It's our StarWTF!? Life Day Celebration! Today we look at one of the most INSANE Star Wars productions, the Star Wars Holiday Special... and specifically we are discussing Bea Arthur's badass bar tending character, Ackmena. She's the rough and tough nighttime bartender at the Cantina, who is wooed by a man which a volcano head... and did we mention that she sings to the customers? It's both wonderfully entertaining and completely unwatchable.
Ackmena was the nightshift bartender in Chalmun's Cantina in Mos Eisley on Tatooine. She was a favorite amongst the patrons there, as she was more approachable than the daytime bartender, Wuher.
We also discuss our favorite Star Wars Christmas gifts from over the years.
As well as a few things from our own personal gift wish lists.
Happy Life Day everyone! Goodnight, but not goodbye.
Today we look back at Dejarik, the game that you probably know as "Holochess". It's the chess-like game that Chewbacca and R2-D2 play in the Millennium Falcon. The Dejarik table is a Star Wars icon (even teased by JJ Abrams during episode 7 shooting), but is the game itself any good? And more importantly, if you were playing, would you let the Wookiee win?
Dejarik was a popular holographic game that was played throughout the galaxy. When activated, the game would project holographic playing pieces that resembled dangerous-looking species from throughout the galaxy. The players can move their pieces to attack one another and said pieces will behave like living beings when in battle.
With The Force Awakens trailer out, everyone is buzzing about the new cross-guard lightsaber, but we go way back to the Expanded Universe and talk about the Lightwhip! We discuss the worst possible "light" weapons, and speculate on what we'll see in the sequels. (Note: We recorded this BEFORE The Force Awakens trailer was released, so there's lots of speculation. Alex's was eerily accurate.)
Lightwhips generally functioned on the same principles and mechanics as lightsabers, emitting a coherent beam of energy that was used as a weapon. However, rather than the straight, meter long blades emitted by standard lightsabers, lightwhips featured long, flexible blades that often exceeded several meters in length.
In this episode, we discuss the coolest looking vehicle in the Star Wars universe. And we get right down to business with the AT-AT vs. A Tee A Tee debate. How do YOU pronounce AT-AT? Then we discuss the practicality of the design. What is inside of this beast of a vehicle??
There was a Kenner commercial that said "at at" about 7,000 times in 30 seconds.
Lego continued the tradition:
Then decided to change their mind:
But most importantly we have this:
And there it is! The word from Joe Johnston, Art Director on Empire Strikes Back and DESIGNER OF THE AT-AT. "Imperial Snowalker" has a nice ring to it...
The Force Awakens trailer is here! We've watched it a few dozen times and are ready to discuss it in a special edition of StarWTF!? This one is a little more speculation than education as we know as much as you do. We just may have watched it a few more times.
We get to the bottom of the most famous drink in all of the Star Wars universe... blue milk! We figure out where it comes from and desperately try to figure out why.
We also talk about how much of this Luke actually drinks and whether or not it has medicinal effects. It's all crazy, as you would expect.
In this episode, we discuss the ever-stable & always awesome bounty hunter IG-88. It's an assassin droid with seconds of screen time, but pages and pages of Expanded Universe backstory. And that story is intense.
We also learn what "IG" stands for (it's not exciting at all) and how creative they were in naming all 4 IG's as well as IG-88's aptly named ship, the IG-2000. It's a longer episode than normal, but well worth the length.
