A ‘Star Wars’ Fan’s Confession

When I started this gig, I vowed never to write about Star Wars as a topic. You see, I love Star Wars. An Attack of the Clones IMAX poster hangs over my printer. The Darth Vader voice-changer mask sits next to my phone, it’s within arm’s reach from me right now (yes, sometimes I wear that hot bastard when scribbling this column). A collection of light sabers buddy up against my DVD shelf. And other useless Star Wars shit currently takes up an entire corner of my mom’s basement. I’ve visited Skywalker Ranch, a trip I was more than willingly to go in debt for since my newspaper was good enough to get the invite, but too crappy to afford my travel expenses. I camped out for the prequels (but I did not dress up, gotta draw the line somewhere damn it). Oh, and most shocking of all, I actually love all three prequels.

Now you may have noticed I used the word “love” twice just a few sentences apart. That’s why I chose never to discuss Star Wars in this column. Writing about something you “love” tends to come off as mawkish, drool-sloshing hyberbole. And I prefer to leave that nonsense to Ain’t It Cool News.

But with the computer-animated Star Wars: The Clone Wars hitting theaters this weekend, I can no longer remain quiet. I must say this. I have to say this. I wouldn’t be a true Star Wars fan if I didn’t say this.

I just don’t give a shit whatsoever about this movie. I’m way more pumped to see Tropic Thunder again this week than visiting the wars in the stars.

I mean, I’ll see Star Wars: The Clone Wars, probably even on Friday, but it’ll feel more like a chore than anything else. I’ll probably even watch the TV series (my TV always seems to be tuned to TNT as it is). But in the end, I’m completely indifferent towards Star Wars: The Clone Wars. Well, not indifferent. In fact, I think it looks awful.

But it wasn’t always like that. About 3 years ago is when word leaked that George Lucas planned both a computer-animated and a live-action TV series. At the time, both prospects excited me (actually the live-action one still does, if it ever happens). Considering this was Lucasfilm, I figured the computer-animated show would push the technological envelope. Either it’d be really nifty and hyper-stylized like Genndy Tartakovsky’s brilliant hand-drawn “Clone Wars” series or it’d break out some photo-realistic animation similar to what Beowulf achieved.

Then I came across pics from the film. And holy shit. How disappointing. The characters looked like bobble-head dolls. Lifeless, blocky toys. I half expected Woody and Buzz Lightyear to appear in the film. At this point interest waned. But it’s when the lameass trailer arrived that I went from “meh” to complete and utter “wtf?”.

The problem with the trailer, other than proving the animation looks just as shitty in motion as it does in a still, is that it’s built like the trailers for the live-action Star Wars films. For the live-action trailers, the editors didn’t have to show all the money-shots. They knew that just footage of Star Wars characters standing around and looking at something off-screen (Ewoks humping in the distance, who knows?) would be enough to whip the public and media into a frenzy. Oh my God, Yoda!!! R2-D2!!! Some tattooed dude!!!

Yet, with the animated film, it doesn’t work that way. Showing a Yoda that looks whittled from Irish Spring soap looking as if he’s about ready to poop a hammer doesn’t do much for anyone. The trailer needed to roll out images that have only existed in the wet dreams of fanboys to really hurdle the obstacle of its cruddy animation. Yet, nothing in that trailer shows anything that hasn’t been seen in the live-action films.

It’s a turd of a trailer. It looks like a turd of movie (and early word indicates that the perception is reality). This feels like a disjointed, cheap rush job. And in some ways it is. There was never suppose to be an animated film. Essentially Star Wars: The Clone Wars is the TV series’ first few episodes scotch-taped together and from what I can gather, Lucas should have left it as a TV series. I’d say the majority believes Star Wars finished on a successful note with Episode III, although there is a debate on whether it was successful relative to the prequels or the original trilogy. But who cares? Most people enjoyed it. Yay.

Yet, Lucas can’t help leaving a rotten taste in the mouths of moviegoers. You know something has gone seriously wrong when an ardent Lucas supporter like me turns his back on the franchise. It’s just so bizarre for a Star Wars movie to be coming to theaters and me not buzzing from an anticipation high. I suppose this is what the prequel haters felt like before Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith. Hmm, what a suck-ass feeling.