I am not alone: The disappointment of my fellow Star Wars fans

It’s been an interesting few days, now, in this post “The Last Jedi” world.  As I said in my first post, after I saw the movie, I didn’t hate it. I couldn’t. Mark Hamill was too wonderful in it. But I did say that I’m done. This isn’t my Star Wars and I’m not interested in where it goes from here.

This is really something I’ve been saying for two years, since seeing The Force Awakens. The events of The Last Jedi are pretty much exactly what I expected. Not that I am happy about that, but it wasn’t surprising. This is where I thought the Disney Story was going.

A funny thing is happening on the internet. Slowly, fans like me, are starting to vocalize that they don’t like this new direction. They aren’t happy that the victory at the end of Return of the Jedi, and the happy ending we got for our heroes Luke, Han and Leia has all been for nothing. They don’t like having to “kill the past” or accept that their heroes were just human. It’s not really an enjoyable experience anymore.

I thought it was just me. I felt mostly isolated these last two years as everyone tried to tell me The Force Awakens was great. Now, I am not alone.

Several very thoughtful articles have come out on the subject. All of them filled with spoilers, so be careful if you haven’t seen the movie yet and want to remain spoiler free.

Here are a few:

“Star Wars is Dead, Gen X-ers. Get over it.” Written by a fellow member of Gen-X who is trying to come to grips with the fact that this new Star Wars isn’t for us.  It isn’t a slam on the new movie, just a commentary of unhappiness of the author. The folks commenting on the article don’t get that subtlety. (maybe that’s why so many of them like TLJ. They don’t see the subtle things that are breaking our hearts).

“The Backlash against The Last Jedi explained“. I think this one comes close to understanding, although my disappointment with the new trilogy isn’t with the humor nor is it with the inclusion of women (naturally).

“Here’s Why the Luke Skywalker of ‘Star Wars: The Last Jedi’ Doesn’t Feel Like Luke (commentary).”  This is a really good one, and I agree with pretty much everything in it. My dislike, from a storytelling perspective, is that we’ve been told everything and not shown it. I can’t accept the fates of Luke, Han and Leia because we’ve been told things happened and they reacted rather than seeing the things happen and their reaction. The characters I see in these new movies are so very foreign to me, and nothing feels earned. There was no relationship between Han and Ben in The Force Awakens, and the death of Han really felt flat. It didn’t hit me emotionally then or now.  Similarly, we are told about the backstory of Luke and Kylo, not shown. Perhaps if these movies had taken place 15 years ago and actually showed us the fall of Luke’s Jedi temple, things might have been better.

I’ve been posting articles like the ones above on my Facebook page all week. My friends have probably tired of my constant anti-Star Wars rhetoric. One of them responded to a link by saying he hasn’t found a single friend of his who saw TLJ that liked it. So he and his family are going to wait for DVD. My response to him was as follows:

I think you will find that folks who are our age, who saw the original trilogy in the theaters, who grew up with Luke, Han and Leia in our heads, will not like this movie. They shouldn’t have liked the Force Awakens for the same reasons, they just didn’t see it. This trilogy very forcefully throws away everything achieved in the original trilogy. It very directly says to those of us of a certain age in the audience, to kill the past, and stop idolizing your heroes. This movie isn’t bad. Mark Hamill makes it with his amazing performance. It’s just the whole premise of the story exists to destroy what we loved, and I won’t accept it. So this is the Disney Star Wars, not my Star Wars, and I’m done.

In the end, all of these other voices, who also have the exact same feelings I do, are giving me a sense of closure. I was always going to walk away from the new Star Wars. From the moment the credits rolled on The Force Awakens, I was done. I just needed to see Luke one more time.  In a small way, knowing I am not alone is really very comforting.

Thank you, Star Wars, it’s been wonderful…

Well, I am on the other side now, so here are some personal thoughts, that I also hope aren’t spoilers. I will write a more lengthy review later that will be.

