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Star Wars
William Shatner Disses Star Wars
Sep 21st
I was reading Fox News today (usually check out all the news sources) and came across an article titled:
William Shatner disses ‘Star Wars,’ says ‘Star Trek’ is better: Who wins the intergalactic debate?
In this article, he goes on to say that George Lucas borrowed everything from Star Trek. He even says the new Star Trek movie by JJ Abrams has better special effects than Star Wars. He also says Star Trek has a better story line. He also says that Star Trek had better heroines than Leia in Star Wars.
While it was a lot of tongue in cheek, it was pretty funny. I love both, so I don’t really consider one to be better than another. I really like Bill Shatner, so I really enjoyed the interview.
You can view the video here:
You can read the entire article on Fox by going here. Enjoy!
Darth Vader Playing Golf – Hilarious!
Jul 7th
I like to post a good video from time to time. I just came across a really good one. this is a Spike TV advertisement with Darth Vader playing golf. I haven’t laughed this hard in a long time, especially when the guy pulls out his golf club at the end. At the end it says “Star Wars, There Is Much To Be Learned.” Check it out when you have a moment!
Adywans Empire Strikes Back Revisited – Color Correction Clip
Mar 25th
It’s no secret how cool I think Adywan’s Star Wars Revisited is. I think the guy is a genius. Well, I was looking around on YouTube and some of the new Adywan Empire Strikes Back Revisited color correction footage and it looks pretty cool.
For me, watching Adywan’s Star Wars Revisited was like watching a new and very refreshing version of the movie. I expect Empire Strikes Back Revisited to be the same. You’ll have to take a look at the color correction footage for yourself. Enjoy!
501st Legion on Deal Or No Deal – Star Wars edition! Did you see it?
Apr 28th
I just had to give a shout out to the 501st Legion. They made an appearance on the NBC TV show Deal or No Deal and they did a great job! I have met some of these guys and they are some of the nicest people out there. I dream some day of getting enough money to acquire the armor and become a member. That would be a geek dream come true.
All I can say, as I watched the 501st up on stage, is that those guys must have been pretty nervous. What an awesome experience for them! Now that the show has aired, I’m sure the 501st will be able to write more about their experience. It is my understanding that they were under confidentiality agreements (duh) until the show aired. It got over about an hour or so ago. They don’t have much on their site right now about it.
They also got to meet the Deal Or No Deal models in Princess Leia slave outfits. Lucky dogs! 
Nice job guys!
New Trailer For Adywan’s Empire Strikes Back Revisited!
Feb 17th
Many of you have probably heard of Star Wars The Phantom Edit. The Phantom Edit is a fan edited version of The Phantom Menace. Why edit the movie? Because many of you have the talents and abilities to do so. Many people didn’t like Star Wars Episode I, so they have since edited the movie the way they like it, usually featuring less Jar Jar.
While tracking down some fan edits of The Phantom Menace (after watching Star Wars Episode I – The Rise of the Sith by Slumberland) I came across what I consider to be the best fan edited movie I have ever seen. The guy goes by the name Adywan. I learned about this guy while visiting the forums at originaltrilogy.com.
This guy created his own edit of Star Wars A New Hope named Star Wars Revisited. He has re-edited scenes, added music, added planets and many special effects. The end battle scene at the death star is stunning. I highly recommend that you torrent Star Wars Revisited and watch it for yourself. I got mine in xvid format at mininova.org. I would like to state, however, that you should legally own a copy of Star Wars ANH before downloading the torrent. Who doesn’t?
You can see a trailer for Star Wars Revisited here:
I just came across a new trailer for Empire Strikes Back Revisited. There is also a forum discussing the new edit you can find here. My hopes are pretty high for this one and I am certain the quality will be just as good, if not better, than Star Wars Revisited. Adywan, you’re a bloody genius!
Empire Strikes Back Revisited Trailer:
In Search Of The Force? Try The Jedi Church!
Jan 27th
Those Brits sure come up with some fun and interesting stuff. Can you believe that in the 2001 British census 390,000 people claimed “Jedi” as their religion! Obviously Star Wars is a lot more than just a movie to some people. Not only do people claim Jedi as there religion, but they practice it on a regular basis as an official religion.Jedi also appears to be 70,000 Australians’ religion of choice as well. This means that one in 270 Australians consider the force to be their official religion. According to the BBC:
An e-mail was sent around the world in 2001 saying that if 10,000 people declared they were Jedi, it would be recognised as an official religion.
