Han Solo's blaster used in "Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi" sold for $550,000 at a Las Vegas auction on Saturday. Turns out that Ripley's Believe It Or Not bought it. Believe it... or not. The prop was part of a collection sold off by the movie's art director James L. Schoppe. From Rolling Stone:
Other items at Saturday's auction included an original "Biker Scout Blaster" (sold for $90,000) and an Ewok prop axe ($11,000) from Return of the Jedi.
However, Han Solo's blaster fell well short of the record for the priciest Star Wars item in the franchise's auction history: In June 2017, an R2-D2 unit that was seen in numerous Star Wars films sold at auction for $2.76 million, over its $2 million pre-auction estimate.
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It was 1997 when Simon Jansen started his remake of the first Star Wars film -- Episode IV - A New Hope -- as an ASCII animation (or "asciimation," as he coined it). Read the rest
Solo: A Star Wars Story, the latest Star Wars feature film and Disney's fourth, offers something new even as it stays connected to the old. I have a few gripes, but Solo is a nice side chapter to the ongoing Star Wars mythos.
Set roughly a decade before A New Hope, the original Star Wars film, Solo chronicles the journey of a 20-something Han Solo from an orphan looking for a brighter future to the swaggering but lovable scoundrel originally portrayed by Harrison Ford.
Standard backstory fare includes Solo meeting the Wookiee Chewbacca and fellow miscreant Lando Calrissian. We find out where he grew up and how he came by his surname. He acquires the Millenium Falcon and his biggest claim to fame: making the Kessel Run in a record-breaking twelve parsecs. Solo brims with action and humor—I think it's a great stand-alone film.
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Here's an unusual opportunity for a hardcore Star Wars fan. An authenticated, screen-used segment of the original Death Star (yes, from 1977) can be bid on through eBay.
In partnership with Hollywood Memorabilia, this exclusive screen-used, sectional piece of the Death Star was featured in Star Wars: Episode IV and utilized for special effects. After filming, much of the Death Star was lost, but this authentic piece was discovered and salvaged. Very few of these pieces exist, and has remained mostly uncirculated with the Star Wars community, until now. The prop was kept by an ex-ILM employee for the next 37 years, and stored in a safe for the last 4 years.
This nearly two-foot-long piece of Star Wars history is expected to "sell for upwards of six figures," though the current bid is just over $10,000. Bidding ends June 3 and a letter of authenticity is included in the sale (I would hope so!). Read the rest
Onnit's $65 Solo Yoga Mat features a lifesize Han-in-Carbon for you to perform upward-facing Jabba on. (via Cnet)
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Hey Californians, a burlesque show is headed your way for a short tour all the way from Australia starting on May 31. Not just any burlesque show though, this is "The Empire Strips Back: A Burlesque Parody."
Yep, a Star Wars-themed burlesque show.
It started off in 2011 as a one-off event in Sydney but apparently the demand is high for sexy, stripping Stormtroopers. Its organizer Russall S. Beattie soon found himself extending its run, and then extending it some more. In 2014, he directed its full-blown production.
It was booked in a 150 capacity room with the expectation that he might get three nights out of it. Those three nights sold out in record time and the show has since succeeded beyond any expectations. Four national tours and one complete overhaul later, the show has delighted an audience of over 50,000 people since then. February 2016 saw a Huffington Post online video article on the show go viral, with its 20 million views in a few days spark the interest of many international promoters, thus an international tour is planned with the show heading overseas indefinitely within weeks/ days of the latest Australian tour ending.
Six lucky California cities will host the tour: Riverside, Los Angeles, San Diego, San Jose, and Sacramento, with a final show in San Francisco. Tickets are available now.
Btw, this is how they get around the legality of using the almighty Star Wars brand:
(HuffPost) Read the rest
Mexican artist Monica Robles Corzo created a cool mashup of modern monsters and Mayan iconography for her Mayanizations series, like this reimagining of the Alien Xenomorph. Read the rest
It appears that Jedi Master Yoda is holding up the books using the Force, but it's really just a strategically-placed metal bar which holds up the first book that gives that illusion.
You can buy this Yoda bookend for $19.95 from Hallmark, of all places.
