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| In this episode: Star Wars I: The Second Trailer |
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STAR WARS: EPISODE I
THE SECOND TRAILER 
No, this one is no joke. I did see it today. Fox was showing the trailer at their
studio, so I took a long lunch, hooked up with Sven (who's temping there), and HAD A
BLAST! They were showing it repeatedly in a small screening room. The screen was,
therefore, small, but the sound was nice.
You can see the trailer already at the Star Wars website. But if you want the immediate skinny, here's what I think: It's fantastic. Amazing. Magnificent. If the movie is anywhere near as good as the trailer implies it is, we're all set, baby. This trailer focuses on the larger story, or at least part of it, while the teaser trailer focused on the Anakin angle. If you don't want to know anything, skip this paragraph. Or maybe skip everything and wait to see it yourself. In the trailer, there's talk of invasion by what looks like the Lords of the Sith, or the Federation maybe, or both. There's a gang of attack droids (seen fleetingly in the first trailer). There's a fleet of giant, hovering transports of some kind moving over fields of green grass. There's a spooky-looking Sith Lord speaking of revenge. There's C-3PO in various stages of fabrication. There's Ewan and Liam doing some fucking awesome light saber play. 'Scuse the language. There's Senator Palpatine looking almost as goofy as he does as the Emperor, at least when he's in his robe. There's some kick-ass small-craft race or chase through what looks like a Tatooine landscape. There's Jabba—or probably some other Hutt, since he doesn't look as young as the fake Jabba in the Special Edition of Star Wars. There's a lot. The effects, for the most part, are shockingly good. There are some CG problems, like there always are, but most of the CG effects are keenly realized. 'Scuse the language. There are some fantastic creations here, like the weird reddish droids that unfurl themselves like dangerous pill bugs. Some of the ships are great, too, but some look, well, fake, like CG stuff. Then there's that retarded floppy-eared guy. We hear his voice in this, and, oh, man, I'm gonna hate him. He looks fake and his voice is silly. Just plain silly. Natalie Portman gets a lot of exposure, but she has a terrible English accent. Thank God she's got her hair-dos. They put Leia's cinnamon buns to shame. Funny thing is I don't recall her having an accent in the teaser trailer. I think Liam and Ewan are gonna rule this movie, and the bad Sith guy looks scarier than either Darth or, of course, the little gnome they call Emperor. Whether he has the same cool as Darth, though, is yet to be seen. He could just be your run-of-the-mill bad guy with spooky contact lenses. Since the trailer is effects-heavy and deals mostly with grand plots and action, there is still room for the movie itself to fall apart with the actual human interaction and the writing and the acting. Seems like everyone's talking about the rumor that Jake, the kid playing Anakin, sucks. His one line in the teaser trailer would support this, but that's only one line. At least he's not CG and doesn't have a silly voice. I'm gonna hate the floppy-eared guy. Really. That's the word. If you have time, go to the Star Wars website. Download the trailer and the gaudy new poster (see above). May the... what's it?... the Forts be with you.
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