Luke Perry
Already in his mid-twenties when he shot to stardom playing a James Dean-type high-school rebel on Beverly Hills, 90210, Perry has, like most of the series' costars, struggled to shed his teen-idol im...
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BirthDate BirthPlace |
10/10/1966
Mansfield, OH |
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Miranda Lambert, Little Big Town Lasso Top Honors at Academy of Country Music Awards
April 07, 2013 11:32pm ESTThe world of country came together for one of several nights honoring their top talent for the 2013 Academy of Country Music Awards. Hosted by The Voice's Blake Shelton and the two-first-named Luke Bryan, the night belonged to Shelton's wife, Miranda Lambert, and group Little Big Town. Taking home trophies for Female Vocalist of the Year, Song of the Year, and Single Record of the Year, Lambert proved herself the toast of Nashville with her track "Only You." Other big winners included Eric Church and Jason Aldean, and featured performances by an increasingly-varied roster of artists from across the spectrum — including John Mayer, Stevie Wonder, and Kelly Clarkson. Also came the announcement that the Artist of the Decade award would be renamed to honor the show's former producer, Dick Clark. Check out the full list of nominees (with winners in bold), below! RELATED: Kids' Choice Awards Winners Entertainer of the YearJason AldeanLuke BryanMiranda LambertBlake SheltonTaylor Swift Male Vocalist of the YearJason AldeanLuke BryanEric ChuchToby KeithBlake Shelton Female Vocalist of the YearMiranda LambertMartina McBrideKacey MusgravesTaylor SwiftCarrie Underwood Vocal Duo of the YearBig and RichFlorida Georgia LineLove and TheftSugarlandThompson Square Vocal Group of the YearThe Band PerryEli Young BandLady AntebellumLittle Big TownZac Brown Band New Artist of the YearJana KramerBrantley GilbertFlorida Georgia Line Album of the YearCarrie Underwood, ‘Blown Away’Eric Church, ‘Chief’Taylor Swift, ‘Red’Luke Bryan, ‘Tailgates and Tanlines’Little Big Town, ‘Tornado’ Song of the YearLee Brice, ‘A Woman Like You’Eli Young Band, ‘Even if It Breaks Your Heart’Miranda Lambert, ‘Over You’Eric Church, ‘Springsteen’Hunter Hayes, ‘Wanted’ RELATED: MTV VMAs Move to Brooklyn Single Record of the YearEli Young Band, ‘Even if It Breaks Your Heart’Miranda Lambert, ‘Over You’Little Big Town, ‘Pontoon’Eric Church, ‘Springsteen’Hunter Hayes, ‘Wanted’ Video of the YearEric Church, ‘Creepin’Hunter Hayes, ‘Wanted’Little Big Town, ‘Tornado’Kacey Musgraves, ‘Merry go round’Taylor Swift, ‘We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together’Zac Brown Band, ‘ The Wind’ Vocal Event of a YearKelly Clarkson (Feat. Vince Gill), ‘Don’t Rush’Rascal Flatts (Feat. Natasha Bedingfield) ‘Easy’Kenny Chesney (Feat. Tim McGraw), ‘Feel Like a Rock Star’David Nail (Feat. Sarah Buxton), ‘Let It Rain’ buxtonJason Aldean (Feat. Luke Bryan and Eric Church) ‘The Only Way I Know’ Songwriter of the YearRodney ClawsonDallas DavidsonJosh KearLuke LairdShane McAnally Yeehaw, y'all. Follow @alicialutes on Twitter [Photo Credit: CBS] From Our PartnersJessica Alba Bikinis in St. Barts (Celebuzz)Pics of The Rock Making Things Look Small (Vulture)
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Farewell, LucasArts: The 10 Best 'Star Wars' Videogames
April 04, 2013 2:43pm ESTYesterday’s news that Disney has decided to shutter LucasArts, the videogame company overseen by Lucasfilm that’s produced nearly three decades worth of Star Wars and Indiana Jones games, not to mention the Monkey Island saga, gave us a full-blown nostalgia attack. Disney seems so determined to put all their effort into the production of Episode VII that they’re shutting down much of non-Episode VII Star Wars content, including the Clone Wars TV series and games like Star Wars 1313 that were in the pipeline for future release. Eric Geller, one Star Wars fan who helps run TheForce.Net speaks for many of us by saying, “They seem to think they need a dearth of other SW content to get us excited for the sequels. Have they met us?” For kids growing up in the ‘90s, LucasArts’ games were the only way to extend the experience of Star Wars beyond endlessly replaying VHS copies of the Original Trilogy. At least, until we were old enough to start reading the Expanded Universe novels. Whether geared for the computer, NES, or N64, these games helped us fall even deeper in love with that Galaxy Far, Far Away. The batting average of these Star Wars games was really formidable, with the X-Wing and Dark Forces series, in particular, being consistently strong. Admittedly, in recent years, the quality of LucasArts’ output has waned. For all the hype, 2008’s The Force Unleashed doesn’t offer gameplay mechanics or storytelling anywhere near as satisfying as that found in Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast, released six years earlier. But we still played. RELATED: Disney Closing LucasArts, Future of ‘Star Wars’ Videogames in Question So, to honor LucasArts’ formidable legacy, movies editor Matt Patches, staff writer Michael Arbeiter, and myself, geek writer Christian Blauvelt, put together our picks for the 10 Best Star Wars Games Ever. Oh yes, and the 5 Worst — nobody's perfect! 