San Diego Comic-Con 2010 Saturday
When you go to Comic-Con, you’ll want to spend some time in Hall H, the giant room where stars come to talk about huge Hollywood projects and show off the biggest stars at the show. This year, I went all day Saturday.
11:45 Warner Bros
Moderator: Geoff Boucher
Green Lantern
First, Green Lantern writer Geoff Johns came out to introduce some footage. It showed some effects shots, including a green fist coming from GL’s ring, a shot of Oa, and Tomar-Re. No shots of GL costume. Then they brought out some of the cast and crew. [Read the rest of this article]
San Diego Comic-Con 2010 Friday
Liz Smith (@Dammit_Liz) is Boba Fett.
This day was a little less busy, with fewer panels and a little more wandering in the exhibit hall. I caught the Batman: Under the Red Hood premiere with Chris Tulach at night.
12:00 IDW and their ‘Bro
Panel for Hasbro tie-in IDW comics. I went hoping to get some info on the D&D comics. There was…a little.
Moderator: Andy Schmidt
- Larry Hama (G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero)
- Robert Atkins
- Mike Costa (G.I. Joe titles)
- Denton Tipton (editor, Dungeons & Dragons comics)
- Michael Kelly (from Hasbro)
- Alex Irvine (writer, Dark Sun miniseries)
Transformers Ongoing Series
- Mike: They’ll go into space, find Hotrod, bring back Decepticons, 5-part arc.
- DRIFT 4-issue miniseries by Shane McCarthy, Alex Milne. Origin of Drift, introduction of Lockdown.
- Last Stand of the Wreckers TPB
- Transformers: Sector 7 (movie universe). John Barber and Joe Suitor.
- Transformers Prime (Oct.), prequel to November TV series on The Hub. By Mike Johnson.
Dungeons & Dragons Comics
- Denton Tipton: Aug. 11 issue #0 comes out for $1. Ongoing series (Nov.) by John Rogers (Transformers, Leverage) with art by Andrea DiVito and covers by Tyler Walpole (Wayne Reynolds for launch books).
- Dark Sun miniseries. Writer is Alex Irvine, artist Peter Bergting, covers by Andy Brase (a friend of Brom).
Alex: The main character is a broken-hearted mul gladiator. (Didn’t quite get the name; something like “Grupic.”) He was sold back into slavery, and believes he was betrayed by a noble woman he loves. He breaks out and escapes into the desert. There, he meets Aki, a bard/dune trader/slave hunter. They come to find the mul carries an artifact that causes people to come looking for them. They have to sneak back into Tyr.
I asked during the Q&A which classic monsters might be appearing in the two series, but had no luck getting an answer. [Read the rest of this article]
San Diego Comic-Con 2010 Thursday and w00tstock 2.4
As I trudged to the convention center in the morning, I noticed the usual crush of hired guns foisting advertisements wasn’t in full effect yet. (But no worries, they’d be crowding the streets by lunchtime.)
10:00 “Spark of Imagination” Panel
Guests
- Tony DiTerlizzi (Planescape, Spiderwick Chronicles)
- Travis Knight (lead animator, Coraline)
- Mike Mignola (Hellboy)
- John Stevenson (Kung Fu Panda)
- Doug TenNapel (Ghostopolis, Earthworm Jim)
- Moderator: Geoff Boucher (Hero Complex blog, L.A. Times)
As soon as DiTerlizzi gets introduced, a guy in the audience says “Planescape!” in that growl usually reserved for dudes yelling “METAL!” This session is about the creative process and what inspires the panelists to create.
Q: Do you start small and grow big, or come up with the big idea first?
Tony: Start with character. The audience has to care about the character before caring about that character’s struggle. [Sort of a side track] We’re encouraged to imagine as children, but this becomes “There’s the art guy. Get him!” in high school. Working on The Search for Wondla, about the only human on an alien planet, raised by a robot. His take on Star Wars meets Miyazaki. He loved the maps in fantasy books like The Hobbit and the Chronicles of Narnia. Created an augmented reality map for Wondla. Video show uses mostly 2D images in a 3D space.
Travis: It’s hard to pinpoint the stop-motion creative process. “Artists in general, and stop-motion people in particular, are weird people.” You draw from the things to create: research, life experience, and imagination. When you get “first frame-itis” (animator’s block), you break it with research and thinking about the characters and how they behave. Researched how supermodels move to give the Other Mother in Coraline an “evil supermodel” look. Rehearsed in a mirror; not pretty. Used own experience with daughter for a scene with Coraline and her father, drawing specific expressions he’d seen his daughter and himself make.