I saw Star Wars: The Last Jedi this past weekend, in an IMAX 2D showing. Because I so very much hated The Force Awakens, I decided to see this one only with my husband and children. I didn’t want to have to share my negative emotions, with a large group of friends. So I had warned my family to give me time to process before asking what I thought.

My thoughts were many. First off, I didn’t hate it. Leaving the theater, I thought it was ok. Then talking with my husband and son, who really did like the movie, I found that there were a lot of things I did like. That moved my opinion up to like. But it was a journey to get there, and I completely understand why audiences are split on this one. Those who do not like the movie are complaining about the same things I said two years ago when The Force Awakens came out. They hate what has been done to the events and people from the original trilogy. They just couldn’t see it had been done during what I’ll refer to as the remake of A New Hope.

I didn’t hate TLJ, solely because of Mark Hamill. His portrayal of Luke Skywalker was amazing. Really, for me, he made the movie. In the end, I feel like TLJ gave me permission to walk away from these new films. I just don’t like the world as they’ve constructed. I don’t like that everything was undone from the original trilogy. I don’t like how I feel watching them. And overall, I really do not care what happens to the new kids. This is all a totally personal point of view, and does not mean others can’t like them, but I just don’t. I wanted to watch this one to see Luke, and now that I have, I think this is where the new Star Wars and I part ways.

For me, the story of Luke, Han and Leia ended with Return of the Jedi. The events of Episodes VII, VIII, and IX are one retelling but not my retelling, of what came after.

The Baby Tigers are Here!

Sohni, the Sumatran female tiger at Disney’s Animal Kingdom, relaxes on the Maharaja Jungle Trek

Yesterday, on the Disney Parks blog, Disney announced the birth of two little adorably cute baby Sumatran Tigers at their Animal Kingdom resort. Sohni, their Sumatran Tiger female, gave birth sometime this month to two really cute little tiger cubs. They don’t have names yet, and it wasn’t announced whether each of them were male or female, only that they are here.

(In looking through my photos from our last trip to Disney World, it turns out I did have a photo of Momma Tiger, Sohni. My previous blog post featured a photo of Malosi, the proud father.)

They put up a short video of Mom and babies in their nursery. The images are shot with a black and white camera, positioned over above them, and you can see the two little sweeties rolling around as they try to learn how to crawl their way to their mom. If you need a little smile in your day, definitely watch this beautiful video.

These species of Tiger are endangered in the wild, and thanks to the hard work of the conservationists at Disney and the other Zoos around the world, we now have two more little tigers in the world. I wish them health and long lives and hope that they are only the first in a long line of more new tigers so we can eventually repair the damage and repopulate Tigers in the wild.

In the meantime, I cannot wait to get down to Disney World to meet these little angels!

 

 

Baby Tigers Coming soon to Disney’s Animal Kingdom

Sumatran Tiger at Disney’s Animal Kingdom- Taken June 2017 (pretty sure this is Malosi)

Our family has long been fans of Disney’s Animal Kingdom and not necessarily for the rides, but for the conservation message and the chance to see the animals in the beautifully themed wildlife areas. We spend a lot of time walking the self guided treks and talking with the cast members about the animals that live in the park. During our last two trips to Walt Disney World, we struck up conversations with the cast members stationed with the Asian Tigers section along the Maharaja Jungle Trek. We were curious about one of the Tigers they had and wanted to know his story and to learn things about Tigers in general.  They are amazing animals and my son and I were mesmerized by his beauty.

We learned that the one we saw on that day in April was Malosi (Seen above in a photo we took later in June of this year), a male Sumatran Tiger and that he was brought to Animal Kingdom as part of their conservation initiative to help build up a genetically diverse population of Sumatran tigers. He and Animal Kingdom’s other Sumatran Tiger, Sohni, were being brought together in the hopes that baby tigers might follow. They were getting to know each other’s smells through a separation but had not yet been together. Needless to say, my children and I were overjoyed.