But the Australian Bureau of Statistics said it would be categorised as “not defined”.
Thousands of people in New Zealand and the UK also followed the advice of the e-mail – with Jedi Knight even being included on the list of religions by UK census authorities.
The BBC recently had an article on Jedi worshipers in Britain. In the article they interviewed. The article covered Barney and Daniel who go by the names Master Jonba Hehol and Master Morda Hehol.
According to the article both Barny and Daniel are trying to increase their numbers and want fellow worshipers to join them in worship close to their home on Anglesey. If I’m ever in Wales I’ll have to stop by and take a look.
Their church activities include sermons on “The Force,” light saber training and meditation techniques.
According to the article:
They plan to go to the official opening of a Surrey-based branch or “chapter” of the UK Church of the Jedi in April, and hope to hire an Anglesey venue for their own services.
Already six followers regularly meet in north Wales to discuss setting up the “church”.
All members are currently men, but women are allowed. Those following the dark side of the force can be expulsed from the church.
This has to be one of the oddest things I have ever heard of.
Ultimate Battle: U.S.S. Enterprise vs. A Star Destroyer – Battle Of The Ships
Dec 15th
You really can’t get much geekier than an argument on who would win between Star Trek’s Enterprise D or E and a Star Wars Star Destroyer. I know this is all Sci-Fi and a ridiculous never-ending argument. I am a huge fan of both genres, so when I got into a friendly argument with my friend at work I reluctantly picked the side of Star Trek.
As this argument ensued at work, people around us started laughing, thinking we had both truly lost our minds. Perhaps we did a little. The argument then turned to Star Wars vs. Star Trek. These were our main arguments in a condensed and far smaller format:
Friend: Star Destroyer big, Enterprise small.
Me: Enterprise faster, more maneuverable.
Friend: Thousands of lasers.
Me: Lasers dude?! You’re kidding me. Phasers kick Lasers in any match.
Friend: Super Star Destroyer and Death Star kill the Enterprise.
Me: Agreed. I don’t think the Enterprise D or E would win those two. So I throw in the Borg.
Friend: <Pure silence ensues.>
Me: Nuff said.
I have found in my own observations that there are a lot more casual Star Wars fans than casual Star Trek fans. I have also found, again in my own observations, that there are a lot more die-hard Star Trek fans than there are die-hard Star Wars fans. This means in most “forum” based arguments on this topic, Star Wars will almost always win by sheer numbers.
Many people try to throw The Force into the mixture. I used to think this was a big deal as well, especially when watching the classic trilogy of Star Wars (ANH, ESB, ROTJ). The Force kicks trash in those movies. Then the prequel Star Wars movies came out. TPM, AOTC & ROTS have changed my mind on this. I now think The Force would be a minuscule influence in any such fight.
In The Phantom Menace we discover that Midichlorians actually dictate one’s power with the force. It’s not something you can get stronger with (except training), unless there are synthetic Midichlorians being produced and injected into the blood stream. You will also discover in Revenge of the Sith that a bunch of clone troopers can EASILY wipe out the Jedi. I can’t even begin to tell you how disappointed I was watching the Jedi get seemingly killed in seconds by a blaster!
A lot of the argumentative stats in this epic battle are taken from non-canon books, video games and other non-canon sources. This includes both sides of the argument. And let’s not throw in the Expanded Universe from Star Wars into the argument. The Expanded Universe of Star Wars books contradict themselves on every level.
I have done my own research and have found the following sites to be useful when determining who would win a U.S.S. Enterprise D/E vs. Star Wars Star Destroyer battle.
List of Ultimate Star Wars vs. Star Trek Sites:
ST-V-SW.net (Great arguments in favor of Star Trek <when looking at sheer firepower and defense capabilities>. Well researched data with sources to back it up.)
StarDestroyer.net (Great arguments in favor of Star Wars. Seems to utilize a lot of non-canon data.)
Answers.com also has a nice article on the subject that you can read here.
There are a lot of awesome ships in the Sci-Fi universe not limited to just Star Wars or Star Trek. Let’s throw an Asgard or Replicator ship into the mixture, or perhaps a Battlestar from Battlestar Galactica. The Battlestars look awesome!
TheForce.net has some great Star Trek, Star Wars and Battlestar Galactica specs, although who knows if the sources are accurate. You can find them here.
Again, I realize this argument will never come to an end, but it sure is fun!
