I’m watching a lot of what’s swirling around with Star Wars right now with some real fear and even disappointment.  I watched Last Jedi when it first came out and, on a whole, loved it.  I’m not a big Star Wars fan at all (Live Long and Prosper), but I do love the franchise.  I even found some merit in a few spots in the Prequel Trilogies.  Like damn-near everyone in the modern world, I grew up on these movies and the story of Darth Vader, Luke and Leia Skywalker, and Han Solo, is formative to me.

What I don’t get is why these news movies are a problem.  Force Awakens was a delightful return to form and Last Jedi was, as ‘Movie’ Bob Chipman put it, ‘an earnest love letter to Star Wars fans’.  Seriously, if you aren’t watching his stuff, go check it out.  Yet many a fan of the franchise takes umbridge with whole swaths of it, if not flat-out renouncing it.  There’s a petition to have it stricken from canon.  There’s even an edited version that cuts out all the female characters (I refuse to refer to it as a fan-edit; no fan could make something like that).  Insanity. Continue reading →

Day Two of 2018.  Exciting, isn’t it?  Did you make any New year’s Resolutions?  How many of y’all have already been to the gym?  How many of you have already missed a session at the gym?  No worries at all, it happens.

I do want to address one small issue, a common problem with New Year’s Resolutions, and goal-setting in general.  That is mistaking work, effort, being busy, with being productive. Continue reading →