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BEWARE: This is NOT music related. Star Wars fans continue reading…

Beneath the surface of being the vocalist for the progressive industrial metal band, Agrippa93, I’m also die hard Star Wars fan. This year marks the 30th anniversary of Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back, so it’s time to take a break from writing about music and plunge into my inner geekdom to pull out some very fond childhood (and adult) memories.

I’m not the “fanatical collect everything and constantly criticize George Lucas Trilogy snob”, but I have been a fan since I was 4 when Star Wars hit the theaters for the 1st time and ever since. Even stayed loyal through the dark ages when the only pieces available were the Droids and Ewoks cartoons and that horrible live action Ewoks made-for-TV movie, and that wasn’t much to grab.

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The Trilogy Snob is a special breed of Star Wars fan than only accepts the 1st 3 released film (Episodes IV, V, and VI) as true canon. They believe that George Lucas should have never made the prequels and  that all EU (Expanded Universe) including books and comics are garbage (This very similar to American Euro-soccer snobs who refuse to support the US National team and belittle any US soccer league). Some will go to even more extreme views and refuse to acknowledge any but the unenhanced versions of the 3 original films. I’m at the complete opposite side of that view, which could be referred to as Star Wars liberalism, where is I see every new enhancement and new story as a contribution to the Star Wars universe created by Lucas.

Even with all the little quirks like “wooden acting” (probably due to direction) and cheesiness moments including Jar Jar, (Hey, Jedi had freakin’ little teddy bears) I still love all 3 of the prequels and even count Revenge of the Sith as my favorite of all the films. Sith ended on an even bigger downer than Empire Strikes Back. The hero has fallen to the dark side, many have been killed and evil prevails. The prequels are what they are and no amount of whining and moaning about what they could have been is going to change that.

In addition to the 6 Star Wars films the latest addition to the Lucas canon is the Clone Wars animated series, which has just ended it’s 2nd season. This series takes place between Episode II: Attack of the Clones and the conclusion of this era Episode III: Revenge of the Sith during a time in Star Wars history called the Clone Wars, 1st mentioned by Obi Wan Kenobi in Episode IV: A New Hope. For many kids, this is their 1st encounter with the Lucas franchise.

Many fans I know dismiss this as simply a kids cartoon not to be taken seriously without even having seen a single episode. As having seen every show since season 1, episode 1 I can safely say that this series holds up to the standards of the Star Wars franchise adding new layers to the foundations the films laid down. Season 2 has really gone the extra mile in digging into the Star Wars universe and making it part of the whole story, even bringing background stories into light with characters like Boba Fett.

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Back to the original intent of this post before I started rambling off about fan types and canon. Empire Strikes Back is 30 years old this year and it’s time to reflect on that. 30 years ago at age 7 I sat in the front row of the theater waiting eagerly for the next installment of Star Wars, which seemed like forever to get here. I remember clenching the ends of the arm rests with my hands nervous about what was to unfold. This was long before the internet was accessible for anyone to do a quick google search for spoilers.

I remember being shocked at Han Solo uttering a swear (“Then I’ll see you in HELL!”) in the scene where he rides his tauntaun out into the cold blizardy weather that is the planet Hoth. The big scene came up where Luke has crashed onto Dagobah to meet the great Jedi Master Yoda, of which was meant to be a surprise that it was a little green muppet that sounded an awful lot like the cookie monster. No one in their right mind would guess that it would be him.

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I was unfortunate to be sitting next to some blabber mouth kid who had already seen the movie and somehow felt empowered by ruining the surprise for me. I get a nudge from this kid, who I didn’t know to begin with, and he leans over and says to me, “That IS Yoda.” That fuck head killed that Empire moment for me along with the shocking revelation that Darth Vader is Luke’s father. If you are reading this and you were that kid, please email me so we can meet up. I’d like to beat you senselessly within inches from death, wait months for you to heal, and then do it again.

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As with A New Hope, Kenner released whole bunch of truly awesome toys to go along with the movie. For Christmas that year the only thing I wanted was that snow speeder and my mom must have gone to every store in Connecticut looking for one, finally locating probably the last one on earth and it was missing the box and some of its parts. Regardless, she got it for me along with a bunch of other Star Wars toys to fill out my collection, which made my Christmas that year.

Preserving Star Wars toys for collectors’ value was not even a thought at the time and I played hard with them. Like most kids at the time it didn’t take long for the Obi Wan and Darth Vader figures to lose their capes and break their light sabers (nothing a colored toothpick couldn’t cure). By the time Empire toys were out the new Luke Skywalker figure did away with the sliding saber action on favor of a separate piece that he could hold (still yellow?) and be easily lost.

Among other Empire toys I had the Hoth battle scene with exploding base pieces and collapsing walls, the Wampa, the tauntaun with the slit belly to stuff Luke in (Open Belly Rescue Feature), and every figure that came out that year including some of the more obscure ones like, IG-88, Ugnaught, and 4-LOM. Missing from my toy box was the much sought after AT-AT walker and the Slave I with carbnoit frozen Han Solo.

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Back to the movie itself. The Empire Strikes Back is an iconic film that has given us such huge pop culture references like “Luke, I am your father”, which everyone in the world knows. It was a leap forward from A New Hope in that it defied the sequel curse of not living up to the original. The director pushed the story through the characters giving them more depth while still maintaining the look and feel of the Star Wars universe. The story ends on a down note with evil prevailing, a huge risk at the time for a hollywood movie, and most fans claim it as their favorite of the Trilogy, because of that.

Empire Strikes Back has been around for 30 years now and the movie still holds up today. Although some purests will argue, over the years the digital enhancements Lucas made to it and the others only  made the experience of watching them over and over again much better and even palatable for modern 1st time viewers who would see the old special effects outdated and distracting.

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