joefavs

Came across this article the other day about the old Star Wars CCG game from the 90s, which I collected avidly as a kid and recently have been trying to get into playing with a couple friends. Link: https://www.theringer.com/2018/5/21/17374528/star-wars-customizable-card-game-player-community

Anyway, the reason I’m sharing it here is this paragraph:

Holland helped them do that by purchasing an original print of Star Wars and an expensive editing machine that (Braunlich recalls) carried a $50,000 price tag. Decipher imported the equipment from Hollywood to its headquarters in Norfolk, Virginia, and used the machine to capture high-quality images for use on the cards. “That was one of the reasons I always thought it was such a successful game—because the cards were just awesome,” Braunlich says. “Sometimes an image that’s fleeting in the movie, just in the background, we’d want to make a card out of it. And the artists there would do computer magic, and the players really loved that.”

Now, I know from experience that the printing process was unreliable enough that sometimes copies of the same card would look a little different, so the cards themselves probably aren’t worth much as a color reference for projects here, but this was a fun new fact to me that I thought was worth passing along. Honestly, I think a lot of my own personal ideas of what the “right” colors are for Star Wars are based on these cards.

Solo gets an A- on CinemaScore, which sounds pretty good but I guess it’s the lowest grade they’ve ever given a Star Wars film? (I don’t think I understand CinemaScore)

Yeah they really ought to have done a lot more with Val. Kind of a waste of a Thandie Newton performance. It’s going to be cool to have Enfys in the mix moving forward, though.

How is “slavery is wrong” a controversial position for a character to take?

I’m currently working my way through the Jurassic Park 4k set. The original film looks stunning. The second one looks pretty good too. There’s a massive drop off in quality with the third one though, it looks worse than a lot of 1080p blu-rays I’ve seen. Haven’t watched Jurassic World yet, but it’s a recent enough movie that I’d assume it’s original master would yield a fine UHD disc.

Has anybody besides Mala said that they liked TLJ and hated Solo? I’m only seeing “liked both”, “hated TLJ but liked Solo”, and “hate everything, why am I even still here”.

SilverWook said:

I’m of the opinion Lobot was at Cloud City before Lando won it.

Not canonically, they’re already buddies in the Lando comic miniseries.

Of course I liked the droid. I adored Phoebe Waller-Bridge on Fleabag and the idea of a droid revolutionary is an interesting angle that we haven’t seen.

That said, I’d rather have a Lando movie set later and have him with Lobot.

A No Country For Old Men thing could be fun, where a younger bounty hunter starts impersonating Boba Fett unaware that he survived the Sarlaac and the real Fett eventually hunts him down.

Also, L3 is the best character and whether you were happy or sad to see her go is my new litmus test for whether we’re going to get along.

I believe the Han/Fett rivalry was set up in the (no longer canon) Han Solo Trilogy by A. C. Crispin. I don’t hate the idea of bringing that back, but you’re definitely correct to say it currently has no basis in canon material.

Anyway, I’d like to see the “Boba Fett movie” actually turn out to be something like The Good, The Bad, & The Ugly, where he’s a major player but not the sole focus. There’d definitely be room for Alden’s Han and/or Donald’s Lando in something like that.

The beach planet was Savareen. The forest planet wasn’t named in the film, but I’ve seen it suggested that it might be Batuu, the planet where the upcoming Disney park is set.

Tag & Bink in the visual guide. Looks like they were definitely officers and must have been cut.

I don’t understand the problem with teasing Jabba at the end. They clearly want to do a sequel, and we all know he’s got to start working for Jabba sometime, so why not plant that seed here? It felt to me like the joker card at the end of Batman Begins.

The Soundtrack Show podcast is currently in the midst of a 6-part series on the first film’s score. It’s very in-depth and I can’t recommend it highly enough to anyone who likes to nerd out about the music.

link:
https://www.soundtrackpodcast.com/

I’m getting some strong James Horner Star Trek vibes whenever Powell drops a slowed down Rebel fanfare, particularly in “L3 and the Millennium Falcon”.

Also, I really enjoy the swoony old Hollywood thing that “Lando’s Closet” has going on.

SilverWook said:

A couple more things. This movie really had the old school Marvel comic vibe going. That early post movie run when it was just Han and Chewie trying to make some money and getting in no end of trouble. Heck, this could have been one of the 50 page annuals.

I really liked the monkey pilot guy. I’m surprised they had the balls to kill him off as I’m sure somebody at Disney probably wanted him to survive.

Favreau’s plate is probably too full right now to keep playing space chimps indefinitely.

The soundtrack seems a lot more interesting listening to it on its own this morning than it did in the theater last night. I think it must have seemed so boring because of how it was mixed in the film.

Glad I missed whatever that was while watching Solo. Speaking of which, it’s time to try and place the new film.

1-2. Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back
3-4. The Force Awakens, The Last Jedi
5-6. Return of the Jedi, Solo
7. Rogue One
8. The Phantom Menace
9-10. Attack of the Clones, Revenge of the Sith

Couple other EU things I noticed were the imperial academy on Carida and the Teras Kasi fighting style.

SilverWook said:

Anyway, I absolutely loved it. And the unexpected cameo did not bug me like I thought it might. I’m sure this thread will manage to harsh my buzz in the morning. 😛

Ron Howard probably deserves a medal for taking the reins on this. I suppose we’ll never see the footage shot by those other two guys.

Also, nice little Easter egg if you know your Brian Daley books.

Pretty sure I caught a Lando Calrissian and the Mind-harp of Sharu reference, too.

Did Tag and Bink get cut?

joefavs said:

Now that we know Enfys Nest is a woman, do we think there’s going to be some kind of big casting surprise? The only actress on the IMDB cast without a character listed is Lily Newmark, who seems to be far too young, so I have to think it’s someone else.

I was so close to calling it. It was sitting right in front of me, damn it.

So much fucking fun. I’m not sure the actual mechanics of the heist made sense, but the movie had so much charm I absolutely don’t care.

The one thing I will complain about though is the inclusion of Maul. Bringing him back on The Clone Wars was one of the dumbest things to ever happen in Star Wars, even if it did lead to some interesting stuff. When they finally killed him for real on Rebels, I breathed a sigh of relief that I would never have to explain to anyone who only watches the movies that the guy actuallY survived being cut in half and falling into a bottomless pit. But now, here we are.

Sports culture tends to churn them out. I’m not on a personal crusade against athletes or anything, but I’m sure as hell not going to go out of my way to make friends with any, because I’m an adult and I don’t have to.

Oh Christ, now I’m in the dumbest conversation.

TV’s Frink said:

Yeah but are you pro-football-player-in-cheesy-80’s-sci-fi-movie or anti-football-player-in-cheesy-80’s-sci-fi-movie?

I’m pro-Flash, neutral-leaning-con actual football players (excluding the protesting ones).