Nerdist Presents – Star Wars Episode IX Opening Crawl

Nerdist is back with this “leaked” Star Wars Episode 9 opening crawl. With certain fans conflicted about some of Rian Johnson’s creative choices in Star Wars: The Last Jedi, what would happen if Lucasfilm completely bended to their demands, in real time?

Lucasfilm oversees Electronic Arts Star Wars games Weekly!

Via venturebeat.com:

It’s easy to think that Star Wars: Battlefront II is the sole result of Electronic Arts‘ work. That publisher taken the lead on developing and promoting the sci-fi shooter, which is available now on PC and consoles. But Lucasfilm is involved with everything.

“Yeah, that’s very much true,” Luasfilm brand boss Douglas Reilly told GamesBeat last week. “We have a games team here that I run, that meets with all of our partners, and particularly we spend a lot of time with EA, both on the marketing side and the production teams. We bring in Lucasfilm’s story team to help us shape and build the stories we’re telling, so they fit in the continuity of all the other things we’re doing with the Star Wars universe. So yes, we’re very hands-on.”

That involved strategy has the two companies spending a lot of time together.

“In general, we’ll have weekly meetings between the production teams and the marketing teams, with either EA in Redwood Shores or the individual teams in Stockholm and Montreal and Vancouver, wherever they have studios,” said Reilly. “We have weekly meetings. Then we regularly go and visit in person, probably once a quarter, to sit with them, play builds of the games, walk through progress and where we’re going in the future. We’re constantly talking, meeting, and engaging with them in a very collaborative way.”

Click below for the full story from venturebeat.com

Yo, Yoda!

Via Humortimes.com:

Yoda is shrouded in mystery, but we’ve got him pegged.

There are many species in the Star Wars universe — Humans, Hutts, Wookiees, Jawas, Rancors, and the Tusken (soon to be Las Vegas) Raider, to name a few. Yoda, though, nobody knows about.

YodaThe austere website Wookieepedia states that Yoda belongs to “Yoda’s species,” one that is “shrouded in mystery.” While such an enigmatic backstory only helps to grow one’s legend as an impossibly wise mystic, I think it’s pretty clear that Yoda is an Italian-American.

For starters, Yoda looks the part. He’s short. Even the Ewoks, the Irish of the Star Wars’ universe, are significantly taller. It’s rumored that he became such a master of the force after tiring of not being able to reach anything on a shelf. And you have the big ears, in which reside tufts of unruly white hair. Images of beloved Italian-Americans, like Danny DeVito, are reflected in Yoda.

Click below to read the full article.

EPIC ‘STAR WARS’ PREGNANCY ANNOUNCEMENT

Via Babble.com:
When Texas-based parents Zack and Naomi Russell discovered they were expecting baby number four, they decided their only option for the announcement was to “go big or go home.” And that they did — with a Star Wars pregnancy announcement that is simply out of this world.

Like most ’80s kids, Russell grew up with a love for all things Star Wars. He had a collection of action figures in a Darth Vader carrying case (which is probably worth mega Republic credits nowadays). He also had a lightsaber, an X-Wing, an R2-D2 alarm clock (remember alarm clocks?!?), a hand-made Jedi robe, and a Luke Skywalker lunch box.

Now, as a dad, Russell is still an avid Star Wars fan — along with his entire family.

As the dad of three girls, Russell is often teased about being outnumbered and being “the minority in the sorority.” The family heard all the typical lines about how they should “keep trying for a boy” and “maybe you’ll finally get that boy,” once they were expecting a fourth.

“To us, this was a subtle, but hurtful, devaluing of our daughters. I don’t blame anyone, though. We’ve all been programmed to adhere to the ideal norm of one boy, one girl,” Russell tells Babble. He continued:

“Anything slightly outside that norm is cute, anything way outside that is weird. Here we were with three girls already and a fourth kid on the way. A geneticist friend told us that the odds were actually in favor of #4 being a girl, too. Weirdsville all the way. But we’ve had several close friends struggle through infertility, and it put all of that noise into perspective.”

So how did the Russell family come up with the idea of a Star Wars pregnancy announcement?

Well, things got off to a bit of a slow start. When the expectant dad started brainstorming for a fourth baby announcement, he was dismayed to find a lot of “oops!” or “sorry, we’re pregnant again” type of announcements.

But then, inspiration struck.

“We had just seen Star Wars: Episode VII a few weeks before, so the dots started to connect in my mind,” said Zack told Babble. “The Force Awakens. The FOURTH Awakens! We made and rented some costumes, borrowed a green screen, and bugged some friends who were Photoshop wizards. It was tons of fun.”

Not to mention, Rey of The Force Awakens is an excellent role model for any little girl — perfect for the estrogen-heavy Russell family. After posting their announcement, they received lots of positive feedback, both for their creativity and for the exciting news of “the fourth.”

“I was of course happy when people complimented our creativity of [the announcement] but what was truly affirming was excitement for the new person who would be joining our family,” shared the now father of four.

Son, Paxton, joined his three sisters, Annalei, Miah, and Cassia in July of 2016. Russell noted, “Four kids is a lot of work and very difficult at times … we wouldn’t trade any of them for the ideal American family size or make-up.”

Jar Jar Binks Takes Over The ‘Rogue One: A Star Wars Story’ Poster

Via Slashfilm.com:
Even those who have a fondness for the Star Wars prequels recognize that Jar Jar Binks is an abomination to the sci-fi saga. The character is a walking punchline in a wholly infuriating way with no redeeming qualities whatsoever. Not even the insane theory about him being a genius villain who was in league with Senator Palpatine would be enough to make the character tolerable.

Since Jar Jar Binks can ruin things just by showing his stupid bug-eyed, duck-faced self, someone decided to take the gorgeous poster for Rogue One: A Star Wars Story and put Jar Jar Binks all over it. The clumsy, moronic Gungan replaced all of the heroes featured on the poster, from Jyn Erso to Saw Gerrera.

To hell with stealing the plans to the Death Star, just scan this image into the space stations operation system and it should just self-destruct.

Kudos to Empire Magazine designer and freelance illustrator Olly Gibbs for doing a fine Photoshop job with this creation. Not only is it high-resolution, but every Jar Jar Binks looks perfect as each different different character. Getting the holographic Death Star plans on Binks couldn’t have been easy, and it looks great. You might notice that there’s even a Jar Jar Binks version of K-2So, which might actually make the character a tad bit cooler. After all C-3PO can be pretty annoying, but he’s also useful as a droid. Plus, if Jar Jar Binks was a droid, we could just shut him off.

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