Mike: Hellboy started as a sketch. He usually drew Batman for people, but a fan who already had a Batman from him said to draw whatever he wanted. He drew the first incarnation of Hellboy. The sketch kept popping up, and one time he randomly put “Hellboy” on its belt buckle. Later, he had an offer to do a comic and had no idea what he wanted to do. Hellboy was the only original character he had. At first, he didn’t know who HB was, and started vague until the characters took on a life of their own.
John: Put Mike’s art up in office while working on Kung Fu Panda to get inspiration to do the best work he could. The Sinbad movies originally inspired him to pursue a movie career. He worked on The Muppet Show early on, the creative cauldron where he learned most of the things important to his work, primarily from Jim Henson. Collaboration was extremely important to Henson, and he was one of the few people who would say “Thank you” for a good idea. Paraphrasing Frank Oz, “Jim wouldn’t have been such a great creator if he hadn’t been such a great appreciator.” So collaborate, and avoid fearing putting your ideas out there. When you have a big project, you have to say, “I need help to fulfill this vision.” Showed a video of some of his work on The Muppet Show.
Doug: The easy part of imagination is coming up with stuff, and some develop their imaginations more for jobs. Execution is the hard part. You have to communicate ideas to the crew, editor, yourself, or the audience. Separating the good ideas from trash is the hard part. Develop the skill of executing ideas. Really skilled creators, like the rest of the panel, show that it’s a “human trait” to be that good. It’s not impossible to achieve that level; use them for inspiration. Comics are great because they’re a “friendly medium.” You can just get a pencil and paper and write a whole book by yourself. Projects can fall apart, so there’s a whole lot of “nuttin’ to show for it” in the arts. Comics and novels let you have an end product, even if no film version comes through.
From the Q&A
Tony: I think, “What would 10-year-old-Tony want that 40-year-old Tony can make?”
Tony: (Ref: The specifics of inspiration for Planescape) People working with me on Spiderwick and Wondla wondered how the world was so fleshed out. If you played D&D, you have to design a world from soup to nuts. The design is Zeb Cook criscrossing world myths. The art was inspired by Arthur Rackham in large part, along with the otherworldly feel of Yoshitaka Amano.
Q: Do you feel a master plan or outlines constricts your creativity?
Mike: A really big idea is daunting. Start small.
Tony: Make a general outline.
Doug: Break into small, workable pieces.
John: Doing one piece will lead to the next.
After the Panel: Everybody around me was talking about Planescape and D&D.
11:00 The Red vs. Blue Infiltration
Guests
- Geoff Ramsey (Grif)
- Kathleen Zuelch (Tex)
- Gustavo Sarola (Simmons)
- Monty Oum (animator)
Jerry Holkins introduced them. I don’t think most of the audience recognized him. They’re wrapping up the RvB: Revelation DVD for Sept. 14. They’ll have a boxed set, RvB: The Recollection, with 3 most recent series and a bonus Grifball disc. They showed plenty of videos.
Protestors
The Fred Phelps crew had a few protesters outside Comic-Con, but they were far outnumbered by counter protesters. These included Bender and people holding signs saying things like:
- ODIN IS GOD
- Magnets: How the #%$! do they work?
- GOD LOVES FSM
- Jesus was nailed to a cross—Thor has a hammer
4:00 Robert Kirkman
***HERE THERE BE SPOILERS***
Much of this panel was Q&A. A summary follows.
He has a new imprint: Skybound. He is overseeing books by new creators. Skybound is not currently looking for pitches, but scouring online to find interesting talent.
In Walking Dead, expect turmoil arising in the community and trouble for Rick.
The first Skybound title is Witch Doctor by Brandon Seifert and Lukas Ketner. They came onstage for a bit. It’s a horror medical drama—Dr. Strange meets Dr. House. All the supernatural stuff has a basis in the weirdest phenomena of real biology.
Where’s the Walking Dead TV series filming?
Atlanta. The first season is almost done.
Did you give up creative control for the AMC Walking Dead series?
Kirkman is executive producer, hired Frank Darabont (The Stand, The Shawshank Redemption) to write and direct the pilot. Very experienced with adaptations that are true to the source material.
Is there an oversaturation of zombies?
No. Not as many zombie comics as there once were, and there hasn’t been a zombie TV series before.
