Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015) - A Newer Hope

Ten years after the release of Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, a new Star Wars film has finally hit theaters. Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens has already broken box office records and was accompanied by one of the most relentless marketing campaigns in film history. Fans and critics alike are pleased with the new film, which in its intense, focused celebration of the original three films washes away the bitterness some fans hold towards the prequel trilogy (which I personally think goes overboard.)

The Star Wars Prequel Trilogy: A Look Back

In 1999, I was the perfect audience for The Phantom Menace, the first installment of a Star Wars prequel trilogy that promised to show us the untold history of Anakin Skywalker before he would become Darth Vader. We'd finally see the Old Republic at the height of prosperity, Obi-Wan Kenobi as a young man, and the mysterious Clone Wars referenced in the original 1977 Star Wars. Today, a new trilogy is about to begin, starting with J.J. Abram's Episode VII: The Force Awakens opening tonight. I rewatched the original trilogy countless times in my life, but never went back to reexamine all of the prequels. With the new movie ready for release, what better time than now?

Brief Words of Mouth - The Star Wars Expanded Universe

Lucasfilm recently announced that it would not be considering the Expanded Universe stories found in the novels/comics/games when building the new trilogy of films.

My reaction to this is: Good. I read almost all of the books released through the mid 2000's, and aside from the fact that they're almost all bad to fun but mediocre, they took the universe in a direction that doesn't really reconcile well with what's in the films. Adhering to the stories within them would be a futile effort.

A big problem I have with expanded universe stuff is that it gives every background character an extensive history and makes everyone that should be minor have great universal importance. Not all of the books/comics do this, of course, but the ones that do really bother me. I think it's incredibly stupid that a random background robot in the bounty hunters scene in Empire becomes the brain of the Death Star II for some reason.

By over explaining every little thing, the books kill a lot of the mystery and the fantasy of the films. It's a series about family and faith with an expanded universe obsessed with cataloging and categorizing every aspect of it. The authors of these books do what Qui Gon did in Phantom Menace; instead of placing his faith in the kindness of young Anakin, he places his faith in a power meter and then tells Anakin he's bound to be the most important and strongest person ever, setting him on the course to ruin. Everyone's the Chosen One, everywhere.

The Old Republic has to fall to give way to the Star Wars universe people know and love. It was a bloated, complicated mess complicit in some terrible things (the senate turning a blind eye to slavery, the authors some really terrible, uncomfortable stories (Prince Xizor remains one of the worst things they've ever done.) In the decades following Return of the Jedi, a new bloat formed, with the same focus on mechanical classification that Qui Gon fell for. It needs to burn down to return Balance to the Force.

Review - Star Wars (Arcade, 1983)

This review is part of a series focused on games I spent time with during my most recent trip to Funspot. To view the complete list so far, click the Funspot tag at the end of this post!

Atari's 1983 Star Wars game is the first of several arcade Star Wars titles the company would develop during the 80's. It is a first-person vector-graphics shooter that puts players in the role of Luke Skywalker during his assault on the Death Star in the original Star Wars film, in spite of the game being released after Return of the Jedi had already come out in theaters. Atari would follow this game up a year later, out of sequence with the films, with an arcade game based on Return of the Jedi that used pixel art and an isometric view. They would return to the simple vector style displayed in the first game for their third Star Wars arcade title, based on The Empire Strikes Back.