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The influence and Cultural significance of Star Wars? — Page 3

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corellian77 said:

theprequelsrule said:

zombie84 said:

Lee-Sensei said:

About the US and UK's global significance... it's called Cultural Imperialism. The cultures of the countries at the top are very influential.

Well, to be honest in the case of Star Wars is just boils down to 1) English speaking countries and 2) Domestic production. Star Wars was in many ways an American-British co-production so of course it will be biggest in those two countries. It's also, I would argue, equally big in Canada, which is maybe the one area you could make the case for cultural imperialism, but it's not really imperialism since it's a deliberate audience choice mainly because our own entertainment industry sucks in comparison.

Aren't you are forgetting about a little movie called Men with Brooms?

Or the aforementioned Jesus Christ: Vampire Hunter?

How about that CBC reality show that took place on the GO Trains?

“It is only through interaction, through decision and choice, through confrontation, physical or mental, that the Force can grow within you.”
-Kreia, Jedi Master and Sith Lord

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I worked with one of the guys from that show, actually.

Fuck, no wonder people think everyone in Canada knows each other.

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Is that "Train 48" you're referring to? Man, I completely forgot about that show.

“It’s a lot of fun… it’s a lot of fun to watch Star Wars.” – Bill Moyers

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 (Edited)

Hmmm.... do I smell a term paper? ;-)

In any case, the fact that people who aren't even big fans of the films quote them because the (OT) dialogue has become part of our lexicon and so many characters are used as descriptive monikers for individuals (Old wise guy? Yoda. Mean guy? Vader. Hot shot? Han Solo.) is evidence enough of the cultural influence.

Most of the more recent documentaries (like the one from '97 hosted by Howie Long) show multiple examples of how the OT films have influenced our culture.

Just an example from personal experience, I know that AT&T employees call their round logo-thingy the "death star."


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Bingowings said:

As for Star Trek in a wider sense, people are more likely these days to be able to identify members of long gone boy bands of the same era than any of the characters from DS9, Voyager or Enterprise.

Yeah, but those are the crappy ones.  ;-)

Forum Moderator
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 (Edited)

corellian77 said:


Is that "Train 48" you're referring to? Man, I completely forgot about that show.


But as much as that show sucked, it wasn't an actual reality show =P

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Are any of them?

Reality isn't really real really.

I blame cheese before bedtime.

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Article from today's sunday edition on the topic:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/11/fashion/popularity-of-star-wars-endures-even-for-children.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=star%20wars&st=cse

On one level Sci-Fi replaced Cowboys and Indians for children.  Bullets became lasers and swords returned from medieval play via the light saber.

Star Wars's simple title will stick around for the time when the stars/space are still our next destination.  Once that becomes more common place then the ideas of the myths embedded in SW will move onto other stories.

In the less short term, Star Wars will become the poster child for extended/perpetual copyright abuses.