The Sheila Variations

Another message to George Lucas

The biggest Star Wars fan I know (besides my nephew Cashel) is my friend Tom. I went to grad school with Tom. On our first day of orientation (a nerve-wracking experience) - we all sat in a circular room - 100 of us - and had to stand up and tell the entire group (all complete strangers from all over the world) who we were, and why we wanted to be at this school. Not any other school, but this one. The adrenaline in that room!

Tom was one of the first guys to stand up. He made an impression. He was (and is) completely bald. He has a red goatee. And his arms are covered in unbelievable Star Wars tattoos - fabulously rendered. They're art.

He had to acknowledge the tattoos, because they were so noticeable, and he said something about, "I would love to, somehow, be part of that myth, that story - I have such respect for those stories."

I asked him for his opinion on the Greedo-shooting-first debacle - I really needed his input - and he responded in full. (He reads this blog, too, so, in keeping with my earlier post, and with Michele's "poem-contest" he wrote his own poem about the prequel debacles).

Ladies and gentlemen, I give to you: TOM:

Luke trusted his feelings and not the computer
and that's the thing that made him a straight shooter
But somewhere between the old and the new
George Lucas turned the technological screw
One giant step on the road to has-been
was not giving these scripts over to Lawrence Kasdan.
And now we Star Wars fans are stuck like the rest
watching our beloved franchise become a CGI suckfest.
George, if you're listening (I doubt you are anyway),
you're screwing the pooch in a galaxy far, far away
You are not to be trusted with your own creation,
so give the stories to ME to bring to the nation!

Bravo.

And here is Tom's analysis of George's "improvements":

Greedo shooting first is awful looking even if you divorce that bit from it's ruinous effect on Han's character. After roundly acknowledging that technical fact, we can move on to how it waters down the ambiguous essence of Solo. SOLO for Christ's sake. It's depressing in these times that film makers would hack their own films in some revisionist PC meltdown. Greedo shoots first, the Feds brandish walkie-talkies. Bad things from the makers of my favorite movies. I will of course see SWIII because I have to. I will see it more than once. I will buy the DVD. Why? Because I am an addict and the intermittent reward scenario is enough to have me crawling on my knees, weeding through the dirty shag carpet of shitty dialog for the dropped rock-cocaine of lightsaber duels and asteroid-field spaceship chases.

See why Tom and I are friends?

Posted by sheila