Thursday, April 8, 2010

Star Wars Characters

I try not to publish the same posts on my different blogs, but I recently did a post on The Movie Guy about Star Wars and since I only have 7 people who read that blog, I thought I'd get more input by posting it to Chaka's World. I don't consider myself a Star Wars geek, but like most Americans, I'm familiar with the characters in the series that George Lucas has made household names. I'd like to share my thoughts on some of them.

The Coolest

5. Chewbacca- The name, the fur, the crossbow, the wookie yell. What's not to like?

4. The Imperial Guard- Despite being bad guys and having a very minimal roles, these elite red storm troopers are some of the coolest and most mysterious characters.

3. The Darths- This includes Sideous, Vader, and Maul. If your first name is Darth, then you can probably expect a career with the dark side of the force.

2. Boba Fett- This bounty hunter is a stud. I would have liked to have seen more of him.

1. Obi Wan Kenobi- I like both the original Alec Guiness and also the younger Ewen McGregor version. I think it is probably has something to do from the inflections of his voice. My all time favorite Star Wars line is "These are not the droids you are looking for". Using Jedi mind tricks has gotten me out of traffic tickets, speaking in church, and jury duty.

Mixed Feelings

Han Solo- I am a big Harrison Ford Fan, but the tough rebellious guy who pretends not to care act gets old after a while.

Yoda- I know he teaches some great wisdom like "Do or do not, there is no try", but he is also guilty of being a Muppet and saying things like "Good Relations I have with the Wookies."

The Worst
5. Queen Amidala- R2D2 expresses more feelings than her. She is emotionless, sad, and depressing.

4. Battle Droids- These guys are absolutely worthless. They are about as threatening as a slinky and all they do is get sliced to pieces by light sabers. The coolest thing they do is come out of storage.

3. Ewoks-I didn't go to the theater to see jungle Care Bears in space!

2. The blue elephant, and long lipped singer who perform at Jaba's lair. Why throw in such dumb puppets that detract from the coolness of the movie?

1. Jar Jar Binks- No surprise here. I never would have thought that another Star Wars character could make C3PO look cool.

Any characters you like or dislike that I may hve missed? Opening this up to discussion is kind of like my version of a book group discussion. It may not be Shakespeare, Austen,or Steinbeck, but at least I can follow the story line and the special effects are way better too.

11 comments:

Cheeseboy said...

Great recap. I can't fault you for any choices. O.B. has always been my favorite too.

I do think the robot clone army were lame in Episode I. But then, the entire Episode was pretty bad.

Eric said...

I like Watto. I can totally identify with an entrepeneur junk dealer with a stereotypical Arabic accent.

elesa said...

You forgot about Anakin. Especially in 2 and 3. He clearly needed someone to beat him within an inch of his life. He only became cool once he was Darth Vader. But i think you are wrong about Han Solo. And not just because I am a girl. And I am not crying at all right now!

Tom said...

elesa, I'm not dissing Mr. Solo, I just hate it when he has to act so independent and pretend like he doesn't care when he really does. I totally agree with you that young Anakin was in need of constant cuffing.

Fungleberry said...

Love the post. Great stuff about Jar Jar, though I have always thought 3PO was cool!

If you love Star Wars and hate the prequels check out the Improved Star Wars Prequels at Nojarjar.blogspot.com

Fungleberry said...

Great post! I hate Jar Jar, but I think 3PO has always been cool! I love the Ewok bedtime story in Return of the Jedi!

If you love Star Wars and are disappointed with the prequels check out the work being done at:

http://nojarjar.blogspot.com

Kristina P. said...

Is it sad to say that I really don't care about Star Wars? I'll probably be divorced by the end of the week.

HoodChick said...

Funny, I don't think of myself as a STAR WARS geek, but I know all you wrote about. Damn, I guess that's what happens when you work in IT and just pretend to be one of the cool kids...

Tracy P. said...

Hello? Princess Leia ROCKED the house at Jabba's place in that outfit. We should all look that great!

Cal's Canadian Cave of Coolness said...

"Moss Eisley Space Port - you will never find, a more retched hive of scum and villainy. We must be causcious." - minus my spelling that one does it for me.

I kinda always hated that Leia played the whole 'slug slut' thing just to make the rescue plan work. I don't buy that. Not my Leia anyways. Luke KNEW she would have to be caught freeing Han or else he wouldn't have set up the whole 'R2-D2 shoots me my lightsabre in the desert plan' in the first place. HEY, now that I think about it ALOT of coincidences just had to happen for that whole thing to work. DAMN you Lucas.

And Yoda. Let be honest here. The whole organization kinda feel in the crapper on YOUR watch. For an guy with so much age and wisdom you got played, bitch, by a few Sith and a kill switch.

I do like the sheer stupidy and 'Roger Roger' of the battle droids. The "Clone Wars" show put me back in love with them. Rule number one about robots. Make ONE that is smart like R2 - any more and you got yourself a robot problem

If I can give credit for one thing we should all agree that Lucas got RIGHT and impressed us all was the 'birth' of Darth Vader scene. That was scary and sad and epic all at the same time. Every part of the prequels should have felt like that.

Oh and I hate Annakin. WORST actor ever in parts 2 and 3. Hurts me physically to hear him deliver his lines and whine his way to the top of the food chain. GAH!

Tom said...

I just watched Star Wars again with my kids last night and have to say Han Solo is cooler than I gave him credit for. Also, after closer examination, Princess Leia is a bossy b**** in the first movie. I guess being forced to be Jaba's slave/bikini chick helped humble her later on.