10. Episode I—Racer (1999) This is the Rodney Dangerfield of Star Wars games. A lot of fans think it’s terrible without even having played it. But Racer transforms the best sequence in The Phantom Menace into kinetic art, taking you to wholly alien environments like the sulfuric planet Malastare, ocean world Aquilaris, and airless vacuum planet Oovo IV. No, it doesn’t have a story or any depth to its characters—though you do get to play as all the weird alien podracers you glimpse during the Boonta Eve Classic in the movie—but Racer isn’t trying to be “cinematic” like so many games today (games, which, as a result, are often too easy when it comes to actual gameplay). Racer is a souped-up arcade actioner. It capitalizes on your reflexes and muscle memory rather than your higher cognitive functions. But that also means that, like many of the arcade classics, it’s a lot more difficult, and thus a lot more replayable than games with supposedly loftier ambitions. And it has Watto saying stuff like “Ohhhh….You want buy pit droid, eh?” How could you not love that? — Christian Blauvelt 9. Shadows of the Empire (1996) Lucasfilm’s idea of creating a multimedia “interquel,” a story that explores what Luke and Leia did in between The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, took various forms: a novel written by Steve Perry that focused primarily on the movie characters, a graphic-novel tie-in, and a Nintendo 64 game that cut out Luke and Leia entirely to focus on gun-for-hire Dash Rendar, the scruffiest nerfherder in the galaxy not named Han Solo. As Dash, you follow the breadcrumbs from planet to planet to find out where Solo, frozen in carbonite, has been taken, so you can attempt a rescue. Along the way, you encounter droid bounty hunter IG-88, Boba Fett, and a giant dianoga—the tentacle garbage compactor creature from A New Hope! — Christian Blauvelt RELATED: Why ‘Clone Wars’ Was Star Wars At Its Best 8. Yoda Stories (1997) You land in the murky waters of Dagobah, your X-Wing pixilated and your R2 unit complete with incomprehensible speech bubbles. And there, you will find your mission of the day: Where will Master Yoda send you this time — Tatooine, Hoth, Endor? Who will you be charged with saving — Han Solo, Princess Leia, C3P0? The Game Boy and PC adventure game sent the player (as Luke) off on multifaceted quests, completing small tasks to aid in the ultimate conquest against baddies like Jabba the Hutt, the Rancor, swarms of Jawas, and even Darth Vader. Combining the joys of platform games and clever puzzles with Star Wars fandom makes Yoda Stories among the best of LucasArts’ contributions. —Michael Arbeiter 7. Dark Forces (1995) LucasArts did an amazing job creating new characters and designs for their games, and Dark Forces became more than a Doom knock-off thanks to the inclusion of mercenary Kyle Katarn and the revelation of the "Dark Troopers." For a mid-90s, first-person shooter, Dark Forces had unprecedented atmosphere and an array of recognizable weapons finally put in the hands of Star Wars fans. Being able to wield a thermal detonator — only briefly seen in the first trilogy — brought a new dimension to the world we already loved. — Matt Patches 6. Battlefront II (2006) Upgrading the skirmish style of the original Battlefront, the sequel opened up the format for larger missions, saga-spanning story arcs, space combat, and the ability to play as a Jedi. Sure, putting us in the third-person perspective of a Stormtrooper or Rebel gunman was fun, but dropping Mace Windu in the middle of a battle to slice up battalions of Droidekas and pesky Geonosians was a dream come true. Being able to run over Windu with a Trade Federation tank and send him flying off a cliff bumped Battlefront II up to "classic" territory. And the cherry on top: we loved John Williams' cue "Battle of Heroes" in Star Wars: Episode III, but when it backed up our long nights wiping out invading forces during Battlefront II's many campaigns, it was empowering. — Matt Patches RELATED: Han Solo the Lizard, and Other Oddities of the ‘Star Wars’ First Draft 5. Knights of the Old Republic (2003) Compared to Jedi Outcast released the year before, the actual gameplay of KOTOR isn’t great. You have no control over lightsaber combat — moves are actually determined by virtual “dice throws.” But that’s pretty much the norm in role-playing games. What you do get is a story set in a wholly unexplored period of Star Wars history and possibly the most character-driven LucasArts game ever. 3,900 years before the events of the movies, the Republic is at war with the Sith. Or rather, two Jedi, who’ve turned to the Dark Side and are calling themselves Darth Revan and Darth Malak. You play an anonymous Republic soldier with extraordinary abilities that are only slowly discovered throughout the course of the game as you battle back the darkness. As an RPG, KOTOR allows you to make key moral choices throughout the story that determine the direction of the plot…and your character’s ultimate fate, leading up to the most shocking Star Wars reveal since “I am your father.” Also, you will never learn more about the internal politics of Wookiee culture. — Christian Blauvelt NEXT: What's the best Star Wars game ever? Plus, our picks for the 5 Worst. 4. The Empire Strikes Back (1992) In the early days of LucasArts, being able to recreate any amount of the Star Wars trilogy was a gift to fans. Like it's movie counterpart, 1992's Empire Strikes Back — debuting first on the NES then ported over to the Gameboy — managed to, for the first time, convey the thrills of the narrative with involving gameplay. The graphics were low-res, the functionality imperfect (no you f**king Tauntaun, MOVE THIS WAY), but in the end, Luke's Hoth escapades and first taste of force powers made for hours of side-scrolling fun. There's a comic book style to Luke's lightsaber movement that remains imprinted on my mind, even today. — Matt Patches 3. Rogue Squadron (1998) While we cannot forgive the whines and groans that accompanied Luke Skywalker’s desire to take up with the Academy, we can finally understand just why he so desperately wanted to be a pilot: Rogue Squadron gave us the chance to try our hand behind the X-Wing wheel, zipping with an impressive fluidity (at least for that era of video gaming) through some of the Star Wars franchise’s most formidable locales. Highlights of the game include taking down Imperial Walkers with some fancy footwork and a spool of yarn, and taking a dip in the gelatin-esque waters of Mon Calamari. Avoid the tasty topography of this realm: It’s a trap! — Michael Arbeiter RELATED: ‘Star Wars: The Clone Wars’ Canceled, New Series Planned 2. X-Wing Alliance (1998) The last, and best, game in the PC X-Wing series puts you in the cylindrical cockpit of a YT-1300 freighter (for non-nerds, that’s a ship of the same class as the Millennium Falcon), a Y-Wing, a B-Wing, an A-Wing, and just about every other type of craft you can imagine. But it’s not just a first-person space-combat simulator. X-Wing Alliance tells a deep, involving story about a family, the Azzameens, who run a shipping company around the events of The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. When the Empire tries to take over their business, they defect to the Rebel Alliance, and, as Ace, the hotshot pilot who’s the Azzameen family’s cocky youngest son, you participate in the mission to steal the plans for the Second Death Star and finally fly into the Death Star’s reactor shaft in the Battle of Endor itself. — Christian Blauvelt 1. Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast (2002) I’d argue the Star Wars Expanded Universe is at its very best when focusing on characters who aren’t in the films. That allows storytellers other than George Lucas to explore nooks and crannies of the Star Wars galaxy without being a slave to continuity. It also means those novels and videogames don’t feel compelled to drown in the movies’ Joseph Campbell-knockoff mythology and can take different narrative pathways. Exhibit A for how well this can work? The Dark Forces series, which reaches its apex in Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast, the greatest Star Wars game ever produced. Flinty, bearded, commando-turned-Jedi Kyle Katarn has to rescue his partner and lover, Jan Ors, from the clutches of one of Luke Skywalker’s Jedi students who turned to the Dark Side. It’s Star Wars' answer to The Searchers, and it takes Kyle from the seedy, neon-tinted Hutt demimonde of Nar Shaddaa to the glistening spires of Cloud City (where you have an epic lightsaber fight in the carbon-freeze room, just like Empire Strikes Back!), to the jungles of Yavin 4. The level maps are crammed with detail, from the little Ugnaughts who populate Cloud City’s underlevels (who you can slice with your lightsaber if you’re feeling mean-spirited: we do!) to the latest craze in interstellar mixology, a ruby bliel, the must-order drink from your local Chiss barman. And though later games like The Force Unleashed have been touted for their gameplay mechanics, none can compare to Jedi Outcast and its hyper-dynamic lightsaber combat—especially when you have “realistic saber combat” mode activated, allowing for full dismemberment. Until someone invents a T-14 hyperdrive, playing Jedi Outcast is the closest thing to visiting that Galaxy Far, Far Away for real. — Christian Blauvelt THE 5 WORST STAR WARS VIDEOGAMES 5. Force Commander (2000) LucasArts was never able to make a great real-time strategy game. The closest they ever came was with Star Wars: Empire at War and Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds—Clone Campaigns, which basically just used the Age of Empires engine. Force Commander was a particular misfire, though, with an unwieldy camera and uninspired combat. 4. Empire at War—Forces of Corruption (2006) However, Force Commander wasn’t as bad as this epic dud. The sequel to Empire at War features the smallest game maps for an RTS game we’ve ever seen. They’re so small that when a Super Star Destroyer shows up for the finale, it takes up practically the entire map, with no room for maneuverability. A huge missed opportunity. 3. Rebellion (1998) It’s not just that Rebellion hasn’t aged well, it’s that the PC game’s graphics looked archaic even when it came out in 1998, especially compared to what you could find on the N64 with Rogue Squadron, released the same year. A sad, lazy effort. 2. Kinect Star Wars (2012) This is the game that gave us Princess Leia dancing in her metal bikini to “Genie in a Bottle.” ‘Nuff said. 1. Masters of Teräs Käsi (1998) With a name like Masters of Teräs Käsi how could it not be the worst Star Wars game ever? [Photo Credit: LucasArts] From Our Partners:40 Most Revealing See-Through Red Carpet Looks (Vh1)33 Child Stars: Where Are They Now? (Celebuzz)
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TV Tidbits: 'Chicago Fire' Ignites a Sequel, NBC Gets a Ratings Boost
March 27, 2013 9:30pm ESTPotential Chicago Fire Spinoff: NBC is reportedly considering the idea of turning Chicago Fire’s Season 1 finale into a pilot episode for a new series centered around the Windy City’s police department counterparts. Executive producer Dick Wolf will reportedly head the potential show alongside Chicago Fire creators/executive producers Derek Haas and Michael Brandt, and executive producer Matt Olmstead. As of yet, there's no word if any of the Chicago Fire cast members will appear in the police-focused series. [TV Line] That ‘70s Vampire: True Blood is adding a truly psychedelic vampire to their lineup next season. Brothers and Sisters alum Juke Grimes has been tapped to play the role of James, a vampire who was created in the ‘70s who is smart, spiritual, and emotionally deeper than any other nightwalker we’ve met before. Grimes is set to make his undead debut at halfway through the sixth season of the HBO thriller. [TV Line] Nikita Gains an Agent: Last Resort's Jessica Camacho has just joined The CW’s Nikita for an upcoming episode. She will guest-star on the April 5th episode playing Rachel, a Division agent aiming to ruffle some feathers. As one of the underground organization’s few remaining technical operations staffers, Rachel will soon reveal her agenda for breaking free of Division once and for all. [TV Line: ] NBC Gets a Much-Needed Ratings Boost: ...Thanks to The Voice and the mini-Friends reunion on Matthew Perry’s Go On. The Voice snagged 12.4 millin viewers, making this NBC’s best non-sports rating in the 18-49 category since October 2012 and delivered the number one rating of the night on beating out ABC, CBS, NBC and FOX. As for the Monica/Chandler show — aka Go On — the NBC comedy jumped up 90 percent this week and grabbed 5.1 million viewers. Bless your little heart NBC, way to go! [Press Release] Follow Leanne on Twitter @LeanneAguilera [Photo Credit: NBC] You Might Also Like:Topanga's Revealing Lingerie Shoot: Hello '90s! 13 Most WTF Fan Tributes
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Should R. Kelly's 'Ignition' Be the New National Anthem?