When we returned to Disney World in June (yes, I know, we went in April and then again in June, we are HUGE fans) we stopped along the Maharaja Jungle Trek again to ask how things were going. Again Malosi was out, and Sohni was back in her enclosure, but they were hopeful that there might be baby tigers in the near future. The cast  member we talked to said that they might not know whether Sohni was pregnant until she was very close to her due date so there was even a chance she was already pregnant. Again, we were overjoyed and full of good thoughts.

Then last week, we saw the news reported on the Disney blog that Sohni was indeed pregnant. Turns out she probably was pregnant when we had seen her during our June trip! Disney expects the baby tigers to be born sometime during this month of August.

There are so few Sumatran tigers in the wild, I hope for the very best with Sohni and her babies and I am grateful for Disney’s Conservation Fund and its efforts to sustain populations of animals that are struggling in the wild, so that maybe one day we can help build up those wild numbers again.

In the meantime, I will be watching the disney parks blog in anxious anticipation of little tiger cub fur balls and cannot wait to return next year and hopefully see the new additions. All my love to Sohni and Malosi.

Thoughts about Star Wars Celebration 2017

Starting tomorrow, the annual Star Wars convention, also known as Celebration, will start in Orlando, Florida. I won’t be attending, but I will be trying to follow along virtually via twitter and the various bloggers out there.

One such blogger,  at Inside the Magic, wrote his top 5 things he hopes will be announced at Celebration here.

I was going to reply on his blog with my own thoughts, but decided to post them here (so I didn’t complain about The Force Awakens on another person’s website).

I am on board with almost all of his hopes.

(5) George at the 40th Anniversary of the release of Star wars panel.

Say what you will, but George created this world and his absence is noticeable in the lack of originality and cohesive character actions in The Force Awakens (no, Han and Leia wouldn’t have failed parenting so hard and no, Luke wouldn’t have run away – I may have blogged about that in excess over the last couple of years). He needs to be there to celebrate the 40th. I hope Disney invited him, and I hope, as you say, he decides to attend.

(4) Announcement of Luke Skywalker / Ben Solo fill-in novels set between Episodes VI and VII

I don’t really care about Ben Solo/Kylo Ren so I am not at all interested in a book about him. I found him to be an entirely annoying character. Yes, I am one of those old “get off my lawn” Original Trilogy folks who really didn’t like TFA (but find things in this rebirth to love: like Rogue One, and especially the TV cartoon Rebels). On the other hand, more Luke Skywalker is always good!

(3) Lando in The Last Jedi! You bet. We need some “hello what have we here” after the depression of TFA. Fingers crossed.

(2) An Obi-wan Kenobi spinoff movie with Ewan and I am there opening day.

(1) Original theatrical release cuts on blu-ray without the special features would make my year. I’m more excited about that potential than The Last Jedi. 🙂

Are any of you going to attend Star Wars Celebration? I wish I could but I can’t convince the rest of my family to go with me, and I’d feel guilty leaving them. Plus, when you add up ticket prices and then the cost of autographs and photos (because why go without getting an autograph), and it’s a rather expensive few days. Still, Star Wars! Maybe next year. I have a feeing there will be many more Celebrations to come.

RSM

 

The return of the All About the Mouse Disney Podcast

As you all know, I am a huge Walt Disney World fan. I’m also an ardent member of the Apple ecosystem since forever. So it is natural that I’m also a podcast listener. One of my favorite podcasts on the topic of Walt Disney World was the All About the Mouse Disney Podcast.

It was a sad day back in 2010 when AATM went “off the air” as the two co-hosts decided that life had made it difficult for them to continue to bring out a weekly dose of Magic and Mayhem. Thankfully, just this summer, Bryan and Jonathan decided they had been retired from Disney podcasting long enough and came back better than ever, complete with a new website: All About the Mouse Central.

