Gad I'm old....

Anyway there's quite a bit of stuff this year, and a cgi animated series in 2008, and live action in 2009.
Easier to link;

http://www.wizarduniverse.com/magazine/toyfare/003443978.cfm

I can't believe it's been 30 years. Seems like yesterday.I still remember waiting in line, At Eric's Place in center city Philadelphia with my brother and Father.I still haven't seen a movie that's made such an impact on my life as the First Star Wars in '77.

My wife and I were dating at the time. We'd gone with our friends to the Stanley Warner Route 4 (Paramus New Jersey), which may even have been a single large-screen theater at the time (it's 10 screens now). We loved it so much we decided to sit thru it twice. Only Mary had to go home or she'd get in trouble, so I drove her home, and came back to the theater afterward. SW was the last show, so the ticket booth was closed, but the manager was at the door. I said "I had to take my girlfreind home, but my friends are all still in there!" He let me back in!

My Grandfather took me to the first afternoon showing in Memphis, I had been drooling over publicity shots in kids magazines like Dynamite and Scholastic for months and was really jazzed to see it.

It exceeded all my expectations!

John, ditto with my wife and me - Went to see it on a date, I remember shrinking down in my seat as the Imperial Cruiser loomed overhead, and thinking "This is gonna be good!"

We went to see it again later that Summer in a Drive-In, and at the final scene EVERYONE started honking their horns - quite a rush.

It's funny, think about when your parents talked about a movie they saw "30 years ago"...It would have been in the 1940s - The Wolf Man, perhaps, or Casablanca, maybe The Cat People?

I remeber standing in line to see Star Wars in Jacksonville Florida as a teenager. Totally blew me away the first time they jumped to lightspeed!

My Uncle took me to see it at a mall in Tampa. It was part of my reward, for graduating from High School. One time seeing it, I was hooked for life!

Y'all are old. :tongue:

Heh, heh, I concur :) I was alive when SW first came out, but I saw it in 1983, before my teens, as part of the re-release of ANH for ESB.

It's funny, think about when your parents talked about a movie they saw "30 years ago"...It would have been in the 1940s - The Wolf Man, perhaps, or Casablanca, maybe The Cat People?

Funny how little has changed culturally between '77 and now compared to how drastically things had changed between '47 and '77. I still remember seeing Lucas' American Graffiti when it came out in '73 and thinking how ancient those bobby-soxed, hot-rod racing, doo-wop listening teenagers seemed - even though the story took place only a decade earlier. I seriously doubt we'll be seeing a film anytime soon with the tag-line "Where were you in '96?". Things just haven't changed that much.

Funny how little has changed culturally between '77 and now compared to how drastically things had changed between '47 and '77. I still remember seeing Lucas' American Graffiti when it came out in '73 and thinking how ancient those bobby-soxed, hot-rod racing, doo-wop listening teenagers seemed - even though the story took place only a decade earlier. I seriously doubt we'll be seeing a film anytime soon with the tag-line "Where were you in '96?". Things just haven't changed that much.

Zorro - with all due respect, I think things have changed little culturally from our slightly myopic viewpoint - except that those gol-durned kids have it so much better than when we were kids. Why I remember...
Um, back on topic. Cel-phones and text messaging as a primary means of communication? Download music from the internet into a device the size of a matchbook - let alone downloading movies? The music - my Lords, the MUSIC? Read a paper? I'll download it into my Bluetooth with my blogs... And think of some of the shows readily available on TV...There was the merest hint of what they contain when we were watching our favorite shows after homework was done.
I dare think we looked as ancient in our 1980's polyester and qiana to punk and grunge rockers of the '90s.

I first learned about "The Star Wars" from a brief blurb in the Winter `75 issue of Cinefantastique. Big budget science-fiction films were something of a rarity back then, so the fact that a major studio was getting behind a high profile fantasy epic by the guy who made THX and American Graffiti was exciting news for a geek like me. My curiosity was further piqued in the spring of `76 when I happened to glimpse a promotional booklet at a local sci-fi convention. By the time the novelization was published I was already primed and pumped for a motion picture experience I hoped would rival the likes of Planet of the Apes and Logan's Run.

Little did I know.

As opening day arrived, I pestered my rather unenthusiastic father into taking me to the 8PM show at the Chinese Theater. It was a bit of a schlep for us, about an hour's drive, and my dad, who was an insurance salesman, decided to kill two birds with one stone by paying a call on a client along the way. By the time we got to the theater the line was around the block, and I was sure we'd never get in. It was then that my dad -- who was as tight-fisted a Scotsman as there ever was -- did something I'll never forget: seeing how disappointed I was, he forked over fifty bucks for a pair of scalped tickets, then strong-armed us through the crowd and into a pair of seventh row aisle seats (yes, I still remember the row). God, I was proud of him.