March 05, 2013 6:33pm ESTYou can't pick up a right-leaning newspaper or flick on an episode of Hannity or listen to your grandfather clamor on over a bowl of stewed cabbage without being smacked with the following affirmation: this country has taken quite the dive. Yes, the good old days are far behind us — the days of Perry Como, High Noon, and expensive hats. And yearn as we might to bring our homeland to its glorious pre-ironic state, we only really have enough gigawatts of plutonium for a trip back, say, 10 years or so. Such seems to the be the motivation for the latest petition to hit the White House website: a movement to replace our current national anthem, "The Star Spangled Banner," with R. Kelly's 2003 hit "Ignition." Some big dreaming traditionalist longs to return the U.S. of A. to its golden years... and he's apparently willing to settle for a time when people still loved American Idol and hated comic book movies. RELATED: Barack Obama's Jedi Mind Meld Causes Great Disturbance in the Force But if we're going to propagate the efforts of this revolutionary — this free-thinking radical who'd rather bend the pulse than follow it — then we're going to need more than just some R. Kelly song. We're going to need to sweep the national identity as a whole, injecting each and every pop culture fixation of our decade-younger selves into the country's brand. So what other irrelevant bits of mainstream yore, which long-frayed fabrics from the template of 2003, can we revive for an America of which we might once again be only marginally ashamed? New National MottoFrom "In God We Trust" to "You're my boy, Blue!" It's emphatic, it's uniting, it's affectionate, and it's practically the only sentence any of your a**hole friends would say to each other for the entire year after Old School came out. New Country CapitalFrom Washington D.C. to the Matrix. (Reloaded. You know, the better one.) New Presidential ResidenceFrom the White House to House of 1000 Corpses. That was a movie! New Dollar BillFrom the likeness of our first president, George Washington, to that of Ali G. Ah, the good old days before Sacha Baron Cohen sung close-up numbers in impoverished France... New National BirdFrom the Bald Eagle to the Raven. As in, That's So. New National Beverage From bourbon whiskey to "Milkshake." Remember that? Remember when that was a thing? Yes. Now you do. Now you do. The year was 2003... and the time, as we can see, was one of fortitude. A time of Luke Wilson, of teen sitcoms, of Kelis. If we work together, we can bring our country back to this eon of perfection. And the movement, as so many things are, is all thanks to R. Kelly. Follow Michael Arbeiter on Twitter @MichaelArbeiter. [Photo Credit: Hollywood.com Illustration] From Our Partners:40 Most Revealing See-Through Red Carpet Looks (Vh1)15 Stars Share Secrets of their Sex Lives (Celebuzz)
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'Community' Recap: Can Troy and Abed's Love Survive?
February 22, 2013 1:17am ESTLove is a special sort of torture. And believe it or not, Community's trip to the nerdiest of all pursuits, The Inspector Spacetime convention, is the strongest foray into L-O-V-E in a long time. Of course, it probably helps that Britta and Troy are sleeping together now, sending Troy and Abed into a relationship tailspin. Abed seems to be okay with the secret relationship at first, relishing in the fact that their refusal to tell him results in free morning donuts, but when Britta joins the duo as InspectorCon, the panic sets in. Part of that is due to the fact that Abed, in anticipation of Troy's probability of leaving him for Britta, contacts the world's greatest Inspector Spacetime fan, Toby (Matt Lucas of Little Britain and Bridesmaids fame). The problem is Toby is totally trying to steal Troy boyfran. RELATED: 'Community' Recap: You Are Watching Abed TV Toby's evil plan involves magically appearing tickets to a sold-out panel and a false sob story about losing his Constable Reggie (Troy's counterpart to Abed's Inspector) to a woman, who he calls a total Minerva (the name of the only female Inspector is synonymous with b**ch because she sucks, not because they're sexist, of course). But it doesn't take long for Abed to realize that something's not right, and it helps that Toby calls Abed's friends "neurotypicals" and literally says that he and Abed are above them. Abed's BS meter goes off a little too late and Toby traps him in a wannabe TARDIS is hopes that Stockholm Syndrome's onset is only a few hours. But that's when the magic happens. Abed knows Troy will find him, because that's who Troy is to him. When Britta finally does her job as the best girlfriend ever, cheering Troy up and telling him that his "crazy girlfriend" act is totally justified (and buying him that weird Inspector Spacetime toy that "light up and plays music or something!") before sending him off to get his Abed back, the heartwarming begins. Troy scares off Toby with his ability to actually make a fist (Toby only knows how to slap-fight), and Abed is reunited with his human counterpart, which he's realized is necessary as he and his somewhat alien disposition try to navigate regular human culture. What's great about this trio and the way they all learn to appreciate the way in which their relationships can support the other is that it's, in a sense, a wonderful picture that we can all comprehend, whether we've got an Abed or a Britta or both. Romantic relationships and those of extreme friendship require balance, compromise, and understanding, and here, under the light shining on a poster of Thoraxis, we found that timeless lesson. Of course, it wasn't just something we learned from Troy, Abed, and Britta (wow, it's strange to write Troy and Abed without the "and" in the middle). Jeff and Annie do a little friendship soul-searching too, though their interaction this week will have the shippers going nuts. When Jeff decides to leave because their ski resort is shut down and he doesn't do nerd stuff like the InspectorCon, Annie heads up to their hotel room alone, where the room service attendant assumes she's Jeff's wife and the power of imagination goes to her head. Before we know it, she's got an elaborate back story for both of them (even something to explain their separate hotel rooms). The problem is that Jeff is downstairs being hit on by super Inspector fan Lauren (Battlestar Galactica alum Tricia Helfer), who thinks he's Nigel, the guy who plays Inspector super villain Thoraxis. The hotel staff loves Annie so much, they spill the beans on her "husband's" infidelity and she winds up throwing a drink in his face and scaring away his hot nerd