They’ve been back for about six episodes at the time of my writing this blog post, and each episode has had the same or better level of energy, professionalism, production value and fun as what I remember. Both Bryan and Jonathan have a lot of love for Disney and it shows. They segment their shows with a little banter, some Disney news, some interaction with their listeners, and then a highlight segment which consists of either reviews or interviews with notable folks in the Disney community. The episodes have been a bit long, but since I’ve got a long commute to work, one episode can easily fill both my morning and evening drives.

I’m a bit personally invested in this one because I had the honor of being “interviewed” during one of their episodes through a segment they call MouseCalls. They will randomly call listeners who have signed up and given them their phone number and ask them a series of questions about their favorite things at Disney World. It was a heck of a lot of fun, and I’d encourage all their listeners to sign up and give it a try.

Podcasting is hard. It takes a lot of work both to produce the episodes and to find your nitch and keep it. I’d like to see All About the Mouse continue for a good long while before the guys decide to retire again.

Welcome back guys. You’ve been missed.

RSM

 

Taking Your Children out of School for a Walt Disney World Family Vacation

I am trying to write a blog post about my thoughts on taking my children out of school for a family trip to Walt Disney World. My thoughts and feelings about it have shifted around as my children have grown and continued through school. Basically, I take them out as long as I feel they can make up the work. This is getting harder as they get further along in school.

I started with the following bulleted list of pros and cons. I thought I’d post those here to my blog as a sneak peek into my thoughts and also to ask for inputs from anyone who might read this.

 

Pros

• Able to pick times with Lower crowds (potentially)
• Able to pick times with potentially cooler temperatures
• Might help to coordinate multi-family trips
• Hard ticket special events: MNSSHP, MVMCP, WDW’s anniversary (Oct 1st), Walt’s birthday (Dec 5)
• Educational opportunity

Cons

• Missing class time, especially the first time teacher goes over something
• Having to make up homework, classwork
• No perfect attendance
• Too much work to make up upon return (higher grades especially)

How to mitigate issues

• Plan long in advance
• Don’t pick the beginning of the school year when your child and the teachers are just getting into things
• Let the teachers, school know long in advance of the trip and work with them to make up homework/classwork
• Pick out dates that are best in terms of testing, homework, projects
• know your child, Can they make up the work or will they fall behind

What are your thoughts? Send me comments and I will add to what I’ve captured above.

Worrying about an Ahsoka/Vader showdown

As I’ve made perfectly clear, Star Wars: Rebels is currently my favorite Star Wars property outside of the original trilogy largely because of my love for Ahsoka Tano.  I’ve enjoyed watching this season’s episodes because of her addition to the cast of characters, but that enjoyment has been one of hesitance.

Ahsoka was Anakin’s apprentice, assigned to him by Yoda during the Clone Wars. She started out young and reckless, like a couple of Skywalkers we know and love. Her relationship to Anakin is the one thing for me that made his descent toward the dark side real and painful (not his relationship with Padme). Their relationship was more than best friends and something deeper than romance. Yes, Anakin loved Padme, but he had an admiration and protection and deep respect for Ahsoka. When she left the Jedi order, it devastated him.  A new Anakin/Ahsoka preview has been released that beautifully captures their relationship in devastating brilliance.

When she survived the Clone Wars (I cheered!), I knew it was a matter of time before she’d have to face Vader. We know from A New Hope that the Jedi are all but extinct, so her fate has always been one of speculation of when, not if, she would die. We were meant to believe that Obi-wan was the last remaining member of the Jedi Knights. As the Empire Strike Back showed, “all but extinct” probably covered Obi-wan and Yoda. I contend that it can also mean Ahsoka (and Kanan and Ezra for good measure).

As you know, I’ve had enough of the death of major characters in the mythos I enjoy. If the audiences these days have an affinity for death, I wish they’d get their fill from things like Game of Thrones and Daredevil and leave my stories alone. In Star Wars, I want my hope. Yes, characters might die, but you all already got Han Solo. You should be satisfied. That’s more than enough to last for the rest of the Star Wars movies as far as I am concerned.

Count me firmly in the camp that believes Ahsoka does not have to die in order to maintain the established history of the state of the Jedi as told in A New Hope. Technically, she’s no longer a Jedi. She left the order. She’s just a rebel with Force sensitivities now.