Will you come back to write more Marvel Zombies?
No. Said his piece with 1 & 2.
What’s your favorite rock band?
“Probably Rock Band 2.” [Joking. Kirkman's very funny. See him in person if you can.]
[Skipping a bunch of questions. If you want to know about anything specific, ask in the comments.]
Did you consider doing the TV series in black & white to match the book?
Thought about it. Felt it would be too “stunty.” People might skip the channel thinking it was an old movie.
How do I break into comics as a writer?
Find an artist and make a comic.
Will the high mortality rate in Walking Dead affect how you cast?
We’re hoping we’ll get more big actors who can do short runs but not commit to an entire series.
I heard there’s a Science Dog t-shirt in Walking Dead TV.
Yes, but they had a bad reference for the symbol, so it looks more like a bear’s claw. I want to put a donut shop in the series called Bear Claw so it becomes an internal reference.
6:30–?1:00? w00tstock
There was a long line for w00tstock 2.4. They had two screens instead of the usual one. I had a special pass thanks to Liz Smith, the w00tstock Dungeon Master. I was in the top VIP area at first, the first guest there, and managed to contain myself when the next guests were Jamie Hyneman and his wife. Show was very cool. More controlled, focused than usual, but about the same length since there were more performers. Molly Lewis had to wait outside when she wasn’t on stage since it was a 21+ venue. (Free Molly!) Performers were:
- Paul and Storm (they are the opening band)
- Wil Wheaton (blogger, ubergeek, Wesley Crusher)
- Adam Savage (Mythbusters)
- Marian Call (folk musician, plays a typewriter)
- Matt Fraction (comics writer and madman)
- Jamy Ian Swiss (the Honest Liar, magician)
- Molly Lewis (ukulele YouTube sensation)
- Phil Plait (Bad Astronomer, showed trailer for new Bad Universe show on Discovery)
- Len Peralta, drawing the special show poster on stage throughout the night (Geek a Week)
- Jason Finn (drummer, member of Presidents of the United States of America)
- Chris Hardwick (Nerdist podcast)
- Mike Nelson, Kevin Murphy, and Bill Corbett (Rifftrax)
Themes of this show included double, triple, etc. rainbows, “Free Molly,” and beer. Special guests ranged from Jamie Hyneman (Mythbusters) to Aaron Douglas (of BSG, in his flight suit for a cheap “toast” joke) to Grant Imahara (Mythbusters, escorting Chewbacca) to Bill Amend (Foxtrot). Hope I’m not forgetting any people! Molly gave a free concert outside during halftime.
In a few days, you should be able to find videos of the show on YouTube. I’ll try to remember to post them to comments.
It was a late night, and it’s another late night typing this the next night. I’ll recap today tomorrow, and confuse you more.
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- Optimus Prime stands guard near the entrance to the convention center. As far as I know, he didn’t blow up any innocent cars, thinking they were Decepticons.
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- A shot of the (modest for SDCC) crowd in one of the large areas between the seminar rooms and outdoors.
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- This year, there were a couple massive ads that covered the faces of buildings. This is one, the other is for the Scott Pilgrim movie.
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- A promo area for Scott Pilgrim vs. the World outside the con. Long line is long.
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- Across the street from the con, you can see a few protesters from Fred Phelps’s group, and a BUNCH of counter-protesters.
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- Seen at the Splatterhouse booth
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- The open gaming area
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- The line for w00tstock
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- Bunch of folks doing autographs this time: Marian Call, Len Peralta, Jamy Ian Swiss, Phil Plait (the Bad Astronomer), Paul, Storm, Wil Wheaton, Aaron Douglas, and Matt Fraction (who later did get a table).
San Diego Comic-Con 2010 Preview Night
Here’s a quick post to cover the tiny bit of Comic-Con that’s happened so far.
After a mistake that put me on the wrong shuttle and a nearly hour-long drive around downtown, I arrived at the house Chris Tulach and I have rented a room in. Then after a 30-minute walk back down to the convention center, I snagged my professional badge and headed toward the exhibit hall that was just opening up.
The first thing I saw when walking into the hall was a massive image of anime-style comic heroines with their boobs hanging out. Way to break those comic fan stereotypes, Comic-Con! Chris headed for the Hasbro line to pick up some Transformers Blaster exclusives while I wandered the hall. First awesome freebie: cardboard Alien face-hugger on a stick. The exhibit hall seemed really segregated, perhaps more so than last year, with video games on one far end, big movie company booths next them, then toy manufacturers, then comics, then small press. They carted in some huge movie props, like a giant golden throne from Thor. The Stan Winston booth had three Iron Man suits, Iron Monger, and the mecha from Avatar.
