Star Wars: Episode VII: The Nerd Rage Awakens

[Timby]

I just started collecting vinyl this year. There's tons of new releases. It's coming back.

It's not "coming back," inasmuch as that it's still an extremely niche market, but a lot of major label releases still get limited vinyl runs, and minor releases / niche artists get limited runs, as well. All fifteen of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds' albums have been released on vinyl, and they have extremely limited appeal in the United States, for example.

Scores are a slightly different beast, however, in that they're an extremely niche market. Soundtrack sales on CD have fallen off a cliff to the point that the specialty shops like La-La Land Records commission extremely limited runs. Vinyl's a whole other story. Like, when Fury Road was announced a vinyl soundtrack release, that was huge news.

 

[Tulin]

don't you mean the 17th?

Well, we'll be going to the midnight showing at 12:01 on Thur. 17/12 so, since we'll be getting to the cinema at about 8:30pm on the night of Wed. 16/12, that's the date I'm using. EIther way, it's still AT LEAST a full day before the Yanks get to see it!

 

[Tulin]

I was really looking forward to it, but after reading IGN's review I think I'll wait too. The review said that while it does reveal a few things about the state of the galaxy post-RotJ, the story itself and it's new characters just aren't very interesting. I'm wondering if the fact that all of the post-RotJ books and comics we're getting before the movie focuses on new characters means that they are waiting to show us what Luke, Han, and Leia were up to then after the movie comes out. I guess I can understand wanting to keep people surprised about where they are in TFA, but it is kind of annoying.

Yeah I can understand not wanting to reveal what those characters have been up to in the last 10 or 20 years, but surely we could at least learn something about the first few years or so after ROTJ. It's hard to imagine that would really impact very much in TFA.

Watch Lego Droid Tales!

That's RIGHT after the Ewok celebration!

 

[Hound of UIster]

Well I was really looking forward to reading that new Aftermath novel, but from the reviews it sounds like it's mostly just focused on a whole bunch of new characters (and Wedge, woohoo) and barely involves Han, Luke and Leia at all. Which were frankly the only ones I was really interested in learning more about post-ROTJ anyway.

I might still give it a shot, since I'm curious to learn anything about the state of the SW universe after ROTJ, but I still can't help but feel a bit disappointed.

I was really looking forward to it, but after reading IGN's review I think I'll wait too. The review said that while it does reveal a few things about the state of the galaxy post-RotJ, the story itself and it's new characters just aren't very interesting. I'm wondering if the fact that all of the post-RotJ books and comics we're getting before the movie focuses on new characters means that they are waiting to show us what Luke, Han, and Leia were up to then after the movie comes out. I guess I can understand wanting to keep people surprised about where they are in TFA, but it is kind of annoying.

I took advantage of Comixology's Star Wars sale to pick up a couple of legends comics cheap, Tales Vol. 1, and In the Shadow of Yavin, the first collection of Brian Wood's post ANH series.

The Greg Rucka mini Shattered Empire is probably going to be better. Honestly most DR affiliated novel writers are just terrible barring a few exceptions.

The best thing so far from Aftermath is

Spoiler: ...

the New Republic is back and Boba is probably alive

.

 

[JD]

Anybody heard about the other books released today? I know three of them a kids books, and one is YA but I'd still be willing to read them if they're good.

 

[Mr Light]

I was looking at them in Target today. There's three tiny hardcovers that are for "middle grade" children each starring Han, Luke, or Leia. The Han one is by Greg Rucka. Then there's a fatter book that's even longer than "Aftermath" something about Stars. I hadn't heard of this one and reading the dust jacket I couldn't tell if it was a real novel or a YA novel.

 

[Allyn Gibson]

Anybody heard about the other books released today? I know three of them a kids books, and one is YA but I'd still be willing to read them if they're good.

I'm getting those (the Han/Leia/Luke books and Lost Stars), along with Aftermath, through work next week.

I flipped through Aftermath at a bookstore after work last night and read bits and pieces here or there. (Yes, including the epilogue where a character is so vaguely defined in that scene -- and I have no idea if he appears elsewhere in the novel -- that part of my brain went, "Wait, is that supposed to be...?") I wasn't really taken with the prose style -- I generally find novels written in present tense to be pretentious -- but I'll give it a shot next weekend.

