Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with the new This Week In Star Wars.
So, it's my first slightly delayed column. Here I was so proud to have gotten it out on time during my European/Middle Eastern adventure and then I let little things like exhaustion and a half-day of travel from the West Coast back home make me late by a day. I'm so disappointed in myself, but I can't be too mad considering how fantastic I feel after sleeping for 14 hours.
We're a day late, but it's here. Let's see what happened between August 17 and August 23, shall we?
August 19th, 1973 - Ahmed Best born.
Yeah, he's probably the most hated man in Star Wars film history, but as much as I fall into the “Jar Jar sucks” camp I don't blame Best for it. My problems with the character have less to do with Best's voice and movement work and more to do with how he's written. Stepping in shit, clumsy to the point that might as well have been a Looney Tunes cartoon and accidentally heroic... it's a badly written character and I feel like much of the time Best has to shoulder the majority of that criticism.
The man deserves some credit for being one of the first to embody a wholly CG creature. He didn't just record his lines and call it a day. He was there in that silly get-up. Before Andy Serkis perfected performance capture, Best was there to provide movement reference for Lucas' digital animators.
So, happy birthday Mr. Best!
August 23rd, 1974 - Ray Park born.
Darth Maul is a little more beloved than Jar Jar. Just a little bit. Ray Park killed it in the role. He looked fantastic, he was perfectly menacing and had the martial arts skills to back up the evil look.
Maul as a character didn't need to be much more than Palpatine's bulldog and that mystery helped make him iconic, but I gotta say the expanded character work done in The Clone Wars cartoon is pretty fantastic, too.
Happy 41st birthday, Mr. Park! Thanks for kicking ass all over the place!
August 17th-19th, 1978 – Ralph McQuarrie “Sword fight, interior work room” painting began and finished.
Another week, another look at some of Ralph McQuarrie's work. At this point in production of The Empire Strikes Back he was going hard at the climactic saber duel between Vader and Luke. Once again I'm blown away at how simple and perfect his design work is and just how closely it resembles what was shot the next year.
August 21-22, 1978 - “Sword fight on antenna” by Ralph McQuarrie completed.
Jesus, look at that! It's so beautiful. What I wouldn't give to be able to paint something like that... Yet another spectacular piece by Master McQuarrie that helped set the template for one of cinema's most famous reveals. Simply incredible.
The above image is the final product. I also have his rough sketch that preceded it so you can see a little bit of his process. Check it out:
That's it. Short one this time out. Next week has a little more substance, including the anniversary of Lucas finalizing his Star Wars contract with Fox, which happened at an odd time. We'll talk more about that next week! See ya' then!
-Eric Vespe
”Quint”
quint@aintitcool.com
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