Preview night doesn’t really lend itself to details beyond “I saw this and this and this and this.” It’s just a night that’s not quite as busy and has all the stuff set up. So look forward to my recaps of the remaining days (and w00tstock!), where I’ll be taking more notes about panels and announcements.
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- Stan Winston props from Iron Man and Avatar
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- THRONE USED IN THOR MOVIE. ALL THOR CAPTIONS WILL BE IN ALL CAPS. MIGHTY!
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- Tron: Legacy light cycle
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- Statue at the Weta booth, promoting…a line of steampunk/retro future guns. I guess. Hard to tell what this really was.
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- Mecha for Red Faction: Apocalypse, cold and aloof
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- Mecha from Red Faction: Apocalypse, now open for business
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- Rock Band 3 on display at the EA booth
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- MJOLNIR, THOR’S HAMMER
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- I totally want a gladius flash drive from Spartacus: Blood and Sand.
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- Billboard for The Walking Dead
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- This house set (post zombie attack) promotes the AMC series of The Walking Dead.
Movie Review: “Inception”
Inception is a wildly entertaining summer blockbuster wrapped in the packaging of a sleeper hit science fiction thriller/heist film. The film excels due to the stunning combination of well executed directing, inspired writing, spot on acting, and seamless production. Though primarily billed as a Leonardo DiCaprio movie there was a large majority of the movie that the ensemble cast took the reins, including a great performance by Joseph Gordon-Levitt who didn’t threaten to outshine DiCaprio’s but provided an excellent balance to the movie. Inception is one of the first high concept sci-fi thrillers that should be accessible to a wider audience without relying on the appeal of spectacular gun fights and martial arts. If you want to see a technological and intellectual movie that pulls you along for one hell of a spectacular ride then Inception should be at the top of your “must see” list!
I decided to see a midnight showing because I am a big fan of supporting original, non-gimmicky (read: 3D) properties and I sincerely hope that this kind of movie gains popularity in Hollywood. Inception was not only directed by Christopher Nolan (The Dark Knight, Batman Begins, Memento) but it was also written by him and is not directly based on any specific book, comic, video game, or any one previous movie. The movie is being compared to films such as Blade Runner and The Matrix, but I believe these comparisons are less direct and more based on similar themes, matching tones, and the shared moods that can be elicited by the films. For example, the style of storytelling that is used in Inception is very reminiscent of Blade Runner and it very clearly leaves a lot of room for interpretation by the viewer. [Read the rest of this article]
Dear Roger Ebert
When I was a young boy, one of my very favorite shows was At The Movies. In my 6 year old mind, you were the good guy and Gene was the bad guy. While I’m sure that Mr. Siskel was a wonderful person, to young me, you were the ultimate and nobody disagreed with you. You were almost as cool as Optimus Prime. Almost.
In college, I used to run a computer bulletin board system. One of my favorite things for my friends and me to do was to review the movies we saw in a place where we all could see . I still tried to keep up with your reviews. I didn’t always agree with what you said, but hearing your opinion always made me think twice about mine. We agreed on Judge Dredd. We were, however, at odds on The Guardian. In retrospect, it being one of the secret VHS tapes I hid from my parents when I was 14 in order to repeatedly rewind and watch the nude scenes probably affected my opinion somewhat.
Now, I’m a blogger. Occasionally, I review things. I blame this partially on you. You’ve always been one of those figures in my life that I would eventually like to grow up to be. You have always had my respect. Recently, you said things that made me lose some of that respect. No, this is not about you saying videogames are not art. While it would be quite the understatement to say that I disagree with you, I think you’ve taken more than enough flak about that. Please, allow me to give you some new, fresh flak.
Mr. Ebert, my beef with you today is in regards to your recent article, “Okay, kids, play on my lawn“. I appreciate your saying you should not have said videogames can’t be art without having more experience with them, though you still believe they can’t be art. You’re entitled to your own opinion. I don’t have a problem with that.
What I do have a problem with, sir, is that you’re not even willing to try. From your article:
And I didn’t want to play a video game. If I should dislike it, I already had a preview of the response awaiting me: I was too old, I was over the hill, I was too aged it “get it.” That became the mantra: “Ebert doesn’t get it.” I disagreed with them about age, which I know more about than most of them, but I had some sympathy about the concept of not “getting it.” There are many, many things I believe many members of our society don’t “get,” but I don’t think they’re too old or too young to “get” them, only differently evolved.