lady. Season 3 Jeff would have stormed off immediately, never to return, but new Jeff (NEW JEFF!) sees the truth: Annie is a young woman desperately seeking her friend's attention that he so callously denied her when his "cool" plans fell through. RELATED: 'Community' Recap: The Haunted House of Hawthorne He finds her, apologizes for ditching her and he even offers to buy her a drink: the dreaded, manhood diminishing appletini. Jeff begrudgingly orders it for his Zach-Efron-loving friend, which is the mark of true friendship. But there's enough hints of flirtation that those hoping Jeffannie will become a thing eventually just got some fuel for their fire. Finally, Pierce and Shirley invite themselves along on the convention trip, even though the gang didn't invite them because they knew they wouldn't like it. They're immediately scooped up by a marketing team who knows they don't belong there and are ushered off to a hotel meeting room where they become the focus group for the American reboot of Inspector Spacetime. It's clear that this is an opportunity for Community to lament the tastes of mainstream America (the same tastes that kill their ratings despite being a smart, innovative comedy), as Pierce tells the market researchers that he wants simple, easy jokes and blondes with big breasts in his Inspector Spacetime. Shirley attempts to do the right thing and tell the marketers that the reason people like the original show is because it's smart and it doesn't talk down to its audience. Her words almost stick with the pencil pushers until Pierce has a genius idea: change Constable Reggie to a blonde with a Tennis racket! In the end, we find a CW/CBS-ified series starring Luke Perry and Jenni Garth as Abed's soul is slowly shattered into a million pieces. And while it's fun to get a little catharsis by making Pierce the face of whoever generates 15 million viewers for the Big Bang Theory while Community can barely crack 3 mill, it's the sad truth of the world of network television and no amount of on-point joking can change that. RELATED: 'Community' Guest Star Tricia Helfer on a 'Battlestar' Reunion? Still, "Conventions of Space and Time" is the sort of episode that makes you giddy NBC is letting this little show continue. Wrapped up in the silliness of an Inspector Spacetime convention is an episode that truly understands the delicacy of human relationships, both those with other humans and those with television shows that arrest them so heartily. If this is the beginning of the end, and there is no Season 5, at least Community is going out on a note that speaks so heartily to its adoring fans. Grading on a Curve A+: Britta (yes, actually) “Do they even have to talk? They could just touch tentacles and download.” +20 (solid burn, girl) “You are not being crazy, that dude is trying to steal your boyfriend.” -Britta being the best girlfriend ever +300 “I’ve told you before (breathy whisper) I don’t care about Inspector Spacetime.” +20 Britta is the best girlfriend. Mean it. +1000 Total: 1340 points A: Jeff (Yes, Actually) “Jeff why is everyone staring at you?” -Britta “Because they’ve never see a man who’s had sex before?” -Jeff -30 Jeff’s move to “practice his American accent” for an audition. A reluctant +20 “Is that my actual hair? And if it is, did it fall out naturally? Because if it did, tell me right now because I have to call science.” -Jeff +30 “If we were married, you would not find me flirting with some woman in a hotel bar.” -Jeff to Annie after their faux-marriage debacle +100 Buys Annie the appletini, potentially wounding manhood. +50 Jeff stands on stage as Thoraxis. +100 nerd points Rips his shirt open while doing it. -15 for vanity Total: 255 points A-: Troy “Are you sure it’s okay Britta is here because she can just wait in the car.” -Troy -20 (but still hilarious) “It’s Troy. It’s the first word in Troy and Abed! Toby and Abed in the Morning? That’s ridiculous! I am not psycho!” -Troy +60 for Troy and Abed in the Morning reference and the fact that rage Troy is the best kind of Troy Troy simply knows that Abed is in the phone booth. +100 “I always say if you love someone, set them free, if they don’t come back, they were never yours to begin with.” -Britta “That makes no sense. What if they get hit by a car or fall down a well? Remind me to never put you down as my emergency contact.” -Troy +75 Total: 210 B:Abed Abed knows that Troy and Britta are sneaking around on him but he lets them keep up the charade to get free donuts. +10 Abed is so trusting that he buys the Nigerian cry for help email, but it actually turns out to be real. +50 (because, aww) “Cadbury Cream Eggs are sold all year round there.” is a selling point for Abed -50 (ew) “If I could Winger you for a second?” -Abed (as he squints his eyes slightly and makes his voice just slightly more gravelly) +15 Abed’s distress noise sounds like R2D2 +10 Abed's realization that regular humans are super important to his strange lifestyle. +100 Total: 125 points C: Annie Annie’s alter ego is as a world famous police detective. +50 “Mmm, tastes of... fog.” -Annie drinking scotch +15 Annie has a Charlie St Cloud poster in her bedroom. -15 Annie’s attention to detail: she takes bites out of both dishes to make sure it looks like there’s been a couple hanging out in the room. +30 crazy points Total: 80 points C: Shirley Shirley’s ominous comment, in reference to the ruined Inspector Spacetime spin-off: “Just remember, Abed. I did my best.” +50 Total: 50 points D: Pierce (Doing better, buddy!) “See, it’s funny because it’s clear.” -Pierce, helping to ruin Inspector Spacetime for America -100 Pierce lays face-down when the entire room obeys Jeff’s “Bow before Thoraxis” command +20 Luke Perry and Jenni Garth are the bimbo leads of America’s Inspector Spacetime (Pierce’s fault) -1000 Total: -1080 points Follow Kelsea on Twitter @KelseaStahler [Photo Credit: Vivian Zink/NBC] From Our Partners:25 Forgotten Celebrity Crushes of the ‘90s (Vh1)30 Stars Who Have Gone Topless (Celebuzz)
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'Star Wars' Yoda Creator Dies: Why His Work Was Cooler Than Any CGI
