Star Wars 7x7: A Daily Bite-Sized Dose of Star Wars Joy

Surprise! Lucasfilm released an official synopsis for Solo: A Star Wars Story today. What does it reveal about the movie that we didn't already know? I'm dissecting the 76-word statement and comparing it against what we already know about the movie thanks to Ron Howard's prolific social media posts. Punch it! ***I'm listener supported! Go to http://Patreon.com/sw7x7 to donate to the Star Wars 7x7...

How did Han sow the seeds of Snoke's destruction in his final moments on Starkiller Base? Why does Finn's jacket suggest more time passed in between The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi than we previously thought? These and more questions are being discussed in today's episode of the podcast, another deep dive into The Last Jedi Visual Dictionary. Punch it! ***I'm listener supported! Go to http://P...

Did you know? The Resistance scribbled secret messages on some of the bombs they dropped on the Dreadnought in The Last Jedi. I'm translating a couple of those Auerbesh messages - plus, does a location on the galactic map in The Last Jedi Visual Dictionary hint at something about Solo: A Star Wars Story? Punch it! ***I'm listener supported! Go to http://Patreon.com/sw7x7 to donate to the Star Wars...

During "Safe Week" last month, I shared with you the details of the story mode for Star Wars Battlefront II, which continued the story of Iden Versio and Inferno Squad. Well, it ended in a cliffhanger that was to be resolved with the DLC for The Last Jedi. And now that it's been out for a while, so spoilers *shouldn't* be an issue, I thought it'd be a good time to finish the story and close the bo...

Fox moved Deadpool 2's release date from the week after Solo: A Star Wars Story to the week before it. Why does that give one box office expert a weird feeling? Also, the upcoming reshoots that aren't really "reshoots," per se, trailer anticipation, and some older news about a Star Wars legend contributing to the movie in this post-production update on Solo: A Star Wars Story. Punch it! ***I'm lis...

There are basically four kinds of stories in The Last Jedi Incredible Cross-Sections book: Business stories that give you a glimpse of the work of an industry; thumbnail stories provided in their entirety; hints at brand new events never detailed previously in the canon; and the re-introduction of elements from "Legends" (aka the old Expanded Universe). For the latter, one of the inclusions harken...

One of the (many) neat things about the Incredible Cross-Sections books from DK Publishing is the miniature stories you find included side by side with the descriptions of the vehicles being profiled in the book. And in some of those cases for The Last Jedi book, those stories and tidbits of background include information that had previously been the stuff of "Legends" - aka, the Expanded Universe...

You know the Resistance bomber sequence in The Last Jedi, of course. Well, it left a lot of moviegoers (or, perhaps, a few very vocal moviegoers) scratching their heads. How did they get the bombs to drop in zero-G space? Why did they stay so close together that they could all be taken down by a chain reaction? And where were they for The Force Awakens, anyway? Well, these questions are all very c...

Finn told us that the siege cannon deployed by the First Order on Crait was "Death Star tech." Well, what kind of Death Star tech would power a giant laser cannon? If you guessed kyber crystals, you'd be right as rain. But here's the scary thing - that's not the only weapon in the First Order's arsenal powered by kyber crystals. And for all we know, Supreme Leader Snoke's ship could have had tons...

Back when Captain Needa said, "No ship that small has a cloaking device!" about the Millennium Falcon, that's about all we knew about stealth tech in the Star Wars galaxy. Thirty years later, it seems the galaxy hasn't advanced very far in that field. On today's podcast, we're talking about what we've learned about stealth tech as a result of the events of The Last Jedi, with help from DK Publishi...

Donald Glover on the reshoots, Ron Howard's silence on social media, the breaking of a three-movie box office streak, and the biggest question of all - when will we see the first trailer??? All that and more about Solo: A Star Wars Story on today's podcast, as well as some news that had been reported as being about Rian Johnson's new trilogy, but it has to be about Episode IX in reality. Punch it!...

Thanks very much to Justin Bolger, Social Media Strategist at Lucasfilm, for helping me look at the decisions made - especially by Poe Dameron - in a new and more charitable light. If you remove the value judgments, there are no "good" or "bad" decisions. There's just "human" decisions, as Justin put it. Today, I'm taking a look at how those all-too-human decisions nearly caused the death of the R...

Console games, mobile games, and virtual reality - for a while there, we thought that we were going to get a lot more storytelling out of the new releases. That we were going to learn more about that galaxy far, far away with every new release. Well, it seems that won't exactly be the case, based on 2017 and what little there is to be known about 2018 so far. Battlefront II and location-based VR e...

