Star Wars Saturday: ‘Lego Star Wars Droid Tales’

It’s the conceit of Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead–take a familiar story (Hamlet) and retell it from the perspective of characters of lesser import (Rosencrantz & Guildenstern) to offer dramatic irony and humor. This idea has been reused many times over, including in the Star Wars Universe with the comic series Tag and Bink Were Here.

Now Disney is offering up Lego-style animated retelling of all 6 episodes of Star Wars from the perspective of C-3PO and R2-D2. The series will consist of 5 episodes 22-minutes in length airing on DisneyXD in the weeks leading up to The Force Awakens’s release.

Lego has a fantastic track record through games and The Lego Movie of turning up the funny on well-known narratives and characters. I look forward to seeing this re-envisioning of the Star Wars Saga as we amp up the marketing and anticipation for The Force Awakens.

 

Star Wars Saturday: John Cassaday Drawing New Star Wars Comic

The newly rebooted Star Wars comic arrives this month, and I’m excited to say it stars our favorite Rebel Alliance Heroes and is drawn by comics hero John Cassaday.

I became a John Cassaday devotee with Warren Ellis’s fantastic Planetary, which offered a kind of alternate universe look at famous comic book characters as a fascinating group of “archaeologists” tracked their artifacts. If you’ve not had the chance to read Planetary, you should put it on your short-and-soon list. Since then, I’ve been casually following Cassaday’s work in a way that I follow no other comic artist (with the exception of a friend in the biz).

The new Star Wars comic picks up with Luke, Han, Leia, Chewie, and the droids post-A New Hope, filling in the three years between the destruction of the first Death Star and the events of The Empire Strikes Back. It is officially part of Star Wars continuity, as dictated by Disney through Marvel. Early reviews revel in how much it truly FEELS like Star Wars.

Check out this gorgeous art.

Notice that brilliant likeness of Harrison Ford’s Han Solo stare and smirk in panel 4. And did R2 just vomit as a diversionary tactic? Stay classy, Rebels. (But seriously, extra points for the chunder scene.)

But to get an idea of how far we’ve come, check out this art from the original comic series from the 70s and 80s.

Dude, did the Hanna-Barbara artists also do this?

Thank you, John Cassaday, for upping the game in drawing a truly Star Wars comic. General, count me in.

Star Wars Saturday: Behind the Scenes Photos from the Opening Scenes

There’s plenty of excitement (and disgruntlement) over the new subtitle for the upcoming Star Wars: The Force Awakens. I myself feel pretty apathetic about it, so today’s Star Wars focus will not be in the evaluation or implications of that title. Nor will it be about Anthony Daniels’ boasting that The Force Awakens could, in fact, trump The Empire Strikes Back in greatness.

It will actually be about a set of photos made available through ikwiz.com dating back to 1976 and the making of the opening scenes of Star Wars: A New Hope. See them all here.

Here are a few of my favorites from the set.

Of course they shot it this way, pre-digital as it was, but it blows my mind a little to see it in action.

R2-D2’s schematics.

R2 being painted by the time-traveling love child of Mark Hamill and Ewan McGregor.

Ralph McQuarrie’s artistic design for the Jawas’ Sandcrawler and droid depot.

Kenny Baker and Anthony Daniels showing that the R2-3PO relationship was not bound by their costumes. You guys are adorbs!