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EUbits: Celebrating the ‘regular’ people, Apocalypse page count, peek at Stover’s Insider short

Listage. Lane over at Roqoo Depot gives the regular folks of the GFFA their due with his list of the top ten non-Force sensitive Expanded Universe characters.

Fate of the Jedi. Lightsaber Rattling reports on Troy Denning’s comments about the likely Apocalypse page count.

Short stories. Get a peek – though not a particularly readable one – at Matthew Stover’s Insider short story, ‘The Tenebrous Way.’

Interview. Writer John Ostrander talks Agent of the Empire with Nerd World News.

Artists. Five contributers to Star Wars Art: Comics share their thoughts on the franchise and comics at CBR.

Excerpts. Two more from Darth Plagueis – a mini on Facebook, and a larger one at Random House’s online catalog.

Pretties.Concept art from Genndy Tartakovsky’s traditionally animated Clone Wars cartoon. It graced Cartoon Network in the gap between Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith, and I’m sad to hear that the DVDs have apparently gone out of print, because it was an amazing series of shorts.

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X-Wing: Mercy Kill cover art, blurb revealed!

Star Wars Books and StarWars.com have released the cover and blurb for Aaron Allston’s X-Wing: Mercy Kill, one of next year’s most highly-anticipated novels. Here’s the blurb:

Outcasts and misfits, spies and warriors, pilots and troublemakers — they’re Wraith Squadron. Founded decades ago by ace pilot Wedge Antilles, this elite intelligence unit, disbanded at the end of a catastrophic civil war, is reunited by former leader Face Loran to find out whether one of the galaxy’s most powerful military officers is a traitor… and whether anyone can stop him if he is. To succeed in their mission, the Wraiths must become thieves, pirates, imposters, forgers, and liars, staying just one step ahead of their enemies and the law!

The cover art is by Mike Bryan. It’ll be the tenth novel in the X-Wing series, which was a staple of the 90’s Expanded Universe, and the first in more than a decade.

Mercy Kill, a hardcover, is currently on the schedule for August 7.

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Syfy brings a triple dose of Christmas cheer with Eureka, Warehouse 13, and Haven?!

Eureka and Warehouse 13 are returning for another round of holiday warm fuzzy episodes tonight on Syfy, and Haven is joining them with its first Christmas episode as well. Eureka ends up animated (in multiple styles from stopmotion to anime, no less) with snowman ninjas, polar bears, and more. Warehouse 13 gives agent Pete Lattimer the It’s a Wonderful Life treatment (Don’t worry about how this fits with the season 3 ending!). And Christmas comes to the weird town of Haven — in the middle of summer.

And being Syfy, there’s also some holiday specials from their other staples: Ghost Hunters on December 7, and an original movie on December 10: Snowmageddon. Over Christmas, the channel will be running marathons of several shows, including Merlin and Being Human, while they will ring in 2012 with their annual marathon of Twilight Zone.

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Essential Reader’s Companion prelim cover, blurb revealed in Random House summer catalog

Knights Archive was first to spot that Edelweiss has the Random House summer catalog items up. The highlight is a preliminary cover for Pablo Hidalgo’s Essential Reader’s Companion. Here’s the blurb:

A new, never-before-published entry in our extremely popular series of fully illustrated Star Wars Essential Guides. Star Wars: The Essential Reader’s Companion is a book Star Wars fans have been asking for, and will be presented with astonishing full-color artwork throughout!

Star Wars: The Essential Reader’s Companion is the first Essential Guide devoted entirely to published Star Wars fiction, from the original movie novelization, to young reader’s books, short stories, eBook novellas, and the most recent adult novel. This book will cover all the fiction that has built the Star Wars Expanded Universe over the last thirty-five years.

Also appearing are X-Wing: Mercy Kill, which features a very vague ‘blurb’ with no cover, and The Millennium Falcon Owner’s Workshop, which we already know plenty of.

And while we’re on the topic of catalogs, both Mercy Kill and The Essential Reader’s Companion have made their appearances on Random House’s main online catalog as well. They’re currently due out on August 7, 2012 and August 21, 2012, respectively.

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The Clone Wars, Star Tours up for Annie Awards

The International Animated Film Society released its list of nominations for the 2011 Annie Awards, and both Star Wars: The Clone Wars and the new Star Tours theme park attraction made the list. The Clone Wars earned a nomination for Best General Audience TV Production, competing against such shows as Archer, The Green Lantern: Animated Series, MAD, and The Simpsons. Two voice actors picked up nominations: Dee Bradley Baker, who plays Rex and all the other clones (although the Annie nomination list credits him as Obi-wan Kenobi!) and Nika Futterman, who earned her second nomination two years in a row for voicing Asajj Ventress.

Behind the scenes, Joel Aron of Lucasfilm Animation got nominated for an individual achievement in an animated production for his work on The Clone Wars, while ILM staff picked up individual nominations for their work on Rango, and swept the individual achievement nominations for animated effects in live action productions: Cowboys & Aliens, Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, and Transformers: Dark of the Moon. For his work editing a television production, Jason W. A. Tucker picked up a nomination for The Clone Wars.

Star Tours picked up a nomination for best animated special production, running against Adventure Time: Thank You, Batman: Year One, and Ice Age: A Mammoth Christmas, among others.

The 39th annual Annie awards will be announced on February 4, 2012.

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Paula’s tips for Star Wars holiday decorating

Nothing says “Peace on Earth” quite like a generational story about war in a galaxy far, far away. And recently, fans have been showing off their Star Wars Christmas trees on the StarWars.com Twitter feed. When my tree covered entirely in Hallmark ornaments was featured, I got a surprising number of questions from people all over the world asking me about it. So let’s make like an intergalactic Martha Stewart and see what I can share.

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EUbits: Tom Dupree revisits his Star Wars years

Blast from the past. Tom Dupree, who was an editor at Bantam, writes about his time editing Star Wars novels on his blog as part of a larger series on his career. Old-timers like yours truly will remember him dropping little hints of book news on the AOL Fan Forum, or perhaps such hints being reported in a so-called ‘fan fiction’ newsletter.

Interview. Michael Reaves talks Shadow Games over at Suvudu. Iffy on the book? Take a test drive with a 50-page excerpt.

Excerpts. A little bit of Luceno’s Darth Plagueis.

Comic reviews. Over at Big Shiny Robot, James reviews Knight Errant: Deluge #4, Crimson Empire III: Empire Lost #2, and Dark Times: Out of the Wilderness #3.

Pretties. Flickr user Sith_fire30 creates custom figures based on Star Wars games and comics. Be sure to check out his Jedi Master Luke Skywalker (based on an issue of Invasion, Cade Skywalker, Savage Opress and more.

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The Clone Wars goes undercover with ‘Slaves of the Republic’

Anakin, Obi-wan and Ahsoka go undercover on Zygerria in ‘Slaves of the Republic’, this tonight’s episode of Star Wars: The Clone Wars. Will posing as a master and slave go well for the master and apprentice as they try to rescue to the people of Kiros? Here’s two clips from this second chapter in the three part story arc, adapted from The Clone Wars comics tale.

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