afar?

Ultimately I hope the crossguard-saber is awesome. In fact I’m almost certain I will love it within seconds of seeing it on the big screen. As a kid I drew so many lightsaber weapon variations: somewhere in a box there’s a guy I drew with freakin’ light-boomerangs which is getting into Mad Max territory.

 

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Film Words

Genre

Imagine, imagine if Disney had said: Star Wars isn’t a franchise, it’s a genre.

The legendary galaxy, a long time ago, far far away, is well understood: What’s true is what’s in the Holocron continuity database.

Open the Holocron. Show everyone what’s in it. Let it become history.

Then let anyone make movies and books that share the Star Wars world. Not like all those other franchises that argue about what’s canon and what’s not… rise above it, become a new shared set of conventions, formulas, history and myth, just like the western but for the 21st century.

So that’s what I wished would happen, but we’re getting Episode VII instead and a bunch more movies coming soon, set in a fictional universe the cultural ownership of which will be policed and its geology mined for the untold riches of merchandise, which is how our world works in 2014 so I can’t feel disappointed, and I guess that’s okay too.

interconnected.org

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Film

Droids

So the little droid in the trailer is pretty damn cute:

droid

And you can find analysis, the lego tribute, what might turn out to be the most misjudged fanart, but it turns out the best droid-related joke has nothing to do with this little fella:

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Film

Mark Hamill talks Force Awakens

This was in 1983 (I always forget that the original trilogy came out almost entirely before I was born).

I’m pretty excited for Luke in Episode 7, Mark’s certainly looking the part:

markhamill

And his voice acting work over the last I don’t know how many years has been ace so I’m really looking forward to him playing an old master jedi.