Anakin/Vader senses her, and we’ve been shown in the Rebels season 2 mid season trailer that the two of them will meet. I firmly believe that it would be great storytelling to have Vader be unable to defeat her, not because she bests him, but because in his heart, he cannot kill her. Luke knew that there was still good in him. Having him spare Ahsoka’s life should give us a glimpse of it.

The one hour season finale is, rumored to be entitled Twilight of the Apprentice I and II. This could mean that David Filoni has filmed what will be Ahsoka’s last episodes, or twilight could mean something else entirely. I’m hoping that it is a bit of misdirection.

In my opinion, Ahsoka should live to provide continuity and proof of the light side of the force still within Anakin Skywalker that Luke knew all along. And because Star Wars is supposed to be about Hope.

 

MTFBWY

Star Wars Rebels: The Shroud of Darkness

Star Wars Rebels, oh, I am loving it so much and so terrified at the same time. The Jedi are my most favorite thing in the Star Wars universe. Not the arrogant Jedi we saw in the Prequels or the Clone Wars, but Obi Wan, Luke and Ahsoka.  Especially Ahsoka. She’s been a favorite of mine since she sprung onto the mythos with her “sky guy” antics as the Padawan assigned to Anakin by Master Yoda. I love her character development from precocious preteen to the strong and wise woman she’s become.

This week’s episode, The  was very Jedi Heavy. In the Shroud of Darkness, we see Ahsoka, Kanan and Ezra return to Lothal and enter the Jedi Temple they visited in season one. Here, the three of them have their own visions through meditation with the Force, that offer glimpses to their future and their path.

My heart broke for her in this episode, when she finally learned what had become of her Jedi master Anakin; learned what she already knew with her head but didn’t want to accept with her heart. The guilt at having left him when she left the Jedi order and wondering whether she might have been able to prevent his fall are heavy burdens. Yet, I believe she can handle that weight, because ultimately we are all responsible for our own choices. She knows this, more than most. I am so proud of her. When she stood outside the Jedi temple on Lothal and wouldn’t open it with Kanan and Ezra because she’s no longer a Jedi I had ultimate respect for her. She lives what she says.  I always felt that for all his faults, Obi wan did the same. (I’ve a special place in my heard for old Ben).

So my terror comes from my worry over her fate, and the fate of Kanan and Ezra. We have always assumed that there no other Jedi when we meet Luke and Old Ben Kenobi in a New Hope. Lucas intended that aside from Obi Wan, there were none left. That is why Luke was so key to the building of hope to overcome the darkness. So, these three force users can’t survive past the next four years or so (assuming Ezra is Luke’s age at present ~ 15 or so, and we meet Luke at aged 19 in ANH). I can’t believe they’d kill them off on what is arguably a children’s show, so their fates might be decided in something off Rebels like, perhaps, Rogue One coming out this year. Or as a fellow in my office says, they all end up on Alderaan with Bail Organa when Governor Tarkin says “You may fire when ready“.

(As an aside, I am happy with the fact that this show is staying what I would call appropriate for children immensely. Much as I ended up liking the tv show The Clone Wars, it was decidedly not for kids and neither my son nor daughter watched it much past its first or early second season. I want Rebels to stay kid friendly.)

In this week’s episode, Shroud of Darkness, I found a lot of Jedi goodness. The whole temple scene could have played as either real (meaning Yoda reached out through the force and was actually talking to Ezra and waving goodbye to Ahsoka) or something mystical produced by the force. Sort of a spirit walk based in metaphors. Kanan’s encounter with the Temple Guard who turned out to be the grand inquisitor made me cry. I haven’t been his biggest fan, but watching him finally understand the power of not fighting and acceptance of the way things are (something I struggle with) and then being knighted a Jedi was really beautiful. Unlike some others on the internet who see “descnet into darkness” wherever they can, I interpreted him picking up the red lightsaber to add to his blue one when he was battling the Temple Guard as a symbol that to bring balance to the force, we have to accept both the light and dark within us all. We are all neither completely bad nor completely good. At least that’s what I think the new helm of Lucasfilm is trying to say with the mythos they are setting up.

