Hilarity insues! (via)
France’s Henri IV (and horse) go intergalactic
A Paris statue of Henri IV is now sporting a lightsaber as part of an art installation that celebrates the 400th anniversary of the King’s death. Why not? (via)
The fandom minute: Anakin’s borderline is not a disorder
He has issues. Just not those. Psychology Today disagrees with the diagnosis of borderline personality disorder for the Sithling, saying “While Vader/Anakin seems to fit some of the criteria, a closer look shows the traits don’t add up to provide a cohesive portrait of a person with the disorder.”
Con of Cons. There’s no Spectacular at San Diego Comic Con, but since we weren’t expecting much news until August, I think we’ll manage. There is a Her Universe panel, though.
Ballot-stuffing for the win! Clone Wars fans beat out fans of Futurama, Family Guy and some show on FX I’ve never heard of to nab Best Animated Show in TV.com’s Now Awards. (Note to readers: Turn down your speakers before clicking. Note to TV.com: AUTOPLAY IS NEVER OKAY.)
Stop. Just stop. The leader of the Jedi Church has landed a “reality show,” except by “reality show” they mean he’s going to be filming himself and putting it on Youtube.
Star Wars: Uncut is up for an Emmy!
Casey Pugh’s brainchild of collaborative fandom love is up against against network-producted fare for Glee and Dexter for Outstanding Creative Achievement in Interactive Media – Fiction. Big congratulations to Casey and all who participated!
The Emmys are rarely a big deal for genre shows, but Lost is one of the few that have gotten plenty of love – and that adds up to twelve nominations for their final season, including Outstanding Drama Series. (Along with True Blood.) Matthew Fox, Terry O’Quinn, Michael Emerson and Elizabeth Mitchell are all up for acting.
Robot Chicken got two nominations, one for their ‘Full-Assed Christmas Special’ and another for Seth Green’s voiceovers.
As for the other genre nods, Ian McKellen got one for being the only part of The Prisoner remake that anyone liked, while Caprica, Stargate Universe, and V will duke it out with original flavor CSI for special effects.
Videos: Katy Perry geek filks
‘I Kissed a Nerd’ has been popping up all over this week, but ‘California Dorks’ gets my vote. (Via Mandy.)
Please don’t call me a ‘fangirl’
I don’t hate the word – certainly there are worse things to be called – but I don’t like the term ‘fangirl.’
Mainly because of the associations it brings up for me: Screeching, squeeing, inappropriate, out of control and usually prepubescent. The prototypical example:
I know, that’s well before even I was born, and it might as well be the dark ages for most of you. Nowadays, we call them Twilight fans.
(I kid. Sort of.)
So, please: Don’t call me a fangirl. I am female. I am a fan. But I don’t screech, I don’t approach actors with fandom crap that they’d probably prefer not to know about, and it takes something near to an act of god to make me squee.
And I’d rather not be called a Sister of the Force, either. This is not a silly homebrew internet roleplay. We are not all 12, and we certainly don’t need any more reason to be treated like mythological beasts. And hell, Star Wars fandom on the whole has done pretty well without a label. I say we keep that tradition.
Roundup: Still counting down to Celebration V
It’s 50 days to Celebration V and I finally booked my flight! But seriously, here’s the haps, with more sure to come:
- The Star Wars Stories Project is coming, and you can reserve your 15 minutes (of fame?) right now.
- If stories are less your thing than stuff, the collecting program is looking for fan contributions for a gallery at the con.
- We’re seeing a pared-down selection of artists this time around, which is probably good thing, but here’s who’s in so far.
- This year’s diorama? Echo Base, of course.
- Tomorrow is the last day to get your entry to Atom’s Fan Movie Challenge! The winners will be announced in Orlando.
Meanwhile, let’s all just hope that skeevy celebrity blogger Perez Hilton doesn’t show up.
Roundup: All the Celebration V news you can shake your broken droid leg at
Guest list. Anthony Daniels is coming to the autograph hall and on stage. (WTF moment: “He was the voice of Legolas in the 1978 animation, Lord Of The Rings.” The awful one that turned me off Tolkien for decades? What what?)
Panels. And the collecting track just keeps on coming. Don’t fret, folks: I’m sure there’ll be something for the rest of us. (Right?)
Costumes. Register your fabulous duds for the Costume Pageants. If you don’t, they might send the 501st after you.
Book now! There’s no time to waste!
Guide. The folks at Reed have put together Orlando 101.
Roundup: Get ‘married’ at Celebration V, if you dare
The embarrassment squick strikes back. The second WTF moment of the runup to Celebration V has arrived… The Celebration Chapel. Yes, because going to a Star Wars convention just isn’t geeky enough, you can get a (not legally binding) “light side” or “dark side” wedding. Amusing in theory, but… Really? Seriously? That said, apparently I accidentally proposed to Mandy on Twitter earlier and was invited to photograph her other fake internet wedding, so… What? I’m not even sure anymore. Embrace the pain!
Panels. Shocker! There will be a collecting track! Okay, so it’s not shocking at all, since this has been pretty much the only track at the last couple of Celebrations. Sigh.
Guests. In addition to George Lucas, Carrie Fisher and the usual suspects, Ray Park (Darth Maul) and stunt coordinator Nick Gillard have been confirmed.
Don’t tell us the odds. The feds are predicting an “extremely active” hurricane season. Thought you should know.
The Empire Strikes Back turns 30, officially
We’ve already covered a bunch of Empire Strikes Back anniversary stuff, but today is the actual day. Here’s more stuff to check out:
The sequel begins. Leigh Brackett’s first draft of the film surfaced on the internet last week, giving us an intriguing glimpse into the could-have-beens, including a “tender love scene” between Luke and Leia, Lando being a clone, and Darth Vader’s pet gargoyles. (If you just want the highlights, Geeks of Doom has a nice rundown.)
Visuals. Lucasfilm gave Maxim magazine some rare photos, and to save us classy broads from buying Maxim (err, sorry guys) they’re also on StarWars.com.
Disturbance. They also have a look back at the Emperor’s first appearance – including some seriously whacked-out concept art. Baron Harkonnen is totally jealous.
In other news…
- Sci Fi Wire’s Periodic Table of The Empire Strikes Back.
- The Beat calls Empire “the movie that made being a nerd cool.”
- Ars Technica’s Ben Kuchera: ESB is “one of the best science fiction films ever made.”
- LA Weekly was also on hand at Wednesday’s Empire screening, chatting up stars on the red carpet; KABC-TV nabbed video of Harrison Ford and Ewan McGregor, while the Los Angeles Times has Ford.
- It’s “Empire Strikes Back Night” at tonight’s Dodgers game.
- io9’s Marc Bernardin pegs ESB as the film that “introduced an entire generation of moviegoers to the notion of tragedy.”
- Empire is (shocker!) Underwire’s choice as the finest in the trilogy. They’re also giving away one of those new Hasbro At-ATs and counting down 30 reasons Empire still rules.
- There’s another iPhone app coming for me to suck at. ‘The Battle for Hoth’ should show up in the App Store soon – it isn’t there as I type this, but I did find a Christian heavy metal song. (If you’re dying for details, TFN published the press release.)
- Hoth is coming to The Old Republic.
See any more unique tributes to ESB today? Post them in the comments or tell me on Twitter (@clubjade) and I’ll get them in.