(The Awesomer, reddit) Read the rest
Not only is Ron Howard the narrator (and an executive producer) on the Arrested Development, he's also the director of the upcoming Solo: A Star Wars Story. So, it was only natural that the two entities got combined somehow, especially since they both have end of the month release dates**.
Enter Star Wars: A New Hope, a clever parody that melds the music, narration, and editing style of the popular sitcom with the story of Star Wars.
It begins, "Now the story of a family that wants to rule the galaxy and the one son who had no choice but to save it." (The original narration began, "Now the story of a wealthy family who lost everything and the one son who had no choice but to keep them all together.)
**Season 5 of Arrested Development begins on May 29 on Netflix. Solo: A Star Wars Story opens in theaters on May 25.
(Blame it on the Voices) Read the rest
In 1978, the usual gang of idiots at MAD gave us "Star Roars," starring Lube Skystalker, Cree-Pio, Bar-stool, Ham Yoyo, Chewbacco, Zader, and Oldie Von Moldie. May The Farce be with you! Always. Below are a couple example strips but can see the entire parody here.
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Director Ron Howard and the stars of Solo: A Star Wars Story tease us with more context and scenes from the forthcoming film out on May 25.
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This simple GIF from Gadget Love is pretty pleasing to me.
Clone Troopers were not useless in battle. Read the rest
While light on rocks, you can certainly lift a box with Luke and the Force at LEGO Yoda's Hut. Read the rest
A drone captured this aerial peek of Disneyland's Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge (aka "Star Wars land") as it stood at the beginning of last month. I was just at the park this past weekend with my daughter and we caught glimpses of its construction while riding Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. As you'll see, the future planet of Batuu is ginormous (14 acres in total).
The Disney Parks Blog reports:
At Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge, guests will be transported to the planet of Batuu, a remote outpost on the galaxy’s edge that was once a busy crossroads along the old sub-lightspeed trade routes. Here, guests will find themselves in the middle of the action at two attractions that take detail and immersion to the next level: one that lets guests take the controls of Millennium Falcon on a customized secret mission, and an epic Star Wars adventure that puts guests in the middle of a climactic battle between the First Order and the Resistance.
As you can see in this video, which Bob Iger shared this morning during the 2018 Annual Meeting of Shareholders, Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge is shaping up to be one of the most detailed and immersive lands ever created in Disney Parks history.
Star Wars: Galaxy Edge is also being built at Disney's Hollywood Studios at Walt Disney World. The lands are estimated to cost $1B each and both are set to open in 2019. Yahoo!
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I grew up watching Star Wars. I was bought Star Wars toys for Christmas. I had Star Wars sheets on my bed. At some point, those sheets were made into a quilt that I proudly took along with me to university. Despite having science fiction bed clothes, I still managed to have a respectable amount of sex during my four-year degree program. I love Star Wars!
But I'm kinda worried about what Solo: A Star Wars Story is gonna be like.
What I've seen of the movie, so far, has me less than excited for the film. I say this, having loved The Force Awakens and Rogue One. I enjoyed The Last Jedi as well. They felt like a part of the same universe that I've been immersed in my entire life. But the way this trailer for Solo is cut along with the other trailer for the film, has me worried. Watch this thing and tell me that you couldn't remove Han, Lando and Chewie out of the story and still have the same damn movie. It looks and feels like every heist movie and every sci-fi film I've seen over the past few decades.
Don't get me wrong: I'll still go and see it. Alden Ehrenreich's turn in Hail Caesar is one of the funniest things that I've ever seen:
Will he be believable as Han Solo? I don't know. But I feel like I want to give him the chance to fill Harrison Ford's massive boots. Donald Glover? Read the rest
A lot of Star Wars fans were butt hurt over the Last Jedi's treatment of iconic Star Wars characters. Others, not so much--I'm one of those. I think it was a fun film that pushed the franchise forward in a new and interesting direction. No matter which camp you fall into, there's one thing that we can all agree on: Watching Carrie Fisher slap the silly shit out of Oscar Isaac over and over will always be entertaining.
While I'm not crazy about sharing anything from Entertainment Tonight, damn this is fun. Read the rest
Anything A Bad Lip Reading does is a-ok with me. Their latest video is a musical one where Grand Moff Tarkin sings delightful nonsense with Princess Leia.
It's called, "It's Not a Moon."
Previously: Bad Lip Reading Rap of Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back's Battle of Hoth Read the rest
