Sith night (Interlude)


I haven't been to sleep yet. And I have class in 2 hrs. So if this entry is full of grammatical and spelling errors, my apologies...


Tonight I saw the "final" Star Wars film. Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith.

I could have just gone to a theater here in Chicago to see the film, at 12:01am since that's when it's most fun. But instead I opted to go with my friends in Geneva/Aurora and took a train out there tonight with David. I bought tickets for this screening about a week or two ago. We had a pretty full party to go see this flick: me, sarah, david, finiak, pat, stu, stefin, other pat and talitha. 9 people.

Sarah picked David and I up at the train station, and then we went over and picked Finiak up at his place. Then the 4 of us hit Bennigans for dinner and a drink (well, except for Mr. Underage [David]). After that we went back to Sarah & Stefin's place to meet up with Talitha, Stefin and Othr Pat. I called Stu to confirm when to meet us and make sure all was going well on his end and he had Pat in tow, and agreed to meet us at 11 at the theater.

So once we had everyone together, we headed off. We got to the theater around 10/10:30 and Sarah was shocked to see the line that spread out of the theater and spilled into the sidewalks and street. I guess Sarah didn't realize what she was getting into going to a Star Wars film at the 12:01 screening... and not just any Star Wars film, but this Star Wars film. Her reaction was kind of cute :P

Luckily, the long winding lines for some other theater. We were in theater 6, and we got seated immediately. It turned out that in a theater with 30 screens - 30 of them were showing Star Wars that night. Holy shit.

Other Pat and I were hanging out in front of the theater when Stu and Pat arrived. They were in good spirits and taking in the surrounding action. Not long after they arrived did none other than Darth Vader arrive, his $120 "Force FX" lightsaber in hand. And what is a good Vader cosplayer without a bad Obi-Wan cosplayer showing up randomly with his blue Force FX lightsaber to duel with him? The hilarity of this situation being that only a few moments after the two began dueling did the plastic casing of Vader's lightsaber fall off. Yes. Fall off. Fall the fuck off. Leaving nothing but a glowing, wilted, red "thing" dangling off the handle. I don't know for sure how those Force FX sabers operate - but the wilted glowing red 'thing' was just kind of pathetic. The penis jokes spewed forth, and I kind of felt bad for Vader's inability to perform under pressure. Obi-Wan's saber, mind you, remained steadfastly erect. Indeed it would seem the dark side isn't as strong as the light.

Anyway, with pat and stu's arrival we were all assembled. It was a lot of fun, since the entire group of my friends is rarely all assembled at the same location. This night was an exception. It was like, for Star Wars, everyone could hang out and talk about a mutual interest. We ate pixie sticks and acted like fools. We watched the kids in the audience act like dorks with their play lightsabers, and we acted like dorks praising the various ads that were being projected on the screen.

Then something strange happened. 12:01am came. The lights went down. The ads on the screen vanished. Everyone applauded. Everyone got excited...

And then...

The ads came back up.

And we waited...

and waited...

And then someone from the theater came in and told us that there was only one print of the film being shown in 30 theaters - and that the movie would not start for a couple moments.

Now, I understand the principle of this. In case you don't know, films in theaters are on multiple "reels". That little black dot in the top right hand corner indicates a change from one reel to the next. However - usually, there are multiple prints for multiple projectors.

This caused me some concern. The idea they seemed to be using is that they'd wait for the reel to run out on one projector, then transfer it to the next, and continue to swap from one projector to the next with each completed reel.

Stefin tried to explain to me that this wasn't a big deal. Now, in theory - it's not. But a reel is generally 40-45mins long. Which would mean that, um, the movie would have to start at least 40mins late. I must have misheard... right? They couldn't possibly only have one print of the film that they were using for *every single projector in the fucking theater*.. could they?

They could. Because, they did.

12:45am comes around and finally Episode 3 began. Yes. 44 minutes late.

As Stu said - he didn't know what he wanted to see more. A Star Wars fan riot, or the movie.

But all that waiting suddenly didn't matter when the movie actually began.

I'm not going to review the film, not now anyway. But I will say this - It's amazingly, fuckingly, fantastically awesome. Best since Empire, if not better. I'm serious. The second half of the film is near perfect (the writing not withstanding).

I have not seen a group of people so happy, and satisfied, by a film in a long time. It seemed like everyone was moved and completely content with the 2 hrs they just spent watching light flicker at 24 frames per second on a screen. After the movie everyone was just oozing energy. It was a great feeling.

The funny thing is that I felt happier and had more fun in the 4 or 5 hours I spent in and around that theater tonight than I did all weekend at Anime Central. It was like.. old school ACen. I guess. More intimate. More "male" driven, I guess. I don't know how to articulate it. It just felt better.

I can't wait to see it again.

On March 11th I wrote, "This movie will own us all."

I take great pride is reporting, I was completely owned.

And, if you have't already, you will be too.

Now - the pics!!!

David on the train ride

Me on the train ride (I just thought it was a cool looking pic....)

The line outside the theater

Kids playing lightsaber in the theater before the movie

Stefin's very appropriate shirt

Darth Vader & storm troopers arrive

Vader vs Obi-Wan (yeah, this pic sucks..)