Dad wasn't quite sure what to make of the movie at first (the robots were a bit silly for his tastes, and Princess Leia's attitude just plain pissed him off). But by the time the action moved to the Death Star he was hooked (having served aboard an escort carrier in WWII he could relate big time to the end battle).

The only reason I'm not attending Wonderfest this year is because it coincides with the Star Wars Celebration taking place here in L.A. Dad died years ago, but at 8PM on May 25th I plan to be inside the Chinese Theater with my seven-year-old son at my side.

Call me sentimental. :)

I dare think we looked as ancient in our 1980's polyester and qiana to punk and grunge rockers of the '90s.

Hmmmm ... maybe we're talking apples and oranges here, Chris. Technology marches on at an ever-dizzying pace, and "fashion" has it's limited shelf-life - but Star Wars as a cultural phenomonen is as ubiquitous as it's ever been, the biggest deal on the Grammys the other night was that The Police were appearing, and a brand new Rocky movie is playing at the local Multi-Plex. The past just ain't that past anymore ... is all I'm sayin'. ;)

I was wandered around downtown. I saw 5 people in line for the opening day of SW so I figured it was about to start. That was a lot for a sci-fi movie.
Forty five minutes later people were still coming in and I wondered if there were somehow two theaters in the building and I was in the wrong one.
Soon there were 3 rows of kids sitting on the floor at the front, 2 rows in each aisle, and dozens of adults at the back. Somehow they all knew it was going to be great.

There are some neat action figures coming out this year, like a battle damaged Darth. or the spiderman 3 tie-ins.

Rob - sounds like you had a great Dad. Sounds like he would be proud of you too.

Huzz

I guess I just don't WANT to believe it's been 30 years. :p

My dad took me the first week of June while we were visiting relatives out of town. Because, of course, when you're visiting relatives, you jump at any excuse to take a break. Wasn't my dad's cup of tea. He didn't get it sad to say. But I was overwhelmed in a way never before or since. The thing I remember most about that day was coming back to the relatives' house and being so disappointed in having to reinsert myself into reality. I didn't want to leave the Star Wars universe. In some ways I never did. :thumbsup:

It's a thrill to see my son loving Star Wars as I did. And there's so many cool toys!! As I type I hear the music for the Star Wars Lego 2 video game drifting upstairs.

Star Wars Lego is a really fun game. I've got both games so I can play all six movies as a little Lego character. Its a total hoot!!

Huzz

Love the many humorous touches they've thrown in. Leia using R2 as a trash can. A sandcrawler driving around on the surface of the death star! Hilarious. :p

I was supposed to go see Star Wars with a bunch of friend's for a birthday party. The birthday boy's mother got all stressed out about having to stand in line for 2 hrs, so she dragged us to a double feature of Stunts (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076776/) and Day of the Animals (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0075913/). :rolleyes:

Needless to say we were very very disappointed.

It was almost a month before my mother took my sister and me. We waited an hour for the box office to open, but were fourth in line. I've never been the same since. :hat:

My grandfather was the one who took me to see movies when I was a kid -- I could count on one hand the number of movies my parents took me to see, and I'd have fingers left over. I was also resistant to Star Wars back in the summer of '77, mainly because it wasn't Star Trek -- but the droids fascinated me. But he took me; I was at that magic age (I was nine years old) when you're ripe for something to make an impression. We went back to see it again about seven times over the course of the next 12 months. For the rest of his life, my grandfather named it as the best movie he and I ever saw together.

Now that I think of it, it's interesting that the first movie my grandfather took me to see was a Disney film (Song of the South). The first movie I actually remember seeing was also a Disney film (Bedknobs and Broomsticks). Star Wars made the biggest impression on me. The next-to-last movie he and I saw together was The Phantom Menace, and the last was another Disney film -- Tarzan.

Qapla'

SSB

Ahh, Star Wars. I was about fifteen or so and I went with a friend. Star Wars was the first movie I saw multiple times in a theatre. I think I went about four times, which, for me, was a lot! And know I've watched each movies several times on DVD with my kids. They love it!

When SW Special Edition came out, it was more thrilling for me, because I WAS in a line. I enjoyed talking to other fans, and having just bought an issue of STARLOG, I had more SW stuff to talk about.