Star Wars - Comic-Con and "The Force Unleashed"

Comic-Con is something I've obviously heard about, both from friends who have attended and because I'm involved in events and discussions where Comic-Con is often brought up. I've never actually been interested in attending, especially when I've heard how crazy and crowded it's gotten, but when I recently found out what would be happening on Star Wars Day this year on July 25, 2008, I actually considered making a last-minute day trip. Most interesting to me are the ILM and Hasbro seminars. ILM will be having a panel on the effects they did for "Crystal Skull", which I enjoyed, and it's been so long since I've seen ILM do a presentation. Multiple years ago, I was fortunate to be able to attend a number of presentations done by ILM, including one on the effects done on "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" and "The Abyss", and I loved seeing all the steps in the process of getting the effects to the screen. My favorite seminar was when they had a presentation for their 20th anniversary, and included was an 8 minute segment that showed some of the highlights of the films they'd worked on, and it was mentioned that the segment was shown to employees, some of whom had been with the company from the beginning, so they saw 20 years of their lives flash by in 8 minutes. Hasbro will be having a presentation to talk about the toys they will be releasing in 2008 and 2009 in the Star Wars and Indy lines, and since we're big collectors in both those areas because we love their stuff, I'm excited to see what I'm going to be spending money on in the next year.

So I was unsure about whether I really wanted to take the day off and drive all the way down to San Diego and deal with wading through Comic-Con, but the decision ended up being made for me when I discovered that registration is already closed because the con is sold out. Oh, well, at least I don't have to make the decision for myself. I'm sure there will be multiple write-ups on the net about Hasbro's presentation, so I'll just have to remember to look for those in a week or so.


In other Star Wars matters, the new videogame "The Force Unleashed" will be available on September 16. This game has been in development for years, and we've been hearing about it and seeing footage from having attended seminars at WorldCon and Celebration IV the last couple years. The husband can't wait for this to come out, and it's pretty much the reason he wanted to get the PlayStation 3, though he has also enjoyed playing the Star Wars and Indy Lego games. I'm not really into the gaming as much, though I like watching it, so I expect I'll watch a bit when he plays, but I'm actually interested in the underlying story/plot, so I'm excited that the novelization is going to be released on August 19. I've been jokingly taunting the husband that I'll get to read the novel a whole month before he can play the game! :)

LucasArts has released an official trailer that shows the look of the game as well as the backstory. (In case the trailer doesn't show up correctly below, here's the direct link to it.)




To me, it actually looks like a trailer for an amazing new animated movie. I'm looking forward to reading the book and watching the husband play the game.