January 28, 1997 @- The Panther Prints bY

J Jones

As goes with the theme of this supplement, I’d like to share with you my most personal, private thoughts and recollections of Star Wars. Ready? I, in my twenty years on this planet, have not seen more than 5 minutes of any Star Wars movie ever made. Yes, its true. Of course, there were exceptions to this general rule, like the time I went to my class bully’s 10th birthday party and watched “Return of the Jedi,’ but I was too cautious and concerned that I might break one of his toys and invoke his wrath than I was engrossed with the movie. Besides, I had already missed the first two movies, and what would be the harm of missing the next?

Well, in total honesty, I didn’t miss the first two movies altogether. I think I was about three or four when the original movie came out, and my parents thought that I ought to see such a ground-breaking movie event. (This, of course, was a time in the late 1970’s when VCR’s were

as distant as routine civilian trips to the moon.) I don’t remember much of it, except that I was horribly afraid of Darth Vader. The only clear, long-standing memory of the entire movie was during those close-ups where his face covered the screen, and proceeded to walk seemingly into the camera. In the mind of three year old who is at his first movie ever, and is just barely getting used to watching a very big TV in a very dark room, and was probably so hyper on those giant-sized candy bars that my head was spinning, this was twice as scary as any toddler’s nightmare.

I remember wailing every time he was on-screen, to the point where my parents had to take me home since I was disturbing the rest of the absorbed theatre. In perhaps a method of parental control, my room was redecorated in a Star Wars theme, complete with god- awful blue curtains and a Chewie doll. (Chewie is another fearful memory. To a three year old, he looks a lot like a teddy bear gone bezerk, which probably explains the fact that I preferred my “security penguin” instead of a teddy bear.) When I was bad, I was never threatened with the ‘boogeyman in the closet’ routine, but rather “Darth Vader on the curtains will come alive and get you.’ I rarely disobeyed my parents until I was twelve.

So, to this day, whenever someone brings up the subject of Star Wars-dom, or related subjects, or science fiction in general, I feel the overwhelming need to smile and nod, since I have no idea what they might be talking about. And to tell the truth, that frightens me more than - Darth on a Wookie rampage.

By Chris McNeil (chmcneil@upei.ca)

Well, it’s a new year, and a new swing on this column. Seeing as how I wasn’t sure what else to talk about after my last couple of columns, I’ve decided that instead of just being a helpful guide, I’d turn this into a

- little column where I can

talk about the wild, crazy and just plain weird things one find while surfing. Now, this is our Star Wars issue, and I came across something the other day which fits the bill.

When looking at the alt.fan.sf.starwars newsgroup, I noticed that the Wedge Antilles cult are at it again. Wedge Antilles? Who the heck is he? Well, I’m not a big Star Wars fan myself, but luckily (?) a friend of mine is, so I can get information on this kind of thing. It seems that Wedge is that guy in the first movie that has engine trouble or something and bails out, letting Luke take his shot at the Dath Star. That’s it. Oh yeah, I think he makes a brief appearence in the other two movies too, for a grand total of maybe one full minute on screen, and half a dozen lines. Wow. Truly the stuff of which legends are made.

Well, normally you'd be surprised if this guy even made character guides, but in fact, he has his own fan club. He’s arly voted as one of

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the most popular charac- ters, there web pages devoted exclusively to him, he even has his own newsgroup, alt.fan.wedge. His fans don’t call them- selves “Wedgies”, though, more’s the pity.

What’s so great about this guy, that would make people prefer him over Han Solo or Princess Leia, Boba Fett or Darth Vader? I’m not sure. Maybe it’s the air of mystery: a guy who is on screen for about fifteen seconds a film is pretty darn mysterious. Or-and this one I’ve heard batted around a lot-it’s because he actually managed to live through all three films. Maybe it’s those rugged good looks, though you'd have to see the actor in person because I think he’s always wearing a

y Chris McNeil

flight helmet on screen. Or maybe it’s the cool name: Wedge. Yeah.

It’s interesting to note that Wedge fans all seem to hate Luke Skywalker. They call him “farm-boy”, and say he’s a lucky hick who managed to be in the right place at the right time. He’s also not as good a pilot as Wedge, because using the Force is cheating. I wasn’t aware that war had any rules, but maybe it’s a Star Wars code or some- thing.

Ah, well. If you’ll excuse me, I’m going to wrap this up and go start a fanclub for that pilot waiting for Indy at the start of Raiders of The Lost Ark. He’s the real hero, and he wasn’t scared of snakes either.

SS,

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