star wars

Chris Knight's avatar

If Disney was really smart, they would hire this guy to make a bunch of traditional-animated films like this!

There was a shorter version that Paul Johnson released a few years ago, but this is the full-fledged vision: Star Wars: TIE Fighter.  And it is breathtaking.  I dare say that I speak for a lot of fans out there when I say that this… THIS… is what we want to see.  And see more of.

Here it is:



For all the wonder of CGI-animation, the traditional 2D style has more… I dunno… “character”? “Emotion”? How about “heart”? And that’s what this video has in spades. This is as much of a Star Wars story as the live-action films, in my opinion. And it’s one that I would gladly pay to see more of at the box office....

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Chris Knight's avatar

Today shall be a day long remembered…

Courtesy of the amazing folks at GOG.com (the GOG stands for Good Old Games), what are by far two of the greatest computer/video games ever wrought by mortal hands have gone on sale today, ready to be enjoyed by a new generation or by those who have longed to reminisce about those heady days of the early Nineties.

Stick it to the Empire in
X-Wing…

And I would be saying that even if they weren’t Star Wars titles!

X-Wing was an astounding and revolutionary game in its own right and when it came out early in 1993 it took the industry by storm.  With a brilliant combination of 3D graphics, rich user interface, an immersive storyline and balanced yet incredibly challenging gameplay, X-Wing was the Star Wars experience that everyone wanted but few thought we would ever get.  This ...

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I had heard only insanely good things about Star Wars Rebels: the latest animated series taking place in that galaxy far, far away.  It’s also the first real Star Wars production since Disney took over the franchise.  And additionally, it’s the first installment of Star Wars since the new canon policy was announced earlier this past spring.  The gist of that being: anything that Disney does with Star Wars from now on is canonical so far as the lore goes.

Tonight was the premiere episode, an hour-long special titled “Spark of Rebellion”.

What did I think of it?

Star Wars Rebels is already the most fun, the most unadulterated, the most mature, and purest Star Wars experience that I’ve enjoyed in a very, very, very long time.

 I can’t think of a single thing that I didn’t like about this.  Where the prequels failed, Star Wars Rebels is already ...

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Chris Knight's avatar

I still don’t know what I’m supposed to be writing lately.

But I feel like I need to post something more than the running train of my current consciousness.  All that’s missing are exotic pharmaceuticals like what Hunter S. Thompson used with his own.

So for what it’s worth, here is what might be the very first “spy” photo from the filming of Star Wars Episode VII, somewhere in the desert of Abu Dhabi…

Speculation is that it’s anything from part of a moisture farm, to the foot of an AT-AT walker.  Maybe the Jawas scavenged Imperial hardware in the decades following the Empire’s defeat?

The new Star Wars movie begins primary filming next month....

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Chris Knight's avatar

To quote Yogi Berra…

“I’ll believe it when I believe it.”
I’ll wager an RC Cola and a Moon Pie that Star Wars Episode VII gets delayed to around May 25th, 2016.  Ain’t no proper Star Wars movie been released outside of late May, and I’ve confidence that larger forces at work will compel Disney to keep to the tradition… whether it wants to or not.
(‘Course, the very first Star Wars movie was originally slated for a Christmas 1976 release until it got pushed back, so Disney isn’t completely without a leg to stand on here.) 
...
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Chris Knight's avatar

News breaking now out of Star Wars Celebration Europe that John Williams will be returning to the galaxy far, far away and composing the score for Star Wars Episode VII.

John Williams.  Because when you get the band back together,
you positively can NOT do it without this guy.

In a pre-recorded video for the folks attending Celebration Europe, Williams said that he was “looking forward to drawing on some of his original themes and adding new material”, according to IGN’s report.

New Star Wars music composed by the master himself.  “This will be a day long remembered…”

Thanks to good friend of this blog Drew McOmber for the heads-up!...

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Lord only knows how legit this is. Whether it is or not, it’s both uproariously funny and downright creepy.  From Craigslist…

I don’t think that’s how they did it for The Empire Strikes Back.  Can’t this guy find a geek to set him up with some circuit boards and servos instead?

Anyway, thanks to Erik Yaple for another twisted find!...

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Chris Knight's avatar

Right now, somewhere as you read this, pre-production is well underway for Star Wars Episode VII.  The script is being written and re-written, conceptual artists are creating new visions of a galaxy far far away, and there is already a casting call for major roles in the next movie.  Barely eight months ago we could have never imagined a new Star Wars trilogy would be happening (in fact, I still find myself hardly believing it).  And now under Disney’s management, we are being promised not just a new trilogy (perhaps even two) but a Star Wars movie every year from 2015 until the end of time.

And therein rests a problem which hopefully is being discussed somewhere at the Mouse House and at Lucasfilm:

With all of these new Star Wars movies… how are they going to be titled?  And what does it mean for the Star Wars films ...

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This past Friday evening saw musical parody genius, pop culture icon and now bestselling author “Weird Al” Yankovic come to Quail Ridge Books & Music in Raleigh, North Carolina as part of his seven-city book-signing tour promoting his just-released children’s tome My New Teacher and Me!…

"Weird Al" Yankovic, Al Yankovic, My New Teacher and Me!, Quail Ridge Books, Raleigh, North Carolina, signing

My New Teacher and Me! is the follow-up to Weird Al’s acclaimed 2011 children’s book When I Grow Up (available as a standard book and as a newfangled iOS app for your iPad!).

I arrived at the store about three hours before the signing (incidentally, Quail Ridge Books is a really nice independent bookstore: I’m gonna make it a habit of swinging by there any time I’m in the Raleigh area) and bought a few copies to get signed.  I wound up reading My New Teacher and Me! in the interim and found it to be a delightful and well-crafted (and funny...

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Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, iPad, iOS, Apple, BioWare, Aspyr MediaWhen I first heard about it this morning, it was only from a report and there had been no announced availability but my first reaction was already “SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY!!”

Guess who just spent ten bucks on the App Store?

BioWare’s Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, deemed by many to be the greatest Star Wars video/computer game ever and one of THE best games of all time period, has been ported to the iPad and is on sale now!  Ten years after it was first released, Aspyr Media has taken this much-beloved classic and put the whole experience in the palm of your hands, to enjoy wherever you happen to be.  It requires at least an iPad 2 to run and it needs iOS 6.  As well as some hefty space for the install (1.9 gigs free but I’m hearing at least 2.5 ...

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