The Star Wars Conundrum
Jan. 7th, 2016 11:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shannon_aLast night we were playing Between Two Cities, a game where seating order is very important. It thus has cards that let you randomize seating order. I drew one which read "Alphabetical by the Last Movie You Saw". I immediately knew this was problematic and said, "Everyone raise your hand who saw Star Wars last". I think 4 of the 7 had.
I chose a different card to determine seating order (number of letters in your first + last names, one that almost always puts me last in the seating order because shannon + appelcline = 17, something I came to bitterly realize when I was signing those 200+ Designers & Dragons late in 2014).
And that's a lesson in exactly how much a cultural phenomenon the new Star Wars is.
Kimberly and I saw The Force Awakens the Sunday after Christmas as our yearly Christmas movie. Star Wars was probably my first SF franchise, because (I think) I saw it when it first came out, at the age of 5 or so. It was definitely my first comic book (Star Wars #1, but one of the bagged reprints, not the high-valued original). But over time it's never been my top SF franchise. That's definitely Doctor Who, with Star Trek (especially Deep Space 9) coming in #2. And there are a few others that I'm a definite fan of, like Blake's 7 and Babylon 5. Put a number in a SF show title and I'm there.
But I quite liked Star Wars 7. It was fun, it was exciting, and there was some point in the movement that sent nostalgic chills through me. (I can't remember the scene any more, but I teared up, and it had little to do with the current movie.)
[This part could be construed as a very general spoiler.] I was astounded how much Abrams cleaved to the original movie — not just with the plot beats (which were a little too cleaver at times), but also with the filming and style and directing (which was great). J.J. Abrams, Now With 95% Less Lens Flares (tm). What really astounded me, though, was how bad Star Wars 7 made the prequels look. In comparison with the maturity of SW7 they look like a bad kid's TV show or something.
Any who, the movie got me excited about Star Wars again, which was pretty much exactly what it needed to do. (Because it's all about me.) I'm currently reading the SW7 prequel novel (from the library) and have the SW7 prequel comic on my shelf (also from the library). I may even want to watch the non-trilogy film next year (though it'll depend on what else is out for our next-Christmas movie).
I chose a different card to determine seating order (number of letters in your first + last names, one that almost always puts me last in the seating order because shannon + appelcline = 17, something I came to bitterly realize when I was signing those 200+ Designers & Dragons late in 2014).
And that's a lesson in exactly how much a cultural phenomenon the new Star Wars is.
Kimberly and I saw The Force Awakens the Sunday after Christmas as our yearly Christmas movie. Star Wars was probably my first SF franchise, because (I think) I saw it when it first came out, at the age of 5 or so. It was definitely my first comic book (Star Wars #1, but one of the bagged reprints, not the high-valued original). But over time it's never been my top SF franchise. That's definitely Doctor Who, with Star Trek (especially Deep Space 9) coming in #2. And there are a few others that I'm a definite fan of, like Blake's 7 and Babylon 5. Put a number in a SF show title and I'm there.
But I quite liked Star Wars 7. It was fun, it was exciting, and there was some point in the movement that sent nostalgic chills through me. (I can't remember the scene any more, but I teared up, and it had little to do with the current movie.)
[This part could be construed as a very general spoiler.] I was astounded how much Abrams cleaved to the original movie — not just with the plot beats (which were a little too cleaver at times), but also with the filming and style and directing (which was great). J.J. Abrams, Now With 95% Less Lens Flares (tm). What really astounded me, though, was how bad Star Wars 7 made the prequels look. In comparison with the maturity of SW7 they look like a bad kid's TV show or something.
Any who, the movie got me excited about Star Wars again, which was pretty much exactly what it needed to do. (Because it's all about me.) I'm currently reading the SW7 prequel novel (from the library) and have the SW7 prequel comic on my shelf (also from the library). I may even want to watch the non-trilogy film next year (though it'll depend on what else is out for our next-Christmas movie).