Marvel's only revealed their plans for the first three months of 2018 so far. But based on what they've done over the past couple of years, we can make some pretty safe educated guesses about what they might have up their sleeves that they're not telling us yet. Punch it! ***I'm listener supported! Go to http://Patreon.com/sw7x7 to donate to the Star Wars 7x7 podcast, and you'll get some fabulous...

We know some of what's coming in 2018, we can guess at a few more, and even with all that there's still a huge gap in what's been announced. I'm going over all the details about the novels from Del Rey and Disney, the reference books from DK Publishing, and unique items from some smaller publishing houses as well. Punch it! ***I'm listener supported! Go to http://Patreon.com/sw7x7 to donate to the...

Star Wars Rebels is entering its home stretch, as the final seven episodes of the series should be released in the first three months of the year. After that, what happens? I've got updates for you on Forces of Destiny, the recently-announced live-action Star Wars series, and what's next from the animation department. Punch it! ***I'm listener supported! Go to http://Patreon.com/sw7x7 to donate to...

The Last Jedi finishes its run. Solo: A Star Wars Story debuts. Episode IX begins and likely finishes principal photography. Rian Johnson's trilogy development gets underway. And maybe we get an announcement about a previously rumored Obi-Wan Kenobi movie, too? It's going to be a busy year for Star Wars movies... Punch it! ***I'm listener supported! Go to http://Patreon.com/sw7x7 to donate to the...

"Tumultuous" would be a fair word for the world of Lucasfilm in 2017. The departure of Lord and Miller from Solo: A Star Wars Story, the departure of Colin Trevorrow and company from Episode IX, the foofaraw from a segment of people over The Last Jedi, and the microtransaction melee prior to the release of Star Wars Battlefront II all made for more dramatic headlines than Lucasfilm is used to in a...

Last year, Nissan came out with commercials for their Limited Edition Rogue that featured special effects elements that looked like they came straight out of Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. This year, as with other aspects of their campaign in conjunction with The Last Jedi, they raised the bar considerably. From AT-M6s to squadrons of TIE led by the TIE Silencer, and First Order landing bays with t...

Although we didn't lose any "big names" in 2017 like we did with Carrie Fisher and Kenny Baker last year, the folks who passed away this year all made their marks in indelible ways on the Star Wars galaxy we've known and thrilled to for the past forty years. ***I'm listener supported! Go to http://Patreon.com/sw7x7 to donate to the Star Wars 7x7 podcast, and you'll get some fabulous rewards for yo...

J.J. Abrams set out a lot of possible paths for the director who would follow in his storytelling footsteps. And it's fair to say that Rian Johnson seems to have zagged a lot of times where other folks might have expected him to zig. In today's episode, I've collected some of the biggest plotlines and potential plotlines from The Force Awakens that went nowhere (or next to it) in The Last Jedi - i...

With the decisions Rian Johnson made for The Last Jedi and the fates of its characters and major galactic powers (or lack thereof, as the case may be), he's potentially created a deja vu situation. For Episode IX, J.J. Abrams and Chris Terrio may have no choice but to echo the events of Star Wars: A New Hope all over again (and in brand-new ways) to close out the Sequel "Trilogy." Punch it! ***I'm...

Since J.J. Abrams only did The Force Awakens, and didn't lay out a plan for Episodes VIII and IX ... and since Rian Johnson only did The Last Jedi and didn't lay out a plan for Episode IX ... are we actually getting a Star Wars "trilogy" in the true sense of the word with this Sequel Trilogy? Or are we getting something else entirely - something that might happen to be very close to the heart of t...

Fresh off their successful Rogue One Limited Edition Nissan Rogue, the folks at Nissan USA raised their game in creating customized accessory packages in honor of their partnership with Lucasfilm and in celebration of the release of The Last Jedi. To find out what went into the making of the new Limited Edition vehicles - just 3,000 in all! - I talked with Jeremy Meadows, a life-long Star Wars fan...

On first blush, the Sequel Trilogy is about Rey, Finn, and Poe, as the new generation of heroes. But when you expand your viewpoint to include the Prequel and Original Trilogies, and you consider that these movies make up the "Skywalker Saga," and you factor in what we now know (or think we know) about Rey's parents, it starts to make you wonder who the main character of The Last Jedi really is. P...