Club Jade

As we reported earlier, Dark Horse Comics announced at the Star Wars comics panel at WonderCon a new title coming this fall: The Star Wars, based on George Lucas’ original 1974 screenplay. This eight-issue arc, written by J. W. Rinzler (of The Making Of Star Wars books) and Mike Mayhew will tell the Star Wars story as it was in the first drafts, and using imagery that first appeared in Ralph McQuarrie’s concept art. We’ve got a preview page to help get you excited for the series, starting in September: (more…)

Folks, WonderCon was, as always, awesome fun this year, but it was also the most crowded I’ve ever seen it (I hear tickets sold out for both Friday and Saturday). This is my 6th non consecutive year in attendance and I was hit by so many backpacks I’ve come to loathe them. Lucky for you, I survived a near fall into a vendor’s booth to bring you this vital information. (more…)

We’re just under a week out from the Clone Wars finale on April 1. I’m sure the media blast has only just begun, but here’s what we have so far.

Lucasfilm held a screening of the season finale at the Presidio Friday evening. Jeff Ellis send the ForceCast a spoiler-free report.

There have been a number of interviews: Dave Filoni in USA Weekend, head writer Christian Taylor at Hero Complex, Peter Mayhew with the Daily Record, and Chewbacca himself at Yahoo.

And over at Big Shiny Robot, Bryan Young talks about getting rid of his cable and (mostly) the annoyance of different air dates and times. It’s certainly made a lot of folks cranky this week!

And after the finale, if you happen to be in San Francisco and/or attending WonderCon, there will be a panel there on the 2nd with Filoni, Mayhew, and Ashley Eckstein! Rumor has it they might show a peek at S4. And Pablo is hosting it.

Get your first look at little Boba’s story arc in this Clone Wars trailer. Also new? Dave Filoni on twitter!

Randy Stradley and company are in San Francisco for Wondercon, and naturally Star Wars came up. Randy talked extensively about the next Invasion arc, and had this to say about Legacy:

Stradley noted that the recent issues of “Star Wars: Legacy” have brought readers to the “tipping point” where Cade Skywalker puts aside his life as a bounty hunter to fight the Sith. “In the next few months, you’re going to see how that comes together, and really how his involvement spurs so much that happens in the galaxy. I don’t even want to get into all the stuff that’s going on. But we’ve got a big surprise coming, and if you thought the end of the current issue was a big surprise, then you really haven’t seen anything yet.”

Hrm. I have yet to pick up the new issue, but the series is in dire need of a serious game-changer for Cade. Bring it on!

• Nothing at all like dusting crops: Will Arnett plays dressup as Han Solo in the new issue of Vanity Fair.

• Conventions: More WonderCon fallout at StarWars.com, including Costumes, Celebrities and R2 Builders
• Comic: Adam McCauley’s Other Darths.

The StarWars.com Flickr has quite a few pictures from last weekend’s convention. And check out more on Flickr from Steve Rhodes, Deborah Beckman, Sherrie Thai, Omar Gutierrez and Tram Truong.

StarWars.com has a partial transcript of WonderCon’s biggest Star Wars event, Steve Sansweet’s presentation. First part a look back at ’99, featuring John Knoll; Part two introduced a new character from The Clone Wars, Cad Bane; Part three has Pablo and Steve going head to head with the Force Trainer and more TCW stuff.

StarWars.com has cover art for the upcoming NJO series, which was revealed at WonderCon today. They also ask editor Randy Stradley a few questions.

UPDATE: Tom Taylor says it’s Luke on the cover, but I have some doubts.

Those of you in the Bay Area or heading there can enjoy the second big con of the year starting today. The first big SW event, the Last Fan Movie Standing, kicks off tonight.

StarWars.com has a few picks. (Carrie Fisher and Mark Hamill are among the guests.) Dark Horse has some stuff going on as well, including something new on their upcoming NJO comic, Invasion.

We’ll be keeping an eye on the StarWars.com blog and Flickr for con reports.