I didn't see the others, but I'm curious about them. The Luke/Han/Leia books are set between the original trilogy movies, if I remember correctly, and Lost Stars is set after Jedi.

 

[JD]

From what I read it sounds like Lost Stars actually starts during the OT and ends with some stuff after RotJ.

The Star Wars.com Database has been updated with vague info for TFA. I'm not sure how long ago the update happened, I found it through an update to IGN's TFA wiki's update to it's Starkiller Base page.

Some interesting new info I've found so far

Spoiler: nothing big, but there are lots of spoilers here.

Starkiller Base is home to a superweapon capable of destroying an entire star system.
Poe Dameron is "Black Leader", and he is the owner of BB-8. The second bit I find interesting, since so far pretty much every image of BB-8 we've seen has been with Rey. He's even an accessory for several of her action figures.
Phasma "leads The First Order's legions of troopers".
A character, probably a droid, named B-U4D (Buford) is part of the Resistance starfighter ground crew.
Constable Zuvio is a "tough and humorless" "law officer on a mostly lawless world". I'm pretty sure I saw a reference to him in relation to Jakku on one of the toy boxes.
Ello Asty is a "skilled if occasionally reckless" X-Wing pilot.
Finn: "A trained warrior desperate to escape his past, Finn is plunged into an adventure as his conscience drives him down a heroic, but dangerous, path."
Kylo Ren has a Interrogator Droid.
First Order Riot Control Stormtroopers and First Order Snowspeeders have entries.
The black Ties are Special Forces Tie Fighters.
The smaller ships we see with the Star Destroyer in the trailer are First Order Transporters, which are used to ferry people between orbiting ships and planets.
General Hux: "A young, ruthless officer in the First Order, General Hux has complete confidence in his troops, training methods, and weapons".
Goss Toowers I part of the technical crew for the Resistance Starfighters.
There's an entry for a group called the Guavian Death Gang Enforcers, who apparently wear special armor.
Jakku: "A frontier world, Jakku is home to thieves, outlaws and scavengers".
Kylo Ren: "A dark warrior strong with The Force, Kylo Ren commands First Order missions with a temper as fiery as his unconventional lightsaber".
Lugga beasts, which Teedo, the scavenger Rey appears to get BB-8 from, rides, are semi-mechanical.
Poe Dameron: "An ace pilot, Poe Dameron is a leader in the Resistance's fight against the evil First Order. He soars into battle behind the controls of a modern X-wing Fighter".
A character, probably a droid, named PZ-4CO works in Resistance base control rooms. The similarity to C-3PO makes me think they might be a protocol droid.
Resistance toopers have to "rely on hit-and-run tactics when faces with the overwhelming might of the First Order". So it sounds like the Resistance is apparently the underdogs in this fight.
Rey: "Rey is a resilient survivor, a scavenger toughened by a lifetime of dealing with the cutthroats of the harsh desert world of Jakku". So it sounds like she has spent the majority of her life on Jakku. I do have to wonder how that fits into the theories about her parentage.
Rey rides an "old salvaged speeder".
Sarco Plank is a "scavenger and trader" who has to wear a special mask to survive outside of his native environment.
Tasu Leech is the leader of an interstellar criminal organization called the Kanjiclub.
Jakku scavenger Unkar Plutt's thugs are "strong armed bullies".

That stuff covers most of the entries for TFA I found, but there were a few that didn't really have any information worth posting.

 

[Hound of UIster]

I guess the Expanded Universe and KJA's ridiculous WMD fetish continues with Abrams/Kasdan. Starkiller Base would have been more appropriate for ROTJ.

 

[JD]

Yeah, that one is a little disappointing, but I guess they must feel they need a big Death Star level threat to give the heroes more motivation.

 

[Skywalker]

I know that the details will be pretty different in the movie, but so far a lot of this stuff on the surface just looks like a bunch of ideas cobbled together from the EU and given a new coat of paint.

 

[Allyn Gibson]

Some interesting new info I've found so far

Spoiler: nothing big, but there are lots of spoilers here.

Starkiller Base is home to a superweapon capable of destroying an entire star system.

I find that disappointing

Spoiler: Reasons

I assumed that "Starkiller" was a tip of the hat to Lucas' original draft of Star Wars, in which one of the main characters was named Starkiller. I wasn't expecting it to be literal in the KJA sense.

