It's a little corny but William-Sonoma's R2-D2 Popcorn Maker will probably appeal to most fans of POP culture, even at its $100 price tag. Something fun: Its head doubles as a serving bowl. Read the rest

"I have had it with these motherfucking Sith on this motherfucking train!" --GPS1138, Video Game Enthusiast

Star Wars Jedi Fallen Order is the best Star Wars game I've played since Knights of the Old Republic, which is one of the best video games of all time.

I did not want to buy Fallen Order. I figured that much like all the other bullshit EA opportunities to rake in cash from Star Wars fans, this game would probably suck. The trailers tempted me but the game's protagonist was yet another whiny appearing young white male with resting Sith face.

Day one and two reviews were so strong I found myself watching others play on Twitch and quickly realized I wanted to play through this adventure myself. I bought the game.

Meet Cal Kestis, a young man who was formerly a Jedi Padawan. Having survived Order 66, Cal starts the game with all the cringe-inducing drama and angst of a Star Wars Jedi trainee. Cal is trying to keep his force powers hidden but must use them to save a pal, thus ensuring the Inquisitors immediately arrive and he must run.

BD-1 rapidly becomes Cal's droid pal and is the most useful and fun droid in a Star Wars game yet. I feel obligated to say BD BD BD often. Cere, Greez and number of other characters aid you on your mission to do what most every single non-Skywalker Star Wars story has seemed to invovle for ages: Jedi babies.

THERE WAS A LASAT JEDI MASTER! Read the rest

Apparently you may buy the Stormie skin, or get it free with an advance copy of Star Wars new RPG.

I wonder if Stormtroopers get 10x weapons bloom. Read the rest

Congratulations to Disney on the exciting new merchandising opportunity of bounty pucks.

I swear these are three different scenes:

And if bounty pucks don't prove popular, there's the less sophisticated tracking fob:

Read the rest

With the launch of the Disney+ streaming service, all eyes were on The Mandalorian, the new sci-fi western set in the aftermath of Return of the Jedi. But the original Star Wars movies are also availabe in 4K, and someone noticed that they've yet again tinkered with the scene where Han Solo shoots Greedo to avoid being abducted by him. Director George Lucas famously edited the scene in the 1990s to depict Greedo shooting first, making Han's killing him an act of self-defense and sanding a rough edge off a classic cinema hero.

The latest cut, which Disney reports was made by Lucas himself, has the two rogues firing simultaneously.

Oh my god. This is not a joke. pic.twitter.com/RMkh7Blg7D

— Star Wars Visual Comparisons (@StarWarsVisComp) November 12, 2019

In the newly edited scene, Greedo says something to Han before shooting (Maclunkey!), although no subtitle appears at the bottom of the screen. Han proceeds to shoot once. This is followed by “a new explosion [that] covers a transition from them shooting to Greedo hitting the table, removing the Greedo dummy altogether.”

The account also discovered while scrubbing through the footage that it appears “the timing has been adjusted farther and they now shoot on the same frame.” It’s possible that these changes were made to improve the pacing of the scene since it’s different from what was originally used.

The Han-Greedo scene is the Oak Island Money Pit of movie scenes: it's been excavated and flooded so much that it's become more of an idea than anything else, its truths forever beyond our grasp. Read the rest

The Mandalorian is the new Star Wars TV show premiering on Disney Plus+. Werner Herzog is the famous filmmaker who will also be appearing as an actor on the show.

It was only a matter of time before someone mashed-up The Mandalorian’s trailer footage with Herzog’s iconic documentarian voiceover. It’s not Grizzly Man, but it’s close.

Read the rest

Well, no, probably not. Also the dialogue remains objectively terrible. But tumblr user swan2swan makes a fairly convincing argument that the actual plot of Star Wars Episode 1 is eerily reminiscent of our present predicament:

The Phantom Menace is the best movie ever because the entire premise is essentially “Amazon has obtained its own private army and now two future samurai have to stop it from forcing Natalie Portman’s planet to use its services by cutting through Jeff Bezos’s army of robots and attempting to convince Congress to do something about it SPOILER WARNING Congress doesn’t do jack so Natalie Portman has to take matters into her own hands also the day is saved by a redneck kid the samurai picked up when the car broke down”.

And I thought it was bad enough just thinking about how Trump could use Palpatine's tactics to cancel Election Day 2020.

Image via Hannford/Flickr and DoD/Flickr Read the rest

When he's not playing drums for bands like Motion City Soundtrack and Tiny Stills, Tony Thaxton hosts a number of wacky podcasts — including a series of weekly Star Wars comedy music videos. Over the course of two years, Thaxton cranked out more than 100 Star Wars-themed songs under the name "Cloud City Soundtrack." While he's finally burnt-out on Tibana gas and has moved onto other Patreon projects, he has released a "best of" Cloud City Soundtrack compilation on BandCamp, with 19 songs featuring fan favorites such as Lando, Greedo, and Admiral Ackbar, as well as some deeper cuts into Star Wars lore like Bor Gullet and Ric Olié.