February 07, 2013 11:59am ESTThe creator of one of the most beloved of all Star Wars characters has died at the age of 98. But when Stuart Freeborn sculpted the original puppet that served as Yoda in 1979, among the many other characters he built for the saga, he already had a decades-long body of work that would have marked him as a pioneer of movie makeup and creature models. It's a career that serves as a reminder of the tactility and realism that comes from physical, non-CGI, special effects. That puppets and prosthetics can have a greater power to move and inspire and believe in than computer-powered, pixel-based wizardry. Born in London in 1914, Freeborn cut his teeth working for producer-director Alexander Korda in the 1940s and was an uncredited contributor to the makeup work in the 1940 production of The Thief of Bagdad that's often held up as the most dazzling achievement in pre-CGI effects. He also supplied prosthetics for David Lean's uniquely atmospheric and sinister production of Oliver Twist. And when Stanley Kubrick needed a makeup artist to help distinguish between the three characters played by Peter Sellers in Dr. Strangelove, he knew whom to turn. In fact, Kubrick was so impressed with Freeborn's work on his anti-war satire that he commissioned him to design the ape-like costumes for the proto-humans that appear during "The Dawn of Man" prologue to 2001: A Space Odyssey. Not to mention that anyone who's seen The Omen will ever forget the beheading effect he created for that film. RELATED: 'Star Wars' Author Timothy Zahn On 'Young Han Solo' Movie & Hopes for an 'X-Wing' TV Show But it's Freeborn's work on the original Star Wars trilogy that will be, for millions of fans of George Lucas' saga the world over, the most cherished part of his legacy. He designed the yak-hair costume that transformed the 7'3" Peter Mayhew into walking carpet Chewbacca, and sculpted the models and prosthetics that would become the Mos Eisley Cantina's uniquely bizarre alien clientele. The walrus-tusked Aqualish who menaces Luke Skywalker? That's Freeborn's handiwork. Snout-nosed, bulbous-eyed Greedo, whom Han Solo shot under his cantina table? Freeborn again. On The Empire Strikes Back, he expanded the Star Wars menagerie with his models for Luke and Han's lizard-like mounts, the Tauntauns, and also Hoth's answer to the abominable snowman, the Wampa. He even one-upped the patrons of the Mos Eisley Cantina with his designs for Jabba the Hutt, a puppet that required multiple performers to maneuver, and the crime lord's gnarly underlings and toadies. Freeborn made interstellar scum and villainy feel like flesh and blood. RELATED: 'Star Wars: The Clone Wars' Recap: Darth Sidious Shows Maul Who's the Master Possibly one Star Wars creation stands above the rest: the puppet he created for which Frank Oz would give movement and voice. Yoda. And for this singular design, Freeborn looked to a source with which he was very familiar: himself. Take a look at Freeborn, and then look at Yoda. There's more than a ballpark resemblance, isn't there? Adding wrinkles, folds, and tangled strands of willowy hair, Freeborn created a Jedi Master who really looked 900 years old. And while Yoda himself may have described his physical shell as "crude matter," the original puppet will forever be the truest depiction of the character. True, he couldn't do flips and twirls like the acrobatic CGI Yoda of Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith, but his power didn't come from dervish-like displays. It came from within. You didn't need to see Yoda wield a lightsaber, because his power was so great, he didn't even need to use a lightsaber. The limitations of movement that came from Freeborn's original puppet design only enhanced the Jedi Master's mystery, the idea that his internal life was more important than his external projection of power. He was a spiritual being made manifest, and never just an effect, which, in his CGI form, he arguably became. RELATED: 'Star Wars': Boba Fett and Young Han Solo Standalone Films, Plus 4 We Want to See How ironic then Freeborn would die just two days after that rumor broke of a standalone Yoda movie possibly being in the works. Here's hoping that if that film ever happens, or Yoda has more cinematic life ahead of him in any Star Wars movie, that Disney and Lucasfilm recognize the peculiar power of Freeborn's artistry and the emotional resonance of a green, two-foot puppet. Follow Christian Blauvelt on Twitter @Ctblauvelt [Photo: Lucasfilm] You Might Also Like: Hot Young Politicians Who Wore This Crazy Hat? Stars Who Changed Their Look
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'Star Wars' Author Timothy Zahn On 'Young Han Solo' Movie & Hopes for an 'X-Wing' TV Show
February 06, 2013 2:12pm ESTSoon there may be more Star Wars movies than there are black holes near Kessel. On Feb. 5, Disney CEO Bob Iger confirmed what the company had already suggested back when it acquired Lucasfilm for $4.3 billion in October: that there will be more Star Wars movies than just Episodes VII, VIII, and IX, and these will be films that'll focus on George Lucas' beloved characters beyond the Skywalker family. Today, an unnamed source told EW that Lucasfilm is planning standalone movies about Boba Fett and the early days of Han Solo, respectively. The Boba Fett movie doesn't come as a shock, considering how beloved he is among the fans, but the Solo rumor is surprising given that it would require Lucasfilm to recast Harrison Ford's iconic role and also that the studio has been reluctant to explore younger versions of the character. He was originally slated to appear as a 10-year-old in Revenge of the Sith, but that idea was nixed. Nor has he ever appeared on The Clone Wars TV series. Also, by default a "Young Han Solo" movie would be a prequel, and, well, we know some fans have strong feelings about anything related to that word. The fact is, the news of a Young Han Solo movie is still just a rumor. Just like the Yoda movie. Just like the idea that Zack Snyder is directing a Star Wars remake of Seven Samurai. But that hasn't stopped us from imagining what exactly a flick about the smuggler's early days would look like. So rather than just idly speculate, we turned to a guy who's had a lot of experience writing Han Solo: author Timothy Zahn, whose most recent novel, Star Wars: Scoundrels (out in hardcover), is an Ocean's 11-style heist thriller centered on the scruffy nerf herder himself. What challenges would a new screenwriter face in trying to portray the Millennium Falcon's captain? What could we expect from a pre-A New Hope presentation of the character? For that matter, what's the difference between writing the Han of Scoundrels, set around the time of A New Hope, and the Han of Zahn's most famous books, the Thrawn Trilogy? And what other characters does Zahn hope will get the standalone Star Wars movie treatment? Here's what the author had to say. Hollywood.com: First of all, none of this has been confirmed by Disney or Lucasfilm, and I’m not looking to you at all to confirm it. I’m just interested in your perspective as a Star Wars author, and even more importantly, as a Star Wars fan, on the rumor today that