I'm probably going on a self-imposed Star Wars moratorium some time this week - once my Episode III review comes out - which I'm sure will cause much consternation (the moratorium, that is, not the review itself)
Until then, a couple things...
First, the final Star Wars Report is up at Film Threat. It probably won't get as much attention as Jeremy Matthews' coverage of the Revenge of the Sith premiere at Cannes, but that's fine with me.
But it does beg the question: how the hell did Jeremy get to go to Cannes?
Also, fellow FT-er and Slobberbone fan Don Lewis brings the following item to my attention:
The Grauman's Chinese Theater in Hollywood is the "Star Wars Mecca". Star Wars premiered in 1977 at the Chinese theater. This is where it all started. It's for this reason that the last two prequel movies have premiered there. It's for this reason that twice before people have camped out more than a month before Episode I: The Phantom Menace and Episode II: Attack of the Clones opened, there were already people camping out in front of this theater!
Those people are back again for a third time. LININGUP.NET, the group responsible for this ritual, has a more active line going than ever before for Episode III: Revenge of the Sith. They have raised almost $30,000 for charity this time around, more than double the amount raised for Clones. There's a problem this time around, though.
They are not showing Episode III at the Chinese theater. At all.
Fox and Paramount have instead decided to play the movie for the public opening night at the Arclight Cinerama Dome... a non-digital, non-historic, and non-Star Wars theater.
The fact that the Chinese wasn't showing Revenge has been known for over a month, yet these people have still held on to the hope that Lucas, a man with his elbow firmly planted on the pulse of fan opinion, would relent and move the premiere back to the Chinese. No such luck, and several thousand holdouts continue to maintain their increasingly futile vigil outside the theater. A vigil which has quickly taken on the appearance of a public martyrdom:
The LININGUP.NET group has been publically preparing to line up in front of the Chinese for a year, and for many of the fans of the Chinese and Star Wars, it's been a much longer time in waiting than that. We have people from all over the world joining our line to be with us at this theater. We have people who've been Star Wars fans since they saw the movie here in 1977... and they want to see the saga end here.
However, now that Fox and Lucasfilm haveconfirmed to us of their decision to not screen Episode III at the best theater in Los Angeles, a theater that three years prior underwent an overhaul specifically to screen Episode II in all its digital glory, a theater that we've been waiting at for over a month, the entire group is left feeling betrayed and emotionally drained.
While I'm not insensitive to the people who traveled long distances to take part in this, I gotta ask these people: when the hell has George Lucas ever acted like he gave a rat's ass about you guys? This is the same man who - just last week - made comments equating the prequels' poor critical reception with the fact that fans of the Original Trilogy are now in control of the media. Your concerns about the "history" of Star Wars at the Chinese mean as much to Lucas as maintaining internal plot consistency in his own films does.
The fact that some of these guys are planning on staying in line as a protest on opening night[1] is probably the best evidence I can find that the end of the Star Wars saga is a good thing. Imagine how out of hand this shit would get if we had three more movies to go.
[1] In other words, these people will have spent six weeks waiting in line for nothing except the privilege of having everyone from the Arclight walk by them at 2:45 AM on May 19 laughing their asses off. Nicely done.
I think the funniest, and most ironic part of all this is that Lucas has arranged for a small army of Stormtroopers to walk the fans from Graumans over to the Arclight for the first showing and these frigging NERDS (sorry, but they are) are refusing to go! C'mon...any STAR WARS fanatic, as these people are, should be bowled over that an army of STORMTROOPERS is going to walk them personally down Sunset Bvd...but oh no, they won't go. Oy.
There is absolutely no way in hell that the last trilogy won't be made.
True dat. On his deathbed, just before he slips away, Lucas will bless some youngster with completing his vision.
I would just hope that final trilogy don't turn out as lame as, say, 'Dune' or 'Godfather III' or something. Course at this rate I'll be rolling in to see 'em in a wheelchair if I can make it to the movies at all.
I would just hope that final trilogy don't turn out as lame as, say, 'Dune' or 'Godfather III' or something.
You mean like Episodes I & II did?
Lucas murdered my love of all things Star Wars when Greedo shot first; he just further violated the corpse upon delivering toilet jokes, the pod race announcer, and the Force as venereal disease.
Anyone who knows me would call me an uber-geek amongst geeks, but even I can't wrap my brain around those that still carry the Star Wars torch.
I guess there's nothing like a nerd scorned....
I just saw the remaining idiots out in front of the theater. I mistook them for a homeless collective until I saw plastic lightsabers and a ronto toy. they were actually out in front of the parking lot next to the chinese theater because Adam Sandler was getting his hands and feet in wet cement in front of a crowd of adoring sheep, er fans, and the area was cordoned off.
There is absolutely no way in hell that the last trilogy won't be made. I don't care what Lucas has said. I don't care what the studios say. Billions of gate says that they'll make episodes VII, VIII and IX.
This ain't over. Goddammit.