And honestly the songs are just delightful in that Weird Al-kinda way, so it's absolutely worth a listen.

Star Wars Songs by Cloud City Soundtrack

Image via Flickr Read the rest

“Long have I waited.”

Us too, Emperor Palpatine. Read the rest

Samuel Delany (previously) is one of science fiction's titans, a pioneer who was the first openly gay writer in the field, as well as one of the first Black science fiction writers to attain prominence. Read the rest

French company Le Creuset has announced a line of its signature enameled cast-iron cookwear themed after the Star Wars franchise; it's expensive even by Le Creuset standards, and a few of the pieces are uninspired messes, but the Han Solo in Carbonite roaster ($450), the R2-D2 Mini Cocotte ($30) and the Porg Pie Bird ($25) are positively brilliant. I'm also fond of the Tattoine Dutch oven, but that one isn't even priced and the company is offering an "opportunity to purchase." (via Geekologie) Read the rest

Mini Cocottes of BB-8, C-3PO, and R2-D2 ($30 each)

Just when you thought they had made all the Star Wars items we'd ever need in a lifetime, comes the Star Wars x Le Creuset Collection. Yep, the high-end cast-iron brand will soon release a line of Star Wars cookware, from a Han Solo frozen-in-carbonite roaster ($450)...

To an extremely limited-edition, hand-painted Tatooine Round Dutch Oven ($900 and sold separately from the rest of the line)...

Then there are these Death Star and Millennium Falcon trivets for $20 each...

And this $395 Darth Vader dutch oven...

But, perhaps the most adorable of the collection is a pie bird fashioned after The Last Jedi's Porg ($25).

The pieces (except that Tatooine dutch oven) will be available November 1 online, at Le Creuset boutique and outlet stores, and at William-Sonoma stores.

images via Le Creuset

(Pee-wee Herman) Read the rest

Relive the glorious moment when the First Order almost ended the Resistance! This lovely model of the rinky-dink Crait Ski Speeder will take you there.

The kit comes with a Poe Dameron minfig as well as some Admiral named Ematt, a 'resistance trooper' and 2 First Order snowtroopers. Pretty sure the resistance guy dies easy.

You may engage in futile attacks on the Mobile Big Laser used by the FI to smash the resistance's big barn door!

LEGO Star Wars: The Last Jedi Defense of Crait 75202 Building Kit (746 Piece) via Amazon Read the rest

Mindy Clegg has posted a wonderful essay covering the "social and political conflicts over fandom", and how even though such discussions are appearing in the modern communities surrounding recent films such as Captain Marvel and The Joker (previously), the reality is that such political and social issues have surrounded both the discussion of, and indeed the very core beliefs of some of our most well-known Sci-Fi franchises for decades:

Roddenberry consciously created a multiracial crew on the Starship Enterprise. The show sought to promote the concept of racial tolerance among its viewers by showing a peaceful and egalitarian multiracial crew of humans. Many saw it as doing just that. Actor Nichelle Nichols, who portrayed Lt. Nyota Uhuru, the accomplished and talented communications officer, was told by Dr. Martin Luther King at an NAACP meeting that her depiction of Uhuru was making a difference in the lives of young black women. This was a time when black women rarely had prominent roles on TV, much less in such powerful positions. When she told him that she was planning on leaving the show due to ingrained racism and sexism on the set, he told her that she couldn’t do that, given the positive role model she was for young black women. She even inspired the first black woman to go into space, Mae Jemison. Jemison would later go full circle, and appeared on an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. George Takai, who portrayed Lt. Hikaru Sulu, eventually also parlayed his acting work into activism.

The 2019 LEGO Star Wars Advent Calendar is here.

Palpatine will rise!

LEGO Star Wars Advent Calendar 75245 Building Kit, New 2019 (280 Pieces) via Amazon Read the rest

The "Vader Down" crossover event in Marvel's 2015 Star Wars comics featured an absurdly-overpowered Darth Vader contending with seemingly the entire rebel force, as well as a cyborg rival for Palpatine's favor.  John Stratman created this two-part 16-bit animated adaptation that does a great job of squeezing in all the highlights and slapstick moments:

(Via Kieron Gillen.) Read the rest

James Stangroom has set out on a quest to find the Stormtrooper who banged his head inside Death Star 1.

You can tell this trailer is a parody as it doesn't give away the whole thing. Read the rest