the first two standalone Star Wars movies will be about Young Han Solo and Boba Fett respectively. Timothy Zahn: All of this is at the rumor stage of course, but, the fact is, I would like to see more Star Wars beyond the core saga. I’d like more Star Wars TV, and certainly more Star Wars books. We’ll just have to wait and see what happens. The Galaxy Far, Far Away is impossibly huge with story ideas and possibilities. RELATED: 'Star Wars' Yoda Movie To Be Made, Rumor Is HW: If a Young Han Solo movie is ever made, what do you think is important to look for in whoever’s cast in the role? TZ: I presume any actor who looks like a young Harrison Ford would get it as long as he gets the attitude correct. However, personally, I would look more for the attitude than how close he would look to a young Harrison Ford. HW: That’s kind of like what Lucasfilm was thinking when they cast River Phoenix as a 13-year-old Indy in Last Crusade. I mean, he looks nothing like Harrison Ford, but he does have the attitude. TZ: Yes, that’s exactly what I mean. I would probably go with what Lucas did originally. Maybe not pick complete unknowns for these movies but not cast anybody really well known either. Someone who has enough acting experience that you know going in he can pull off the role, but not somebody who is a big-name draw all by themselves. HW: Not like, say, Daniel Craig as Boba Fett or whatever. TZ: No. Mark Hamill and Harrison Ford had been in movies before Star Wars, but they weren’t all that well known yet. Bringing fresh faces to any of these big parts I think would be a good move. Those movies launched various careers. The key for me is not so much getting the individual actor correct as getting the chemistry between the actors. That’s something Lucas did beautifully in the classic trilogy. Han, Luke, and Leia…the chemistry works perfectly. Roddenberry also pulled it off with Kirk, Spock, and McCoy. That kind of casting is an art more than a science. And a lot more important than “Does this person look like a young Harrison Ford?" RELATED: 'Star Wars: The Clone Wars' Recap: Darth Sidious Shows Maul Who's the Master HW: What for you was the biggest challenge in writing Han Solo? TZ: Just getting the attitude correct, depending on what era he’s in. He becomes a lot more responsible in the Expanded Universe stories after the events of Return of the Jedi. He was a little more self-centered before that, but with hints of the loyalty, the willingness to step up if the cause is right, the concern he has for the people he cares about, that we’ll see even more of later. But getting his attitude, his voice, his swagger correct on paper is tough. With a lot of that, I think whoever plays young Han, if this actually happens, can get by just by watching Harrison Ford in the movies. How Ford speaks, the little smirks, the lopsided grin, the twinkle in his eye, the sense of humor, the feeling that he will do whatever it takes to get it done. Think about how Josh Brolin played young Tommy Lee Jones in Men in Black III and absolutely nailed it perfectly: the gestures, the voice, everything. If you can find someone with that level of ability, you’ve got your young Han Solo. HW: Is there a difference between the way you wrote Han in Scoundrels as opposed to the way you wrote him in the Thrawn Trilogy or Hand of Thrawn Duology? TZ: Oh yeah, he’s much more mature in the later books. He’s taken on more responsibility. He still chafes at it at times. But he does the jobs that need to be done. He’s more aware of what’s at stake, what the consequences could be if he succeeds or fails. And that’s because he has a family at that point, which brings a whole new set of responsibilities with it. In Scoundrels on the other hand, since that’s set right after A New Hope, he’s much more footloose and fancy free. But even then you can see that once he’s assembled the team he’s working with, he’s not going to abandon them. The seeds of “Responsible Han” are already there. But he would deny it probably. He would say, “I’m loyal to Chewie, and that’s it.” But his actions are leading toward the Han who will park the Millennium Falcon with its back to Yavin’s sun just in case he needs to step in and help Luke take on the Death Star. Just in case he’s needed. He’s not going to stick his neck out…but if he’s needed, he’ll be there. So he’s much more the rogue, much more about looking out for No. 1 in the early books, but he’s certainly not an amoral, “me first and only” type. Which is why you care about him and want him to succeed. HW: What other characters from the movies would you like to see get the movie spinoff treatment? TZ: Lando is an obvious one. You could do a lot with Lando during the time leading up to The Empire Strikes Back. If we’re going post-Jedi era I would frankly like to see Wedge put together Rogue Squadron. I think you could have a whole series of Rogue Squadron movies that would be great. Wedge is peripheral, but he is very popular and rightfully so. Who else helps take out two Death Stars? You could even do an X-Wing TV show focused on Rogue Squadron that, just like the books, would be peripheral to the main Skywalker-Solo saga. That means you could introduce a lot of new characters anchored by Wedge. You could make wonderful stuff out of the X-Wing books. RELATED: 'Star Wars' & J.J. Abrams: Superfans Bonnie Burton, Tracy Duncan, & Eric Geller Weigh In HW: The X-Wing Series is a major favorite of mine. Speaking of casting, did you ever envision an actor playing Thrawn? TZ: I get asked this a lot, but as with all of these casting questions I don’t see my characters in terms of what they look like as much as their attitude, their personality, their response to a given situation. So for Thrawn you’d have the dignity, the intelligence, the fairly unemotional personality. Get an actor who can do that, then with the blue makeup and red contact lenses, you'd probably have Thrawn. If I were casting I would watch expressions, listen to the voice, but not really care about what he looks like. I guess this means I’d be lousy in casting because they’d all look good to me. Follow Christian Blauvelt on Twitter @Ctblauvelt [Photo Credits: Lucasfilm, Random House] You Might Also Like: Biden? Ford? 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'Star Wars' Yoda Movie To Be Made, Rumor Is
