My Star Wars Obsession Continues

It’s 57 days until I get on that flight to MCO for Star Wars Weekend! Not that I’m counting or anything. Not like I’m planning every detail in my mind already. But y’know, all kindza cool Star Wars stuff has been catching my eye on the interwebs lately.

• I first saw Hardware Wars in 1977 on Bob Wilkins’ Creature Features, on KTVU. I was a devoted fan of the show, which perfectly suited my twisted pre-teen aesthetic. Hey Lisa, maybe you remember the show? It was the same show that Lucas was interviewed on shortly before Star Wars premiered. Part 1 is above; click here for Part 2. Many thanks to HardwareWars for putting it on YouTube! (And on a nostalgic tangent here . . . hey, whaddya know . . . Bob Wilkins now has a blog, which looks like good reading for horror fans.)
• Jake Lloyd has been confirmed as a guest for Weekend 4, June 27-29, says the StudiosCentral Star Wars Weekends site. Not that this affects me any . . . I’m going for Weekend 3, and I’m not a Jake Lloyd fan anyway.
• The Disney.com Star Wars Weekends page now has more information about the event, including a list of events (though no schedule/agenda info yet). I for one am looking forward to the “Behind the Force” feature about the Clone Wars series, as well as helping my youngling prepare for the Padawan Mind Challenge. (Hat tip: The Disney Traveler.)
• Dark Roasted Blend has provocative political art mashing up Darth Vader with the Statue of Liberty, plus another one of George Bush with a stormtrooper. You gotta scroll down the page to see them both.
• Also from Dark Roasted Blend, a super-awesome Darth Vader/Death Star Transformer (this time it’s just the second image on the page).
• Muppet Newsflash has a picture of the Muppets/Star Wars mash-up figurines that’ll be available in the Disney theme parks starting in July of 2008. Curses, why aren’t these available during Star Wars Weekends?!?
• Pink Tentacle has a video of a cute little trash can robot named Push-kun, who seems to be spiritual kin of both R2D2 and Push the Talking Trash Can. And y’know, I gotta say . . . if you’re interested in new technologies or Japanese pop culture, you gotta subscribe to Pink Tentacle.
• Wondering about some of R2D2s other relatives? There’s a cool “celebrity robots” t-shirt on the ChopShopStore. (Hat tip: BoingBoing.)
• Legos fans will probably enjoy the Lego Millennium Falcon Time-Lapse movie available at BoingBoingTV.
• I don’t remember if I actually saw this Darth Vader hot air balloon when I visited the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta in 2004, but I sure hope I did. (Hey, it was early in the morning, and apparently I hadn’t had enough coffee.) (And by the way, have you ever noticed how many “Leia in chain mail bikini” pictures turn up on Flickr under the Star Wars tag?)

No Love for the Cheapquels

I stumbled across CM Venom’s blog tonight while tag surfing . . . and apparently we agree on a few things. Check out one of his recent posts, “Chance Of “Home On The Range II”…Zero:”

I know these “films” (for lack of a better word) filled the Disney coffers with money, as they were intended to do. (After all, the cheaper the product, the higher the profit.) But from an artistic standpoint, all they do is weaken the good name that they’re stacked upon. The world doesn’t really need to see what happened when the Little Mermaid returned to the sea, how Tarzan grew up, or a situation where Kronk got a “new” groove. Thankfully, the death of this unfortunate trend means we’ll never be subjected to The Rescuers III: The Rescuers Do Vegas, or Lilo & Stitch III: Lilo’s Prom Night Date Rape.

CM Venom also weighs in on Pocahontas:

In real life, Pocahontas came to England as part of hostage situation, was baptized, took the name “Rebecca Rolfe”, and died of smallpox on the way home from England. Now that’s a direct to video sequel I want to see.

Star Wars: The Clone Wars Sneak Peek

StarWars.com has posted a sneak peek for the new CGI series, Star Wars: The Clone Wars. Some characters look better than others, perhaps because they were CGI in the first place. Yoda looks kinda two-dimensional and unfinished, but General Grievous seriously rocks.