Yes.  Yes.  YES!!!  There’s a new Star Wars movie coming out and hitting theaters in December!  Who’s got two thumbs and is giddy like the proverbial school girl…  THIS GUY!  I couldn’t be more excited.  Can you?  

 

Lets recap what lead up to this.  I assume anything involving IV, V, and VI has been said before and you already know it, so I’ll just leave those alone.

 

Episode I 

 

Now, when Episode I came out I went through the same emotions.  Excitement, anticipation, excitement, then a kind of meh feeling, then excitement all over again.  The leitmotif of current times is, people love to hate.  And hate they did when Episode I came out.  I mean, there was a lot to live up to.  Add to the mix that this movie came out in 1999, you know the year that The Matrix, American Beauty, Fight Club, Sixth Sense, The Green Mile, The Virgin Suicides, Dogma, Boondock Saints, Girl Interrupted, Eyes Wide Shut, Toy Story, Sleepy Hollow, The Talented Mr. Ripley and a slew of other amazing movies came out.  Seriously, Google ‘popular movies 1999’ and be prepared to catch your jaw as it drops, so many killer movies came out that year.  The deck was pretty stacked that year and expectations were high. 

 

So naturally there was a lot to complain about.  Jar Jar being one of them.  Ill timed release dates aside, there were definitely things that weren’t done all that well.  I always felt that George went to digital with it and left some of the lovable-taped-together-popsicle-stick-DIY feel behind.  But, when it’s at your disposal and you invented a lot of the technology, why not, I suppose.  The balance of the movie was a little off, I always thought he could’ve cut down the Pod Race scenes a bit and gave else ware.  But, honestly, thats all I can really complain about.  I loved it then and love it even more now.  

 

Episode II 

 

Pretty dope on all accounts.  It did go even further with the technology aspect of things.  But, I really liked the story line in this episode.  The Boba Fett story was a huge payoff for Fett lovers and the like.  The history of the Stormtroper brought the two era’s together nicely.  Obi-Wan and Yoda were badass, and Anakin stared whining. 

 

The love story was botched pretty hard.  Not in the context or story line, but the dialogue was atrocious.  Hayden Christensen and Natalie Portman (whom I love in everything she does) were less than stellar.  And when I say less than stellar I really mean dismal.  Over acted and uninspiring.  Now, I suppose that could be George being George in those scenes.  But, actors of that caliber (lets be fair, Portman) should be able to act their way out that situation.  Taking what the director wants and making it not so lame is what I would call it.  I’ll leave that there.

 

Episode III

 

What was supposed to be he epic conclusion of new trilogy, definitely ended up epic and concluded.  Not necessarily on good accounts.  The opening space battle was pretty rad, The inclusion of General Grievous was a nice nod to the fans of the Clone Wars. 

 

However, virtually every scene involving Natalie Portman was a huge disappointment... thanks, George!  Any scene that was trying to emit any kind of emotion was over acted and really drug down by lame dialogue and poor direction.  Lest we forget the Frankenstein "NOOOOO!!" that nearly sent me out of the theatre with my $12 bag of popcorn.  Many great ideas are realized sitting on the can, but that idea and the birth scene should’ve been left in the shitter from whence they came. 

 

In conclusion, if you have the time to watch all three back to back to back, it plays as one solid movie.  I wasn’t as bent out of shape as some die hard fans were.  I was more stoked to just have some more Star Wars movies to watch and own. 

 

<Lets fast forward a few months to January 13, 2016 when I’m sitting here finally finishing this article, late as always>   

 

Now, the new movie has come out and it was amazing, and no I’m not going to talk about it… yet! 

 

First, I want to talk about what happened shortly after I started writing this. 

 

With all of this excitement brewing of a new movie, revisiting previous films, and having my love and passion for this franchise reignited.  I also fell deeply back in love with the Star Wars CCG.  What is that you ask?  If you have to ask, you have no idea just how deep the rabbit hole goes. 

 

From December 1995 to December 2001, a company called Decipher had the rights to this amazingly complex card game that many of us know and love to this day.  When I say complex, the new shortened and revised rule book came out at a mere 88 pages.  A strategy game involving two players, who construct light side and dark side decks to play against one another.  Based on themes from the movie, many of these decks have very fun game plays that can reenact your favorite scenes from the movie.  It's not unlike Magic the Gathering, the gameplay is fairly similar and many of the same strategies apply. 

 

As of now I have been vigorously building new decks and play testing them in hopes of competing in a few tournaments this year.  Tournaments?  Yes, there are in fact longtime running tournaments still in existence.  The most recent was the Match Play Championships in New Jersey.  "But Ben, if production of the game was stopped in 2001 how can people still play?!"  There is this wonderful underground network of card dealers and and collectors that still sell these cards in fairly good supply.  Not to mention there exists a Players Committee that has taken over rights to the game in the virtual world.  New “virtual” slips can be printed off, cut out, and placed over existing cards to create new uses for cards that would otherwise be useless.  It pretty crazy to imagine that 15 years down the road a “dead” game is still alive and well, and the likes of me and other passionate game nerds are still carrying on as if we were still in high school.  Yes, the rabbit hole goes deep.

 

I will leave you all with this primer for my next post.  Which will be a full review of the new episode.  Stay tuned, kids.