‘Star Wars’ flashback: ‘Republic Commando: Triple Zero’ (2006) (Book review)
Karen Traviss’ “Republic Commando” series started off with a pulpy war mission novel, “Hard Contact,” which also snuck in the notion of clones as thinking, feeling human beings – something that most prior novels and the people of the fictional GFFA ignored. In “Triple Zero” (2006), Traviss ratchets up her game by bringing the action to Coruscant
‘Star Wars’ flashback: ‘Republic Commando: Hard Contact’ (2004) (Book review)
Watching the clone troopers arrive with Yoda on Geonosis in “Attack of the Clones” in 2002, it was easy to think of them as organic robots. “Star Wars” fans now see clones as human beings in every meaningful way, and the EU began to shape that sentiment even before George Lucas addressed the issue in
The 5 best and 5 worst Special Edition/DVD/Blu-ray changes to the ‘Star Wars’ films (Movie commentary)
As longtime fans are well aware, the “Star Wars” films as we know them from the 2011 Blu-ray release are different in several small but noticeable ways from the 1977-83 releases – sometimes for better, sometimes for worse. And even “Episode I” is different from its 1999 release. Sometimes George Lucas made changes because technology
It’s logical that Anakin appears as ghost of younger self
Movie commentary: Here’s the in-universe explanation for why Anakin appears as a ghost of his younger self in “Return of the Jedi.”
What John thought about ‘Star Wars: A New Hope’ on its 30th anniversary in 2007 (Movie commentary)
To round out the “Star Wars” movie reviews on my blog, here’s a look back at my 30th anniversary essay for “Episode IV: A New Hope,” published in the Brainerd (Minn.) Dispatch on May 24, 2007, one day short of the 30th anniversary of the film’s premiere. Although my views haven’t changed much as we approach the
What John thought about ‘Revenge of the Sith’ in 2005 (Movie review)
To round out the “Star Wars” film reviews on my blog, I thought it would be fun to look back at my review of “Episode III: Revenge of the Sith” from May 20, 2005, in the Brainerd (Minn.) Dispatch. This was my first “Star Wars” movie review for a professional daily paper, so it’s written for a
What John thought about ‘Attack of the Clones’ in 2002 (Movie review)
Just for fun — and to round out the “Star Wars” film reviews on my blog – I decided to look back at what I thought of “Episode II: Attack of the Clones” upon its release in the summer of 2002. I wrote the review for my college paper, the NDSU Spectrum. I went on to rank
‘Star Wars’ flashback: ‘Revenge of the Sith’ novelization (2005) (Book review)
Among the films, the original trilogy is clearly better than the prequel trilogy, but among the novelizations, the opposite is true. It’s not because of anything Alan Dean Foster, Donald Glut and James Kahn did wrong; rather, it’s because the nature of novelizations changed. In the ’70s and ’80s, they allowed moviegoers to relive the
‘Star Wars’ flashback: ‘Knight Errant’ (2010-12) (Comic book reviews)
“Knight Errant” (2010-12), John Jackson Miller’s second “Star Wars” saga after “Knights of the Old Republic,” has one of the darkest possible premises: Lone Jedi Knight Kerra Holt tries to gather up slaves from Sith territory to bring to Republic space as refugees. This is a time – one generation before the “Darth Bane” novels —
‘Star Wars’ flashback: ‘Ewoks: Shadows of Endor’ (2013) (Comic book review)
Ewoks are notoriously controversial among “Star Wars” fandom. The reason, as a famous episode of “How I Met Your Mother” outlined, is simple: They were (successfully) aimed at kids. The marketing was so effective that you can predict a person’s age (or at least whether they were younger or older than 10 on May 25,