Stefin, Talitha and Other Pat

Pat being fed Pixie Sticks by David

Stu, Me and Pat

Stu, Me, Other Pat and Pat

David on the train ride back (that kid likes to sleep, yo)


Good times. Good fucking times. ^_^
- posted by Brendan @ 7:36 AM 0 comments

 
Frindship, trust, cigarettes - and the perks of being a wallflower
I am going to recap this year's Anime Central now. I'm not going to use any real names for the people I went with. You'll know who I am, simply because I'm the one who's writing this and who watched it all. And because this is being written from a first person point of view.

FRIDAY

I arrived to Anime Central at roughly 10:45am. Tom and Paul were still in line for their registration, and I headed off to get my badge from Live Programming. Getting in free to the con, and skipping the registration lines completely is a great incentive to continue doing panels.

While waiting for Paul and Tom I decided to see if it was possible to check into the hotel and get our room. Fortunately, I could and moved my bags there. A few minutes after I was settled in the room they were done with registration and met me there. We checked out the panel listing and events in the program book and headed down to the con to watch a round of Iron Guest. This was one of the few actually con-related events I visited during the course of the weekend.

I ended up leaving 3/4 of the way through Iron Guest to get ready for the Eva panel. Adam arrived at about this time and so we hung out for a while. He didn't have his badge yet but he decided to try to sneak into the panel without one to see it before he waited in the very long line to get his badge. I appreciated that.

This year, as you know, Aaron (EvaMonkey.com), Rachel, and Erik (GainaxPages.com), joined Carl Horn (Dark Horse comics) and I. It was truly a great panel. We got a nice 2 hour block of time this year and while I was not able to secure a TV and VCR/DVD player to present the video clip I rushed to finish before the con, we filled up the time all the same with some great discussion and wrapped things up by giving away some great prizes. I really think this was probably the best panel I've been on - and was a terrific way to celebrate both my 5th year doing that panel and Evangelion's 10th year anniversary. Thanks to Carl, Aaron, Rachel and Erik for being there.

After the panel Adam went to get his badge and I found out that Jeff, Mark and Chris had arrived. I finally bumped into them and discovered that they were all drunk already. Not a little, but a lot. Mark was making a huge scene and humping me. I was fine with that. I wasn't fine with how overtly they were drinking. Beer bottles in hand, yelling at everyone and anyone who went by. I decided to try to get them to the room before con security, or worse - the cops - stopped them for public drunkeness and drinking. We made it back to the room safely, and Mark passed out about 15mins after we got there. Chris went off on his own, and Jeff and I had a very long discussion about relationships, friends, God and life in general. Well, mostly he talked, and I listened.

I listened as a friend, but I couldn't help but find the entire situation ridiculous. Perhaps if he hadn't of been drunk it would have been easier to take him seriously. But when Jeff drinks, he just gets depressed. He started to cry, and I just got frustrated with him. I know as a friend I should have been 'into' it. I should have done more to calm him down, but I didn't care. I was sick of always having to be the fucking "Mom". Missing my fun because of my so-called friends. Of spending my time at cons chasing the kids around, cleaning up their messes and wiping their asses. This was more of the same. Mark woke up and wanted to leave. So I made an excuse to get out of there. I wanted a cigarette with Mark. I told him he could always call me. I asked him if he wanted me to stay. He said no. I was relieved.

Mark, Adam and I went down to the lobby and hung out for a while. Then we went back. As I expected, Jeff was gone. I was glad. He was off meeting people. He'd be alright. Good.

Adam and I met up with Tom and Paul. We sat around and watched people cosplaying. We played Halo 2 in the games room. We watched a bit of Anime Hell. Then we found Mark and Chris.

Jeff had been arrested.

In the course of what could not have been more than 3 hours, Jeff, Mark and Chris had been taken in by con security. Drunk. They told them to go back to the hotel room, calm down and go to sleep and not be a problem for the rest of the weekend. Mark and Chris agreed to these *very* reasonable terms. Jeff did not. Jeff told them they were not his fucking mother, and I'm sure let loose a slew of other insults and bullshit. So they called the police. And they took him away.

And so that's what the rest of my night was spent thinking about. I smoked a pack of cigarettes that night. I thought a lot. I read. I read the book that Jeff and Mark had urged me to read. "The Perks of Being a Wallflower". Their review meant a lot to me. They were right. It's an amazing book. One of the best I've read lately. But there was a distinction between our enjoyment. I could relate to about 80% of it. They could relate to closer to 90% of it. That 10% difference is important. And it's that 10% that the night was mostly about.

Mark and Chris came by to tell me to stop thinking about it. But that mostly made me angrier. Not at them really. Just angrier in general. I walked around more, sat in the screening rooms watching stupid anime. Adam, Paul and Tom were asleep. Mark and Chris were doing their... Mark and Chris things. So I was alone. Reading was a bad idea. It only made me think more. That's what didn't need to be done.


Saturday - to be posted tomorrow.
- posted by Brendan @ 7:34 PM 0 comments