Star Wars 35th anniversary

[pendell]

Today's Wired reminds me that today is the 35th anniversary of Star Wars. It includes this piece on blaster fire (http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2012/05/star-wars-blaster-speed/), a gorgeous piece of over-analysis if I ever saw one :). Catgirls die in larger numbers than if a thousand Alderaans were blown up at once.

Other pieces of interest:

Could Han Shoot Second? (http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/05/may-the-4th-be-with-you-could-han-shoot-second/?utm_source=Contextly&utm_medium=RelatedLinks&utm_campaign=Previous)

R2D2 does flight wrong (http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/01/flying-r2-d2-you-are-doing-it-wrong/?utm_source=Contextly&utm_medium=RelatedLinks&utm_campaign=Previous)

Oh, and if someone sneers at you for loving this stuff and spending wayyy too much time on it? Ask him about HIS hobbies. Charles Krauthammer discusses his baseball addition (http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/300978/nationals-and-joy-winning-charles-krauthammer). Yes. Star Wars is childish but watching grown men play a kid's game while eating bad concession stand food is an 'appropriate hobby'. Yeah, whatever.

ETA: Okay, the 35th anniversary was 24 May, which was yesterday. Even so.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Lord Raziere]

How long do you think it will be before a bunch of people saying they hate Star Wars for various reasons start showing up?

AKA, normal Star Wars fans? :smalltongue:

I bet ten minutes, tops. Lets just acknowledge the kind of fandom we are dealing with here...

And if you post here just to try and prove me wrong, I know you are there to :P.

Edit: huh eleven minutes past my bet, I'm wrong, whatever.

[Aotrs Commander]

I still like Star Wars. (Most of Star Wars anyway. I enjoyed the prequels, at any rate, so I'm pretty mellow on it overall.

Thought I'm beginning to raise an eyebrow at the CGI show's apparent decision to bring Darth Maul back from the dead...)

[Mando Knight]

I still like Star Wars. (Most of Star Wars anyway. I enjoyed the prequels, at any rate, so I'm pretty mellow on it overall.

Thought I'm beginning to raise an eyebrow at the CGI show's apparent decision to bring Darth Maul back from the dead...)

They'd been resurrecting him in the comics since 2001 (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Star_Wars_Tales_9)...

[Aotrs Commander]

They'd been resurrecting him in the comics since 2001 (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Star_Wars_Tales_9)...

*skullpalm*

Shoulda had him cut in half vertically, not laterally, shouldn't they...?

[pendell]

Wired ran that editorial too (http://www.wired.com/underwire/2012/05/opinion-starwars/). Blah blah Jar jar binks Blah blah ruined my childhood Blah blah CGI blah blah blah. It's not like it hasn't all been said before and will probably be said again.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Gift Jeraff]

How could it have reached 35 years of age if it's been dead for the past 15 years?

[Reverent-One]

How could it have reached 35 years of age if it's been dead for the past 15 years?

*Shakes fist in Gift Jeraff's general direction*

*Realizes he doesn't know which direction that is, procedes to shake fist in all directions to cover all possibilities*

[Tanuki Tales]

They'd been resurrecting him in the comics since 2001 (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Star_Wars_Tales_9)...

That was retconned into being a dream or something if memory serves.


Rule of Thumb is though that the CGI Clone Wars is as much of an Abomination as Jar Jar Binks and should be completely disregarded as being canon in the least bit to the sensible Star Wars fan.

[Aotrs Commander]

Rule of Thumb is though that the CGI Clone Wars is as much of an Abomination as Jar Jar Binks and should be completely disregarded as being canon in the least bit to the sensible Star Wars fan.

Eh, aside from the Maul thing, it's better than 90% of the EU novels, NJO onwards especially.

[Tanuki Tales]

Eh, aside from the Maul thing, it's better than 90% of the EU novels, NJO onwards especially.

I highly disagree with that statement. The writing, voicing, plot and a good deal of the characters made just for the show were terrible. And don't even get me started on what they did to the Mandalorians or what they had planned to do to Durge..

[Mando Knight]

That was retconned into being a dream or something if memory serves.
Leland Chee (the "Keeper of the Holocron," the go-to guy for official canonicity of material) stated that the Vader vs Maul story was canon.

Rule of Thumb is though that the CGI Clone Wars is as much of an Abomination as Jar Jar Binks and should be completely disregarded as being canon in the least bit to the sensible Star Wars fan.
Really? The series is better at characterizing Anakin than the movies were. And the clones. And both sides of the war (except the B-1s, which remain high-pitched morons).

