Star Wars news and movie reviews

During a recent episode of the movie discussion podcast Blank Check with Griffin and David, the hosts revisited Jonathan Demme’s 1984 film Swing Shift.

Considered by many (including me) to be one of the great lost classics of American movie history, Swing Shift was originally conceived as a dramedy about American women working in a factory while American men went away to fight World War II. Built around Goldie Hawn, then one of the biggest stars in the world, and the up-and-coming Christine Lahti, a bootleg of the original director’s cut has floated around Hollywood for years, accompanied by whispers about how much better it is than what was ultimately released in theaters.

Warning: Major spoilers for Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker follow, but not for several more paragraphs. I’ll let you know when.

When I was a little kid, I loved Superman.

For the last four years, Star Wars fans have been eyeing the end of the current trilogy — comprised of 2015’s The Force Awakens, 2017’s The Last Jedi, and this year’s The Rise of Skywalker, out this week — with both heated anticipation and dread. The Rise of Skywalker is the final chapter of a trilogy whose first two chapters were generally well-received, and which has felt like a huge improvement over the dismal prequel trilogy that debuted in 1999. But as the last Star Wars feature film for some time, The Rise of Skywalker has a lot riding on it. The movie was always going to either be a fantastic goodbye or a disappointing farewell for fans.

And now the end is here.

No spoilers follow, but strong opinions do; proceed at your own risk.

Disney was preoccupied with two things in 2019. The first was growing even bigger as a company, a task it accomplished by acquiring 21st Century Fox’s TV and film assets. The second was embracing the notion that its future lies not in the innovation it was once known for, but in taking very safe bets that guarantee its coffers will continue to swell, both now and long into the future.

With a publicity move that’s equal parts chaos and cunning, Burger King has revealed that it truly draws its power from the dark side of the Force. In Germany, the fast-food chain has introduced a promotion that involves “spoiling” the upcoming and much-anticipated film Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker in exchange for free Whoppers.

The promotion goes like this: Burger King has launched a voice-activated coupon that purports to contain spoilers for The Rise of Skywalker, and if you record yourself reading these spoilers (warning: clicking that link will take you to an alleged screenshot of one of the spoilers) out loud, you can get a free Whopper. Burger King has also released a commercial featuring the alleged spoilers embedded in the restaurant’s menu and showing customers freaking out over said spoilers:

Lucasfilm has finally revealed the official title for Star Wars: Episode IX. Drumroll, please.

The final film in the latest Star Wars trilogy is called Star Wars: Episode IX — The Rise of Skywalker.

In a new interview with the Hollywood Reporter, Disney CEO Bob Iger discussed everything from the future of Star Wars to Disney’s planned streaming service (it’s meant to compete with Netflix) to what the media giant’s presumed integration of Fox’s assets means for the X-Men.

Iger also spoke broadly about creating an open and safe working environment in the wake of the #MeToo movement, and revealed some key goals for the company, including being more direct in selling its individual brands.

Carrie Fisher will return to the Star Wars universe one final time in Star Wars Episode IX.

The actress, who died in 2016, apparently shot extra footage for 2015’s Star Wars: The Force Awakens that will be repurposed as a way to close off her story in the upcoming film, which premieres December 20, 2019. Both Force Awakens and the upcoming film feature the directorial work of J.J. Abrams. The decision was blessed by Fisher’s daughter, the actress Billie Lourd (who also will appear in the film, as she did in both Force Awakens and 2017’s The Last Jedi).

The Last Jedi is one of the best movies in the Star Wars franchise, for much the same reason The Empire Strikes Back is one of the best. Where the first movie in a trilogy is a thrilling adventure — 2015’s The Force Awakens mirrors A New Hope almost beat-for-beat in that respect — the second complicates the saga by introducing doubt, failure, and sadness.

That often upsets fans. There is tension between the narrative demands of a second film and making a Star Wars movie that does big business, sells toys, and makes fans happy. But adding darkness infuses a well-done second film with depth that endures over the long term.

A divide between movie audiences and critics happens all the time — especially with blockbusters.

Consider the recent case of Justice League, which brought together a bunch of big-name superheroes, to the delight of 79 percent of those who saw it and bothered to register their opinion on Rotten Tomatoes. Critics, however, only liked the film to the tune of a 40 percent score — a 39-point gap. There’s also 2016’s Suicide Squad, with a 26 percent score from critics and a 61 percent score from audiences, for a 35-point gap.

When Rian Johnson took on the job of directing Star Wars: The Last Jedi, he knew what he was getting into — which is why he brought along his longtime producing partner, Ram Bergman, on his first directorial foray into a galaxy far, far away.

Bergman and Johnson have been working together since Johnson’s first film, Brick, a 2005 low-budget indie noir starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt. There’s a huge gap between Brick and The Last Jedi, including the budget and star power involved, and the amount of anticipation leading up to the film’s release. But both still manage to feel distinctly like a Johnson film — which is to say, they both feel like a Johnson-Bergman film.

There aren’t many fictional worlds quite like Star Wars. Since the first film in 1977, George Lucas’s universe has been explored through stories in every possible medium, giving it a world-building depth that rivals J.R.R. Tolkien’s work.

Today, Disney has made it clear that the parameters of that universe are highly protected: There’s a dedicated Lucasfilm Story Group responsible for deciding what counts as part of the official universe, and a comically large number of people have been fired from the latest movies over creative differences on the series’ direction.

It is impossible to look at a porg, the fluffy orb of a creature that features prominently in the new Star Wars: The Last Jedi, and not feel anything.

