May the Fourth be With You

Today is May fourth, and that's an incredibly special day for most people. It's international Firefighters day, so we should should all be glad there's a section of the population crazy enough to run into buildings that happen to be on fire. I keep arguing that maybe we shouldn't be building our structures out of wood and paper mache, but I digress.... Hold on a moment, that's not what you're celebrating today, is it? So what exactly are you celebrating?

News flash, people. Star Wars sucks.

Search your feelings

I don't use the word sucks very often anymore. I prefer to use lame, or shitty, or a host of other words to describe something I'm not particularly fond of. In this case, sucks works perfectly, because that's the sound of the gaping vacuum that this abomination of a cultural phenomenon has created. Star Wars is a slurping, ugly, hot mess of a franchise.

Now, given, the first three films released a few decades ago are pretty good. The special effects were mind blowing at the time, they had an interesting new story and have held up pretty well since then. The acting is lousy, but I'm pretty sure everyone in the late seventies/early eighties was so high on cocaine that they had to be reminded that still they teeth in their mouths. But those three films are just a slice into the Star Wars universe, and most of that Universe is absolutely ridiculous.

Referred to on-set as the Force

There aren't just movies about Star Wars. There are books, games, toys, costumes, dinner ware, spin-offs, bed sheets, action figures (which are NOT toys, apparently), Iphone apps, party themes, wedding themes, and a Christmas special that George Lucas would like you to pretend never actually existed in the first place. That is a sliver of the amount of stuff that Star Wars has licensed. It is not a universe of space fantasy, so much as it's a cash cow that lactates golden milk.

I thought people would have learned after the Phantom Menace, but they kept making movies, and games, and books. People kept buying them. And my Darth Lord, there is a new Star Wars movie coming out, and I can hear people frothing at the mouth already. Sit down for a second. I hate to break it to you, but this new movie will never live up to anyone's expectations. It can't. The fan base has become so rabid we actually have a day of the year now dedicated to it. All across the world, people are calling in sick, so that they can sit down and watch all six films back to back, spending their mornings trying to fast forward to the good parts of the prequels.

Please don't make me fast forward through 80% of the movie, JJ

The worst lot is the Star Wars books. Ever read one? Don't. Do you want to know how many people have authored Star Wars books in the last three and a half decades? Seventy Five. That isn't novelisation at that point anymore. That is slash fan-fiction at it's best. I would complain, but truthfully the longest peace of fiction ever written isn't War and Peace, but a slash fan-fiction piece about Super Smash Brothers that contains over 3,500,000 words. That would be slash fan-fiction at it's best.

It still doesn't compare to my Pokemon Fan-Fiction

What it boils down to is this; I don't like Star Wars because when it started it was a space adventure that was shot on a budget of eleven million dollars. George Lucas was once a rebellious young film maker who took chances and now he's the head of a vast empire of knock-offs, merchandise and what borders on a lifestyle brand. George Lucas was seduced by the dark side.

Darth Schlock

 If you find yourself getting worked up over this, then heed your own words. There is no passion, only serenity. Jedi code mother bitches.

Sincerely,

The Illustrious Mr. Charlton

p,s. Help us JJ Abrams, you're our only hope.

p.s.s. Star Trek is for real nerds.

p.s.s.s. Not that Action balderdash with the JJ Abrams (although the casting was pretty fantastic)

p.s.s.s.s. Actually, with JJ Abrams, the only thing I can hope for is to walk away from the theatres not blinded by lens flares.