Really? You’re worried what people might say if you didn’t like the game you reviewed? You’re the best movie critic. Ever. It’s your job to call things as you see them, even if that means declaring your undying hatred for something the general populace inexplicably loves. You think videogames are still in their infancy? That they might someday become art?
I submit, Mr. Ebert, that you are uniquely qualified to help make that happen. I don’t know of too many videogame critics with your kind of experience. You know well what touches you emotionally when you view what you consider to be art. Can you find it in another medium? Why is it you became a movie critic in the first place? To endlessly kvetch about things you don’t like? Or to improve the state of the art?
I’m not suggesting you play through every mindless beat-’em-up or explode every enemy ship that ever flew in pixellated skies. Some games are designed just for white-knuckled excitement, or to be eye candy. Some are terrible. Just like movies. I am saying that people are telling you they’ve experienced an emotional connection by suggesting games to you. I, for one, would relish the chance to see what you had to say once you gave them a spin.
Will people disagree? Of course. But, really, can you honestly tell me this would be a worse use of your time than confirming that Sex & The City 2 was a giant turd of a movie?
Besides, if you do this for me, you will finally be cooler than Optimus Prime.
Your friend (for my whole life),
Matt
(photo from http://www.flickr.com/photos/bsoist/514375711/)
Inq. of the Week: Summer Movies ’10
Two weeks ago, closing out our week of homebrew related posts, Dave asked how much you like to change the rules of your RPGs. An impressive majority of you (71%) like to make a few minor tweaks to the systems but leave the rest of it relatively intact. The next largest number of you (17%) like to change around a decent amount of rules, while 7% of you like to play with the rules as written and the remaining 5% change the rules more than a decent amount to the point the game is completely different at the end. I voted for the minor tweaks option, because I’ve already started using some small changes to the 4E rules and generally tend to do the same thing to any system I’m running and I really enjoy it being done in games I play in as well.
As it is the first week of April, and luck has it that Dave is out of town and I am writing the Inquisition, I can happily continue my yearly trend of posting an inquisition around this time asking about everyone’s favorite summer movies! It’s actually a trend I stole from Dave, but I haven’t heard him complain about it in the last 3 years so I’ll keep doing it. Last year we saw movies like Star Trek, Terminator: Salvation, Up, and Inglorious Basterds and back in 2008 we had Iron Man, Hellboy 2, and The Dark Knight. By comparison this year looks to be a lot more slim pickings, but who can really say until all of the movies have been released and we know exactly what’s out there.
Kick-Ass - April 16th
The Losers – April 23rd
Iron Man 2 – May 7th
Robin Hood – May 14th
Prince of Persia: the Sands of Time – May 28th
The A-Team – June 11th
Jonah Hex – June 18th
Toy Story 3 – June 18th
The Last Airbender – July 2nd
Predators – July 7th
Scott Pilgrim vs. The World – August 13th
Loading ...Unfortunately Tron: Legacy doesn’t come out until December of this year, so I can’t really put it on this list. Also we may have forgotten a movie in there somewhere, so if we did please tell us and hopefully we can add it in! Here’s a look back at our previous polls and the movies that won them (in order of votes recieved): [Read the rest of this article]
Cheeseburger, Plain
This year, I turn 35. I am long past the age when I realized some things make me feel old. It was extremely depressing the first time I looked at a hot college girl and realized I was in high school when she was born. It was extremely depressing the year I realized that me and spicy food just don’t mix. (However, I did get a large amount of reading done that year.) As a gamer, it is really strange to be able to explain to my Castlevania-obsessed nephew about how a large majority of the games in that series over the last 25 years are about Simon Belmont’s relatives, and to remember playing all of them when they first came out (when I was 10).
Whether it is age or just my natural propensity toward nitpicking remains to be seen – but it seems that the older I get, the more certain things annoy me, both in gaming and in life. The thought that has been lately whipping my brain into a fevered desire to lecture all you young whippersnappers in how it was better in the good old days is that everything always has to be “taken to the next level” or everybody will think it’s lame.
