I might be on BBC World Service today on a program called “The World” The World Today . They’re doing a special on 30 years of Star Wars and I just spoke with a producer for the show. They’ve recorded my comments, but I’m not sure if they will use them. I was speaking quite naturally until they said “We’re recording now” at which point I became nervous and incoherent!

• To find out if you can listen where you are in the world.
• If nothing else, it will be online here tomorrow.

Of course, if they don’t use anything I said, they just gained a slightly bigger audience for the price of an international phone call.

UPDATE: My mistake, I called the show “The World” instead of “The World Today”, in case anyone is paying attention.

For three months they worked on the only full-scale Millennium Falcon, the spaceship from the original Star Wars trilogy, to be built for the films.

And now Lucas changes his mind. More DVD money for them, I guess. The DVD will be available only for a limited time (=mad fan rush) between September and December this year, but the trouble is we all know it won’t be for a limited time. We’ve all been burnt before. Remember the Celebration “exclusive” toys that were later available online for all fan club members? Remember the multiple versions of multiple DVDs we’ve had.

And still, I will probably buy this set as well. I am a completionist, I run this web site, I need to have it all for reference if not for anything else. But all you regular fans, don’t buy it if you have the Special Editions. Or let’s organize a fan refund campaign- anybody who has spent more than $100 on different original trilogy versions in their lifetime gets half-off on this version!

In any case, the only cool thing to come out of this development is a Han Shoots First t-shirt; an official one. Good to know the folks at LucasFilm get the joke, and the irony. I just hope they realize the tragedy they have created as well.

The new DVDs will include the original version of the trilogy and the special edition. And yes, by original versions they seem to mean the ones that showed up in the first run in the theatres. So no Episode IV, yes Ewok celebration song and so on. Enjoy!

Suddenly, ObiWan’s half the man he used to be,
And his shadow’s hanging over me.
Oh, yesterday came suddenly.

Why he had to go I don’t know he wouldn’t say. (“Strike me down and I will become more powerful than you can imagine?”)
I kept whining along, now I long for yesterday.

Yesterday, the practice droid was such an easy game to play.
Now losing limbs is here to stay…
Oh, I believe in yesterday.

The tour started with “Luke’s landspeeder from Episode IV”:; a miniature and a full scale model. There was a section devoted to droids, with R2, 3PO, Droidekas and more. In the ‘Robot Theater’, they had a show (hosted by an animatronic C3PO inside a rusty sandcrawler) to teach kids about real world robots. The Aibos playing soccer was cool.

There were many sections where kids could build their own robots and test different real-world theories that could explain Star Wars technologies such as magnetic levitation and prosthetic limbs. Speaking of prosthetic limbs, in addition to models of the famous prosthetic arms of Star Wars, they also had models and descriptions of real world prosthetics.

Among Star Wars exhibits, the coolest was the 3-piece Darth Vader helmet, dismantled and available to view (through glass) inside and out. The inside of Vader’s helmet (as seen at the end of Episode III) is a very cool sight. There were many original models and costumes from the film; and for the first time, I saw stuff from all 6 films at the same location.

Instead of listing everything I saw, take a look at my Museum of Science picture gallery and come back here to tell me what you thought. The exhibit is definitely worth the trip for Star Wars fans; but you knew that already.

• Flickr : Here you can find a community around photographs. Upload your own, view others’, comment and search. The most fun part are the discussions and the tags. For example, here are all the most recent pictures tagged as starwars and the most interesting. You can even subscribe to RSS feeds (What is RSS?) per tag, user or comments. Here are all the pictures I’ve tagged as ‘starwars’. It’s a whole lot of fun.


• Del.icio.us : Del.icio.us is a flickr for bookmarks. Imagine a place where you could search and surf through other people’s bookmarks- that’s del.icio.us. The advantage is that it is a self-organized and pre-approved internet. Just as with flickr, here are some of the things tagged ‘starwars’ that people are bookmarking. And the most popular tagged ‘starwars’. It’s a great way to keep track of what people are up to on the internet and join in yourself as well.

“I am thrilled to have the chance to go back to something I composed in 1977 and be able to make the entire saga continuous theme-wise.” John Williams tells us. “Notably abscent in the first movie is the Imperial March. Being able to insert that theme in the first movie will create a much stronger emotional flow throughout the Saga. After the release of Episode III George will enhance the original trilogy with additional scenes and special effects, adding my adjustments to the score this will seamlesly branch the entire Star Wars Saga into one massive romantic space opera. I think something of this magnitude has never been done before.”