Star Wars with occasional sarcasm
In stores Wednesday is Darth Vader #2, featuring, apparently, Vader’s runway walk. Will Vader win this round of GFFA’s Next Top Model? Tune in to see!
But first, today brings the paperback of James S.A. Corey’s Honor Among Thieves. I gave it a B+ back when it first came out last year.
Next week is Kevin Hearne’s Heir to the Jedi – look for my review next Monday. Star Wars.com released a preview of the audiobook yesterday.
Lucasfilm has confirmed that Darth Vader himself will be showing up for the Rebels season finale, as previously rumored. Of course, the bigger – and more shocking, if it plays out – part of said rumor is still under lock and key, officially.
You get a brief glimpse of him here:
Vader has already appeared on the show once, in holograph form, an extra scene added when ‘Spark of Rebellion’ aired on ABC.
The Rebels season finale, ‘Fire Across the Galaxy,’ will debut Monday, March 2, on Disney XD.
Rebels heads into the finale with ‘Rebel Resolve,’ and Andi chats with Taylor Gray, Freddie Prinze Jr. and Vanessa Marshall about their characters, and Dave Filoni reveals the likely fate of the courier droid. And Pablo answers two questions, including Hera’s exact relation to Cham Syndulla of The Clone Wars.
The second part of the finale will air March 2 on Disney XD – remember it won’t be on the app early.
Making Star Wars has a new rumor today regarding that long-rumored flashback sequence. It sounds like something that couple very well fill out a couple of important puzzle pieces to all the other things we’ve heard, as well as the big era gap.
So it’s pretty much a sure thing that Felicity Jones is going to be one of the stars of the upcoming spin-off at this point, and we can agree if this counts as a ‘confirmation – but she told MTV’s Josh Horowitz that she “can’t talk about it.” (Lupita N’yongo says she’s sure it will “change her life even more.”)
Naturally that’s about all we’re going to get for anything upcoming, but Star Wars had a couple moments in the opening act. Bib Iger’s wife even wore one of the Rodarte Star Wars dresses on the red carpet.
The weekend’s big Star Wars rumor is that Taron Egerton (Kingsman: The Secret Service) is in the running to play a young Han Solo. It comes from UK tabloid The Sun, via The Daily Mail (which drops a rumor/spoiler about The Force Awakens at the link, so maybe stop reading when you see Egerton’s face.)
The only fairly solid thing we know about casting the first spin-off is that Felicity Jones is the female lead (she can’t talk about it) – and the Hollywood trade reports that broke that said that Aaron Paul and Edgar Ramirez were up for the male lead. People seem to like Egerton for it, but I can’t say I see all three of these guys being up for Han Solo.
Kingman writer Mark Millar did tweet “Taron shot first,” but take that as you will. Whatever the case, it’s a British tabloid rumor, so I can’t put much faith in it just yet.
Since we just found out that Mark Hamill will be at Celebration, it seems appropriate that Jason at Making Star Wars is talking about Luke Skywalker’s role in the film today. Naturally, this is pretty spoilery stuff that references that last big spoiler, so you know the drill.
If you’d rather not, Mike Ryan has a nice piece about being into spoilers that contains no actual spoilers. Well, not for any movie that’s not already been out for years, anyway.
Mark Hamill appearing at Celebration Anaheim isn’t exactly a surprise – it’ll be his third Celebration, and he’s in that little movie due in December – but good to know.
I saw his chat with James Arnold Taylor at Celebration VI, and it was a lot of fun.
Hamill is the latest addition to a lineup of guests that includes J.J. Abrams, Kathleen Kennedy, Carrie Fisher and more.
At the the Irish Oscar Wilde awards – which honored Carrie Fisher – The Force Awakens director J.J. Abrams had a less harsh take on the rumors than one might expect. From the BBC:
Asked about the secrecy surrounding the script, Abrams added: “We did the best we can to preserve the story for the audience, but it doesn’t always work.
“There are a ton of rumours – some true, some false. But I’m grateful for everyone who would want to read a spoiler because it means that they care and want to see the movie.
“I know what it feels like, as an enormous Star Wars fan myself.”
Stephen Fry presented Fisher with her award.
Florian of Jedi Bibliothek (translated) found a listing for The Art of Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens on Amazon.de with a release date of November 2 – well ahead of the film’s release on December 18. Will that date hold? Well, it is Amazon, so: A not-at-all-firm maybe.
He also notes that the entries for most of the Journey to Episode VII series for young readers have been deleted, though the one that seems to feature new/original characters remains.
→ Spoiler corner: We also have two new rumors from Making Star Wars. There’s a rundown of the opening sequences, plus furthur details on some potential (or not?) offspring. On that note, Donna Dickens at Hitfix defends “Luke Skywalker’s right to get laid,” and I am totally jealous I did not think of that headline.