Getting The Most From Your Sci-Fi Movie
Nov 4th
If you’re like me, you probably have wide collection of Sci-Fi DVD movies that are sitting around and collecting dust. You may have watched them once and set them to the side. I even have some movies I purchased, intending to watch them, that are still sitting around in shrink wrap.
There are a few things you can do to give your movie an extended life. The first thing I recommend is to do some research on bloopers in the movie. I love to go to the IMDB and look up a movie and read through the “goofs” as they are called. This is a collection of continuity issues, bloopers and other inconsistencies. This can be fun after watching a movie, or when re-watching a movie that has been sitting around.
A good example of this would be Star Wars. That movie, although a favorite, is filled with continuity issues, errors and bloopers. This is to be expected as many movies are filmed out of sequence and editing often causes a lot of these bloopers to make it to the final cut. There are even people hired to watch for continuity issues, but some errors still seem to make it through.
Just look up Star Wars on the IMDB. Under “Fun Stuff” they have a link called goofs. You can find Star Wars ANH goofs here. I have yet to find a movie that doesn’t have goofs and continuity issues. Look up Star Trek: The Wrath of Kahn. Its has goofs as well. Although this may take away some of the “magic” of the movie, I find it fun to print out a list of goofs and re-watch the movie.
The second thing I recommend doing is looking for “Easter Eggs.” Easter eggs are bloopers, trivia and other tidbits thrown into a movie on purpose. Sometimes Easter Eggs are simply bonus features on a DVD that are not obvious to the viewer. An example of this would be the Star Wars DVDs releases a few years ago. To access the bloopers reel, you have to go through a few steps. The steps are as follows:
Put the bonus disk from the original trilogy into your DVD player and highlight “Video Games and Stills Galleries.”
Using your DVD remote, type the following numbers followed by the “enter” button:
11 (enter)
3 (enter)
8 (enter)
This will then take you to a bloopers reel with about 4 minutes of bloopers from Star Wars ANH, ESB and ROTJ. Please note that the remote control numbers are 1138. This is a number seen throughout the Star Wars movies and is the name of George Lucas’s film THX 1138. A similar Easter Egg can be found on Star Wars TPM, AOTC and ROTS.
There are several places you can go to find Easter Eggs for your movies. I recommend going to DVDEasterEggs.com or EEggs.com. There are many sites and forums out there discussing DVD Easter Eggs.
Have fun re-watching your sci-fi movies!
Attack Of The Pumpkins Part Deux – Star Wars Style
Oct 31st
It is Halloween night and I figure this is the last chance I can get away with posting some cool pumpkins I have come across on the Internet. I have been handing out candy dressed up like the grim reaper. One of these years I will be a storm trooper. Perhaps I’ll go the cheaper route next year and dress up like a Jedi.
I have been watching Ghost Hunters Live for about two hours. It seems a little ironic that Ghost Hunters, which is supposed to be prooving the existence of ghost, is on the Sci-Fi channel. That is fiction people, which means not real. I am still glad the Sci-Fi channel shows it as I find this stuff very interesting.
OK…back on topic here. I have found some very clever and nice looking Star Wars themed pumpkins. I have searched the Web for hours (not really) and have found the best of the best. Enjoy!
Contestant One – Boba Fett
Contestant Two – The Death Star
Contestant Three – Darth Maul
Contestant Four – Rebel Alliance Logo
Contestant Five – Storm Trooper
Contestant Five – Yoda
Some of these people are very creative. I’m curious how many of these are made from a pattern or by trial-and-error. Some of these are obviously easier to make than others. The Death Star pumpkin would easily take the longest. That one looks great!
Which ones do you like? Anyway, I’m signing out. A kid just knocked on the door. Have a Happy Halloween! Don’t have too much fun!
Stormtrooper Armor For Me!
Oct 17th
Yeah, I know. Halloween is right around the corner. I’m poor and can’t really do too much this year, but if money was no obstacle, I would get myself Stormtrooper Armor as seen in Star Wars. I’ve researched it a bit and you would be surprised how many people have gone out of their way to create their own armor. You can even find armor on E-bay. Just do a search for Stormtrooper Armor!
Have you ever heard of the 501st Legion? These guys march in parades, attend benefits and more! I actually met one of these guys from the Alpine Garrison. I would eventually like to look into becoming a member. The guy was nice and I can really appreciate the passion these guys have for Star Wars.
There are a lot of sites out there that give advice on how to build your own armor. There is a lot involved, but many of the replicas look exactly like the props used in Star Wars. Take a look for yourself!
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