I mean, if a character’s drinking a healing potion, why can’t they just, I dunno, pull a flask out of their backpack and drink it and say “ahh” as their health bar is replenished? Is it really necessary that they throw their head back and levitate in the air inside a pillar of light while the wind blows their hair around? Can a person not shoot an arrow without a giant glowing rune appearing behind them? Can a ninja not hit a man with a giant serrated edged broadsword without it looking like a fireworks factory caught fire during a landslide?
I love things that glow. I love things that sparkle. I love neon-colored stuff in general. But when I was growing up, these things meant something. It meant that you were pulling out the BIG GUNS. The glowing sword was the one that was going to KICK ASS. Games today add extra glow-trail effects to lightsabers. They’re LIGHTSABERS. They are already glowing. That is what makes them cool. You don’t have to add explosions. Make them cut something in half and make the wounds glow. That would be cool.
Why is everything so amped up? In videogames, I can see a need for this back in the days when graphics weren’t as detailed and you couldn’t really tell what was going on. In comics, you sometimes need motion lines and starburst effects to indicate motion or impact. We live in the year 2010. We don’t have flying cars yet, but we do have the ability to animate characters in such a way that I can tell when they’ve been hit with a spear without the use of a solar flare to track the weapon’s movements. Don’t believe me? Look at Heavy Rain. There are fights in that game that last several minutes and you never get bored. Exciting, grueling, viscerally interesting fights. Nothing glows, nobody reaches POWER LEVEL TEN THOUSAND OMG, nobody shoots a fireball at another person. There is no excess – there is simply good cinematography and the right cues (visual and otherwise) to engage the player. Admittedly, few games are done in the style of Heavy Rain, but its lessons can be applied to other formats.
Here’s the thing. There’s a reason they call them “special effects”. If every effect is special, then none are. They don’t make an impact anymore. It says a lot to me that the game with the fight scenes that really sticks out in my mind is the “plain” one. It also gives me the least indigestion. Now get the hell off my lawn.
My Love Affair With Tron
I grew up with the movie Tron. Okay, I’ll admit that I grew up with a lot of movies, but there is a shorter list of movies that I watched at least once a year for my entire life up to the age of 18. Tron is most certainly on that list, along with Aliens, Predator, True Lies, and Big Trouble in Little China. Tron, however, is a unique movie in the sense that if someone tells me they like the movie I can that I could be friends with them instantly. With such a strong weight on the movie’s shoulders, being the apparent cornerstone of my entire social life, it’s a good thing that a small percentage of people have seen the film (or will openly admit to it).
As proof, I give you this excellent quote from The Simpsons:
Homer Simpson (in the 3rd Dimension): Did anyone see the movie Tron?
Hibbert: No.
Lisa: No.
Marge: No.
Wiggum: No.
Bart: No.
Patty: No.
Wiggum: No.
Ned: No.
Selma: No.
Frink: No.
Lovejoy: No.
Wiggum: Yes. I mean… um, I mean, no. No, heh.
A few years back the Tron franchise re-appeared seemingly out of the blue with the video game Tron 2.0, which finally allowed us to explore the ‘inside of a computer’ world of Tron in first person. Fast forward to 2010, this year, and Jeff Bridges is not only an academy award winning actor but also starring in the upcoming film Tron Legacy. The movie is set to release in December of this year, and it looks like it will be exactly what you expect from a modern day adaptation of an early-80′s movie franchise. Okay, maybe that’s not the best set up but think about the first Transformers movie and then imagine how awesome this movie could be. [Read the rest of this article]
Uncle Vanir’s Jedi Jamboree
I’ve had the pleasure lately of being the “cool uncle” as far as my 6-year-old nephew is concerned. Ever since about a year ago, his wandering interests have, for the most part, been something I’m either directly interested in, or at least knowledgeable about. At first, it was Star Wars. Ever since I met my wife, my in-laws have tagged me as a nerd, and that meant I would want Star Wars stuff for any present-giving occasion. (While sometimes tiresome, this assumption is usually correct. ) When my nephew turned 5, he started to watch the Clone Wars cartoons (the new CGI ones, not the utterly brilliant Genndy Tartakovsky series from 2003), and he started watching the other movies and getting interested in Everything Star Wars Ever. And so, every time I’d visit, a thousand questions would be waiting for me. At first, it was just things like “hey Uncle Matt, who’s your favorite Jedi”, but he soon figured out I was familiar with most of the names of the vehicles (in the original trilogy, anyway), and he’d describe things he’d seen in the movie and I’d try to decipher what he was talking about and tell him the names. [Read the rest of this article]