[Aotrs Commander]

I highly disagree with that statement. The writing, voicing, plot and a good deal of the characters made just for the show were terrible. And don't even get me started on what they did to the Mandalorians or what they had planned to do to Durge..

Considering that I think a large chunk of the EU novels - particularly everything NJO onwards - is not suitable for recycling as toliet paper, to be fair to the CGI cartoon, it doesn't have to try very hard to be better.

And Asokha Tano is the only Jedi aside from Mace Windu that I actually feel sad about her impending (probable/theoretical) eventual death. She's freaking awesome.

[Dienekes]

I highly disagree with that statement. The writing, voicing, plot and a good deal of the characters made just for the show were terrible. And don't even get me started on what they did to the Mandalorians or what they had planned to do to Durge..

I'll be honest, unless they changed it a lot when the first big alteration of the mando's came in the show I rather embraced it. Mostly because Mando cultre as presented in the books makes no sense and should have been wiped out of existence years ago. Conceptually that eventually a group of people would say "Hey, this getting our ass handed to us repeatedly every couple hundred years isn't working, let's try and not do that" just makes sense to me. But partially I don't like the Mando's in general because a pure military state as they present themselves really shouldn't work.

[Tanuki Tales]

Obviously our definition of good taste is highly different and I will take my leave because the discussion will not take a positive end when someone mentions Asokha. But hey, some people actually liked Jar Jar too.

[TheThan]

I am a huge star wars fan, and as a self respecting star wars fan, there are tons of things i "hate" about star wars. But I'll spare you the details.

[Closet_Skeleton]

There's a secret to enjoying the EU.

Stop Worrying and Love the Retcons.

[Giggling Ghast]

I actually thought Darth Maul's return in The Clone Wars was … well, pretty cool.

[Sotharsyl]

Eh, aside from the Maul thing, it's better than 90% of the EU novels, NJO onwards especially.

What I like about the CGI series is that it has trilogy of epsiodes (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Ghosts_of_Mortis) which are pretty clear that either the Light Side or the Dark Side growing too strong is a bad thing and that a balance is needed even if individuals who can channel both sides at the same time are ridiculously rare even by protagonists standards.

Now this goes against what George has been saying that the Light Side is the whole of the Force, the DS a corruption which needs to go and die and when the LS reigns supreme you have balance.

I prefer the CW episode, as ham fisted as it may be because George well he is the creator but what he's talking about kind of goes against the RL concept of balance and the RL concepts of sides, sides in RL are part of whole, what George was originally saying can work but he should have gone with different words then Light/Dark Side and balance then, from the very start.

The EU is rife with ideas of "balance = best of LS and best of DS" if the people who'se job it is to keep track of this constantly fall back on the RL balance it's best to just give in.

But just to be clear I'm not saying every new protagonist has to be this super Gray Jedi using Force Lightning and Force Healing at the same time, I'm saying I like the ideea that the two traditions Sith and Jedi who have both studied the Force for milenia have each a little bit of the truth in their philosophy.

Even though I would always prefer for my neighbour to be a Jedi then a Sith.

[Jayngfet]

I highly disagree with that statement. The writing, voicing, plot and a good deal of the characters made just for the show were terrible. And don't even get me started on what they did to the Mandalorians or what they had planned to do to Durge..

What they did to Mandalorians was interesting and original. The idea that MAYBE a small group of them are sick of fighting and want to stop, while another group wants to keep fighting and kill the ones that want to stop, was a good dynamic.

I mean unless you assume that somehow it covered every single mandalorian alive at the time it's not a bad set of episodes.

[hamishspence]

What I like about the CGI series is that it has trilogy of epsiodes (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Ghosts_of_Mortis) which are pretty clear that either the Light Side or the Dark Side growing too strong is a bad thing and that a balance is needed even if individuals who can channel both sides at the same time are ridiculously rare even by protagonists standards.
The Mortis arc receives heavy referencing in Fate of the Jedi: Apocalypse:
so it's not a one-off, or a dream.


I'm saying I like the idea that the two traditions Sith and Jedi who have both studied the Force for milenia have each a little bit of the truth in their philosophy.

Yup. Vergere in the New Jedi Order books Traitor and Destiny's Way was one of the better things in that series.


But just to be clear I'm not saying every new protagonist has to be this super Gray Jedi using Force Lightning and Force Healing at the same time
Kyle Katarn (and his students) were a lot like this- but the prize has to go to Revan in the novel The Old Republic: Revanwho we see basically unleashing both light and dark energies simultaneously:

p275: Revan

Instead of charging forward, he opened himself up to the Force, letting both the light and the dark side flow through him like twin rushing rivers. But instead of focusing or channelling the Force, he released it in its purest form.