STAR WARS and Me (Part 1)

The movie heard 'round the world. (Image via Wikipedia)

by Mike Hansen

 

No, I haven’t bought the new Star Wars Blu-Ray box set yet. I’m sure I will at some point; the extras alone make it sound worth it.

I can’t be mad at George Lucas for continuing to make money off of Star Wars – after all, Star Wars is responsible for my very first professional writing gig. And boy, does that drive my wife NUTS. She’s a hardcore Star Wars fan: she’s got almost all of the video releases, books, and comics. I should clarify that she’s a STORY fan: she doesn’t care about every bit of merchandise, but she loves the universe that Lucas created. (That said, the prequels are massively frustrating for us, as are the ongoing revisions of the original trilogy.)

You see, when I met my future wife, we hit it off pretty quickly. We had a ridiculous amount of things in common: we loved Blazing Saddles, Douglas Adams, Tolkien… We even had creepy similarities, like owning the exact same day planner. But when she found out that I was once an Assistant Editor on the Star Wars comics, she had all kinds of questions about what it’s like project-managing a piece of the Star Wars Expanded Universe. And when I told her that I wrote the Crimson Empire Handbook, and got to make up things about Star Wars characters that Dark Horse made up, and got the stuff I made up IN MY HEAD approved by Lucas Licensing, she couldn’t believe it: Who was this weird, pasty dude in her house, who just gets to tell her he MADE UP “official” Star Wars stuff?!

(Fortunately, she liked me, and when her friends asked who I was the next day, she went and dug out the Handbook I wrote – because she’d forgotten my last name! – and the rest is history…)

Other people have already written online waaay too much about Star Wars, but there were a few recent links I thought were worth sharing:

Harry Knowles of Ain’t It Cool News talks all about Star Wars and what it means to our generation here.

And Drew McWeeny of Hitfix’s Motion/Captured blog (formerly Moriarty of Ain’t It Cool) shows his young sons the Star Wars films for the first time – this is so cool (and adorable).

And, of course, if the prequels drive you nuts because they aren’t nearly as good as the original films, Red Letter Media has posted an entire, insane series of videos spelling out EXACTLY what is wrong with them. These films are another perfect example of how to reuse copyrighted content in a new context to create something new and important. Lawyers call it stealing; I call it Fair Use. Good luck fighting the internet, lawyers.

(oh-so-wonderfully NSFW)

What do you guys think about Star Wars? Did George Lucas rape your childhood, or do you not care?

Related articles

• The Star Wars Prequels Aren’t the Only Things George Lucas Messed Up [Star Wars] (gizmodo.com)
• Darth Vader Throws First Pitch at Star Wars night for The Oakland A’s (geektyrant.com)
• A World Without Star Wars (whatever.scalzi.com)
• 8 Lines That Would Have Ended Star Wars Really Quickly (neatorama.com)
• Why Star Wars Should be Left to the Fans (entertainment.slashdot.org)
• Eight Reasons To Dislike George Lucas That Have Nothing To Do With ‘Star Wars’ (theawl.com)
• Star Wars Blu-ray (out today) upsets diehard fans (cbsnews.com)
• Check The Expiration Date On Those Beats!: Girl Raps About Star Wars Blu-Ray Changes (geekologie.com)
• Why The Empire Strikes Back Owns the Star Wars Series (wired.com)
• George Lucas’ Stupid ‘Star Wars’ Changes Will Never Affect the Meaning of ‘Star Wars’ (moviefone.com)
• Jennifer Landa’s Star Wars Blu-ray Rap (geeksaresexy.net)