I think I need to talk to, send an email/open letter/desperate plea, to David Filoni and tell him that I, too, adore Ahsoka and he’s can not kill her off! And yes, while a showdown between her and Darth is inevitable and will be really awesome, I do not want her to die at the hands of her former master. Instead I want him to be unable to kill her, allowing us a glimpse of the conflict, the good, that Luke knew was in him all along.

I want to be able to wear my Ahsoka Live t-shirt from Heruniverse for many many years to come.

May the Force be with You.

Day one of our Multiple Family Disney World Vacation

Disney World trip report time. I promised I’d start going through the Multiple Family Walt Disney World trip that my family and I went on this month (December 2013). In all, five families, myself, my three siblings and our parents, traveled down to spend a week together at Walt Disney World. Not surprisingly, we weren’t all able to arrive at the same time. Based on everyone’s work schedule, and the number of days they wanted to stay at disney, everyone arrived in more of a phased approach.

Because my Mom and I were the ringleaders of this magical trip, and because we’re Disney nerds, we were there first, staying from Saturday to the following Sunday. Eight days. Arriving first gave us a chance to set up everything, and make sure things were ready for the two families arriving the next day and the third family arriving two days later still.

It is a very good thing that we did.

When we booked this trip, through the lovely Disney specialist travel agency Mousefan travel, our agent made sure to code things with Disney as “travel with” to make sure they kept all five of our hotel rooms as close together as possible. When Mom and I (and my family) arrived, we found that four of the five families were together in the same building, and the fifth family was half way across the resort.

This was not good.

My Mom freaked out just a little bit. (It was all internal, but I could tell).

This was also not good.

As it turns out someone on the Disney side of the resort booking messed up . I verified with my travel agent, that she had made sure we were all “travel with.” She had even called earlier that week to make sure the reservation was all set and we’d end up together. So, it was entirely on the part of the Port Orleans Riverside folks.

We had specifically chosen the Port Orleans Riverside because we had a couple of families with five, and didn’t want to go up to either the Art of Animation or a Vacation club resort based on price. The trouble was that two of our five families have three children, making for a family of five but only one of them was seen as an “actual” family of five. The second family of five had a two year old as the fifth. At Disney,under three only counts as half a person in resorts and free at park entry. So, the family with three kids over three was placed in Alligator Bayou somewhere, and the rest of us were in the Magnolia bend section.

This was not at all acceptable to my Mom.

Thankfully, there were two lovely cast members working the check in at the resort, and they worked with the back office (I don’t know what to call reservations, but they had to do a lot of calling to some folks off site) to get us all together.

They offered an option (and I think at this point, it was our only option) where my family and my Mom (my step dad was joining us later because he couldn’t get the whole week off of work) had to rooms in one section of the resort (the Magnolia Bend) that first night, then we would move our stuff over to Alligator Bayou the next night, where we’d be joined by the rest of the families as they arrived. They didn’t have rooms all together until the next night.

That is what we ended up doing. It was hassle for us, because we had to wait for our bags to be picked up in the morning before heading to the parks, then wait for them to be redelivered when we returned from the parks. But in the end, bell services saved the day and managed to get everything where it needed to be.

For the rest of my siblings, they arrived and checked in, then found us in the Alligator Bayou section, never knowing anything had been amiss. In fact, we were all together on the same floor of the same building. The cousins spent every morning, running from room to room as they all woke up. It couldn’t have been more perfect. Everyone enjoyed the resort, and loved the theming over in the bayou section.

Hitch one successfully handled. Much love and thanks to the kind cast members at Port Orleans check in who helped me to keep my Mom from having a very bad day and managing to get her kids and grandkids all together.

Day one down.

Stay tuned for more Disney magic.