So having staked a claim about being more of a comedy fan than a sci-fi fan yesterday and also have not long ago written a blog about how it was time to let Star Wars run with a new generation, I've found something that has placed me firmly back into sci-fi mode and reminded exactly why I was so obsessed with Star Wars for all those many long pre-CGI years. It's called the Star Wars Vault and it's easily the best twenty quid I've spent in a long while.
To call it a book would be misleading. It truly is a vault as virtually every page contains little pockets with stickers, transfers, iron-on T-shirt patches, facsimiles of sketches, handwritten notes and script pages, cardboard press-out spaceships and more. Also, in wisely deciding to focus on the original trilogy far more than the newer films, it's a truly self-indulgent nostalgia fest for me. Another nice bonus is that some of the inserts for the newer Star Wars stuff it contains are for things I actually went to - the programme for the Art Of Star Wars Exhibition at the Barbican and the admission ticket for the marathon screening of all six films on the day of the UK premiere for "Revenge Of The Sith" *. There are some surprising inclusions in there as well. Lucas has long ago vowed to track down and burn all copies of "The Star Wars Holiday Special" made for TV in the late seventies and yet the vault contains not only an extract of the script but also a recording of Carrie Fisher singing the closing song of the special which was set to the Star Wars theme (it really is more horrible than you would imagine).
If you're a child of seventies Star Wars (you know, the good stuff) then try and have a squint at this. It'll bring back some hazy rose-tinted memories of running around with broom handles for lightsabers** and making "Zhuuum" Zhuuum!" noises with your mouth.
* I came third in an MTV competition with this and got tickets to the marathon. They gave out free Red Bull all day to keep us awake. By the time George Lucas came out to introduce the third film, I was bouncing off the walls thanks to the huge amount of caffeine pulsing through my veins (I don't drink tea or coffee).
** The geek equivalent of jumpers for goalposts.
2 comments:
I have that Star Wars Holiday Special on VHS somewhere...George Lucas can fight me to the death for it.
Don't get me wrong: I hate the movie. Too much Wookiee in too small a TV screen. And the guy on the...TELEVISION SET?! I mean, really.
And it's a good thing Carrie went to writing books as opposed to singing songs, otherwise we'd all be hurtin'.
Yeah, I still have it, too. Years ago, I was desperate to see it and then, when I did, I understood exactly why he wanted it burnt. It's not even "so bad, it's good", it's just bad.
(And, yeah, too many Wookiees...doing nothing for about 15 minutes...)
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