 

[DWF]

Some interesting new info I've found so far

Spoiler: nothing big, but there are lots of spoilers here.

Starkiller Base is home to a superweapon capable of destroying an entire star system.

I find that disappointing

Spoiler: Reasons

I assumed that "Starkiller" was a tip of the hat to Lucas' original draft of Star Wars, in which one of the main characters was named Starkiller. I wasn't expecting it to be literal in the KJA sense.

There's no reason why it can't mean both, but then the above spoiler was among the earlier speculation posted in the thread months ago.

 

[fireproof78]

I guess the Expanded Universe and KJA's ridiculous WMD fetish continues with Abrams/Kasdan. Starkiller Base would have been more appropriate for ROTJ.

Let's be fair. Lucas did start it for them with two out of three of his original films revolving around a Death Star.

"Oh, building it again? Great idea, and who's going to give me a loan?"

 

[FPAlpha]

The Star Destroyer looks interesting, though I image Fantasy Flight will make one for Armada in the near future (Wave Three maybe).

I'd bet money on it that they will.

In about 10 days they will release a new X-Wing core set featuring the new X-Wing and the new style Tie Fighters so having SW7 ships in Armada is a no brainer but i guess early 2016 since Wave 2 with the "proper" Imperial Star Destroyer and MonCal capital ships are set to release in Q4 2015.

It depends on what other bankable ships the movies will have.. unsubstantiated information from an aquaintance of mine here in Germany, who works for a publishing company with good ties to Disney, state that all the merchandise we see now are just from the first third of the movie and if that's true we are just scratching the surface.

 

[Venardhi]

It would be really nice to see some new "hero" ships. Nothing in the PT really joins the Star Destroyer, X-Wing, Millennium Falcon, Slave I, Death Star, TIE Fighter, etc. as memorable (and, in some cases, iconic) "characters" in their own right. You could make an argument for the original chromed-out Naboo ship, I suppose. . . but I wouldn't.

 

[Timelord79 (he/him)]

They had a few good tries, but those ships didn't really see some good action to qualify.
The Naboo ship's escape run really was the closest.
Others could have been Darth Maul's personal ship and Dooku's sail boat.
Both of those were basically only used for scene transitions sadly.

But to be fair. Slave I was in the prequels.

 

[Tulin]

You could make an argument for the original chromed-out Naboo ship, I suppose. . . but I wouldn't.

Uuuuuummmmmmm ................. No.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

It would be really nice to see some new "hero" ships. Nothing in the PT really joins the Star Destroyer, X-Wing, Millennium Falcon, Slave I, Death Star, TIE Fighter, etc. as memorable (and, in some cases, iconic) "characters" in their own right. You could make an argument for the original chromed-out Naboo ship, I suppose. . . but I wouldn't.

They had a few good tries, but those ships didn't really see some good action to qualify.
The Naboo ship's escape run really was the closest.
Others could have been Darth Maul's personal ship and Dooku's sail boat.
Both of those were basically only used for scene transitions sadly.

But to be fair. Slave I was in the prequels.

Not to mention, the Millennium Falcon appears in Revenge of the Sith. *ducks*

Of course, the Tantive IV is in the PT as well, and prominently so, and I've always regarded that ship as genuinely visually interesting, both inside and out.

As for the ships new to the prequels, I agree, nothing is as "iconic" as the offerings from the OT.

To me, not providing a new set of iconic ships is actually one of the weaknesses of the PT, albeit one of the less serious weaknesses. Even the Star Destroyers are less interesting than their counterparts from the OT. Similarly, the Consular-class cruiser is less visually interesting than the Tantive IV.

For me, the most visually interesting ship originating in the PT is the Separatist Munificent-class star frigate. I thought the bridge tower was visually interesting, even if it was too vulnerable to be smart on a warship. It's only seen in the background, though. I guess the bridge of the Invisible Hand is kinda cool, but as a whole the ship was ridiculous, I thought.

 

[Mr Light]

I love the Clone Wars ships. The Separatist capitol ship. The ARC-180 fighters. The Jedi fighters from ROTS (didn't like the AOTC one). The Naboo starfighter. The Naboo Queen starliner.