Sure, for anyone with an aversion to tiny teeth or who carries a deep (and correct) distrust of anything avian, they might seem a tad disturbing. But to a lot of people, the cute puffin-beagle-chipmunk-like creature from a galaxy far, far away is heart-meltingly adorable.

This week, moviegoers will return to that magical galaxy far, far away when Star Wars: The Last Jedi hits theaters on Friday, December 15.

For Star Wars fanatics, the two-year wait between The Last Jedi and 2015’s The Force Awakens has been excruciating. Star Wars fans’ fealty to the franchise is well-documented, and they’ve been analyzing every single second of every interview and trailer, positing theories as to what’s going to happen in director Rian Johnson’s new installment and trying to uncover the movie’s biggest mysteries.

’Tis the season of Star Wars hype, and nothing has fans more hyped than this panicky little penguin thing from the new trailer for Star Wars: The Last Jedi.

This little guy is called a porg. They’re officially “the Star Wars version of puffins,” and if that weren’t adorable enough, their babies are called “porglets,” they’re inquisitive, and apparently make great pets.

The next chapter in Star Wars’ ongoing saga is drawing nigh, and fans can now get a substantial taste of what’s to come with the arrival of the first full trailer for Star Wars: Episode VIII: The Last Jedi, hitting theaters this December.

Directed by Rian Johnson, The Last Jedi is the follow-up to 2015’s Star Wars: Episode VII— The Force Awakens, and picks up where its characters left off: with Rey (Daisy Ridley) undergoing Jedi training at an ancient Jedi mountain temple in the care of an apparently much-changed Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill).

Star Wars: Episode IX is currently in need of a new director, as Lucasfilm and Disney announced on Tuesday that Colin Trevorrow — who was also developing the film’s script — has left the project.

The announcement came via a statement posted on the official Star Wars site:

Usually when filmmakers leave a project citing “creative differences,” people assume they mean they couldn’t quit fighting long enough to actually make the film.

But in the case of Phil Lord and Christopher Miller’s exit from the upcoming Han Solo prequel film — a Star Wars spinoff slated for May 2018 release — it’s totally believable.

Now that Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens and Rogue One have blasted through theaters to become huge parts of the Star Wars mythos — and the top-grossing films of their respective release years — it’s nearing time for The Last Jedi (aka Episode VIII) to do the same. The highly anticipated follow-up to The Force Awakens will be released on December 15, 2017 — but what do we actually know about it going in?

As per Star Wars tradition, news about The Last Jedi has been trickling out in fits and starts, thanks to the combination of Lucasfilm and Disney’s aversion to spoilers and a meticulously honed publicity campaign that only lets us in on Stars Wars secrets when said publicity campaign decides it’s time for us to know them. But in any case, here’s what we know so far.

A damaged and dour Luke Skywalker. Rey training with her lightsaber on a rocky bluff. An epic space battle. A retaliation against the Resistance from the First Order.

Those images, among others in the long-awaited first official trailer for Star Wars: Episode VIII — The Last Jedi, suggest that Rian Johnson’s sequel will have a darker, more somber feel than 2015’s The Force Awakens, just like The Empire Strikes Back had in comparison with the original movie.

The Force is with us again: The first trailer for Star Wars: Episode VIII – The Last Jedi made its debut on Friday at Star Wars Celebration 2017.

We get to see Rey (Daisy Ridley) undergo training and wield a lightsaber. We witness what looks to be an attack on the Resistance. And we hear Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) utter an ominous sentence: “It’s time for the Jedi to … end.”

And lo, on January 23, 2017, the movie formerly known as Star Wars: Episode VIII became a full-fledged movie with the announcement of its official title: Star Wars: The Last Jedi.

It’s a fitting title given that The Last Jedi is the follow-up to 2015’s hugely successful The Force Awakens, which ended on a sweeping shot of Rey (Daisy Ridley) handing a lightsaber to Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) on the top of some remote mountain, in the hopes of getting trained in his Jedi ways.

Carrie Fisher, who died December 27 at the age of 60, was best known for her iconic, kickass performance as Star Wars’ Princess Leia. But Fisher also had an equally kickass, incredibly successful career as a writer, script doctor, and mental health advocate, not to mention as a fantastic performer in works that weren’t related to the film franchise that made her (most) famous.

I was lucky enough to see Fisher’s one-woman show, Wishful Drinking, at the Arena Stage in Washington, DC, in 2008. I’ve never forgotten how brutally funny and insightful she was about her struggles with bipolar disorder, addiction, and life in the spotlight. It’s awful that we’ll never get to see the follow-up to that project — which she was just about to start work on when she died, and which would have been called “Wishful Drinking Strikes Back: From Star Wars to, uh, Star Wars!”

Carrie Fisher wasn’t just Princess Leia. She was a writer, a mental health advocate, and also just a straight-up hilarious person. Fisher could turn even the dullest of interviews into a quip fest, but to see her at her comedic best, you should head straight to Netflix to watch her 2007 guest turn on 30 Rock.

In “Rosemary’s Baby,” the fourth episode of 30 Rock’s stellar second season, Fisher plays Rosemary, a feminist comedy writer who is one of Liz Lemon’s heroes. Liz invites Rosemary to work as a guest writer on TGS, but Rosemary’s provocative ideas — what about a sketch at a New Orleans abortion clinic? Or some racial humor? — prove too edgy for TGS’s GE-shilling ways. At first, Liz reflexively sides with Rosemary and her radicalism, but when she sees Rosemary’s rat-infested apartment in Little Chechnya (“So gritty and real!”), she’s horrified. “I can’t end up like that,” she breathes.