February 05, 2013 9:54am ESTYoda! Disney seeks Yoda! At least according to Harry Knowles of Ain’t It Cool News, who cites an unnamed source in suggesting that Lucasfilm and its parent company are planning a movie about everyone's favorite little green warrior as their first standalone Star Wars film beyond the already-planned sequel trilogy. Lucasfilm obviously isn't commenting, and Knowles' sourcing seems sketchy at best, so chock this up to the galactic rumor mill. Honestly, that Zack Snyder remake of Seven Samurai set in the Star Wars galaxy seems every bit as likely. But the possibility of a Yoda movie has gotten us thinking abut what we would like to see if the Jedi Order's Grand Master should get the spotlight. Not to mention that it would pose some massive challenges for the screenwriter and director to be hired, considering that Yoda is a character we've always gotten in small doses...and, quite frankly, may be best that way. First, the script would be made up entirely of backwards-speak, which could become about as annoying as when your Star Wars fanatic friend decides to show off his Yoda voice at a party for longer than 90 seconds. Second, Frank Oz has all but retired from voice acting at this point, and he lent so much more to the character than was ever in the script. Maybe Tom Kane who voices Yoda on the Clone Wars TV series could step in, but Oz had the extra benefit of being a puppeteer. He even controlled puppet Yoda's movements! RELATED: 'Star Wars: The Clone Wars' Recap: Darth Sidious Shows Maul Who's the Master Third, for a Yoda movie to have any expansiveness, he'd probably have to be an all-CGI character. How else can he perform hummingbird-fast flips, twists, and lightsaber parries? And yet, who really liked CGI Yoda in Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith? So much of the tactility that came with him being a puppet was lost. Fourth, the fact that most Star Wars fans prefer practical Yoda to CGI Yoda suggests that we don't really care to see Yoda as a great warrior. I mean, one of the first things he himself ever says onscreen is, "Wars not make one great." We like him as a sage who stands on the sidelines, whose mastery is so great, that he almost never has to draw his lightsaber. The biggest complaint I had about his fight with Christopher Lee's Count Dooku in Episode II is that he had to call upon major acrobatics and work up a big sweat to fight a guy...who he himself had trained. Like Zorro on the classic Walt Disney TV series from the 1950s, Yoda's mastery should have been so great that he'd barely have to move while fighting Dooku. Now sparring with the Emperor in Revenge of the Sith? That's another matter. That was a true match of equals. Five, if they want to go the Warrior Yoda approach, this movie will likely be a prequel. I'll even go on record as saying that the Star Wars prequels get an unfair rap, but, still, a prequel is in no way something Disney/Lucasfilm should be attempting, at all, unless it's an Old Republic movie. Six, part of Yoda's appeal is that he's a cipher, a nexus of the Light Side about whom we ultimately know little. And we like it that way. George Lucas himself has purposefully kept Yoda's backstory shrouded in mystery — he's never even revealed the name of his frog-like race — to the degree that we know nothing about him aside that he likes gross food, is fascinated by electric lamps, and like Obi-Wan Kenobi, can be kind of a lying d**k. RELATED: 'Star Wars Into Darkness'?: The 5 Best J.J. Abrams/Episode VII Mash-Up Trailers Still, if this movie were to actually happen, and almost nothing aside from Knowles suggests that it will, here's what its makers would be wise to consider. Little is known about Yoda's eight-century career with the Jedi, except that it was a relatively placid one. He spent of that time training Padawans rather than fighting wars or going on daring missions. That's why his involvement in the Clone Wars was such a misguided step, not for himself, but the Order as a whole. He was a peacekeeper, not a warrior, and wars by default don't make one great. The most we've ever seen of him in the timeline prior to the movies is in Dave Wolverton's 1994 classic Expanded Universe novel, The Courtship of Princess Leia. Luke Skywalker happens upon a five-hundred year-old recording of a young and sprightly Yoda dealing with the aftermath of a Jedi training ship crashing on the planet Dathomir, home to a race of Force-using witches. And that's about it. Also, the Clone Wars TV series recently suggested there was a thrilling adventure behind the story of how young Padawan Yoda found the crystal he'd use to power his lightsaber. But the only exclusively Yoda-centric EU novel ever produced, Sean Stewart's Yoda: Dark Rendezvous, set during the final days of the Clone Wars, reveals a little bit more about Yoda's backstory. It even suggests he may have had a brush with the Dark Side at one point. RELATED: 'Star Wars' Is 'Lost'! 10 Clips Linking J.J. Abrams' Past and Future — VIDEOS Dark Rendezvous also provides a template for how a screenwriter could approach Yoda as the star of a movie. That's because that book remembered one key aspect of the character that seemed lost in Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith: his playfulness. Yoda's really a little imp in The Empire Strikes Back, messing with Luke, and getting into a little game of tug-of-war with R2-D2. If this movie ever happens, I really hope we see that side of the character. Oh, and there's one other thing that's a must for any Yoda movie: Yaddle. Phantom Menace aficionados, you know who I'm talking about. There was actually a female of Yoda's species who was also a member of the Jedi Council during the events of the Naboo Invasion Crisis in Episode I. Now, I'm not saying that we need to learn everything about Yoda's backstory. But I do really want to learn more about his relationship with Yaddle. Was there some forbidden love that they could never explore because of their respective Jedi vows of chastity? Is there a history of hot and heavy Yoda sex we never knew about? Were Yaddle's parents able to pirate broadcasts of Seinfeld from our galaxy and that inspired the name of their daughter? Those are the questions I want answered when the Yoda movie Star Wars: Do or Do Not directed by Jon Turtletaub is someday released in an alternate universe far more awesome than ours. Follow Christian Blauvelt on Twitter @Ctblauvelt [Photo Credit: Lucasfilm] You Might Also Like: Biden? Ford? Surprisingly Hot Young Pics of Politicians Who Wore This Crazy Hat? Stars Who Changed Their Look After Love
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Kristen Wiig Officially Joins 'Anchorman 2', Don't Act Like You're Not Impressed
February 05, 2013 5:45am ESTLadies and gentleman, can I please have your attention? I've just been handed an urgent news story. And I need all of you to stop what you're doing and listen: Kristen Wiig, who has beautiful eyes and smells like cinnamon, will definitely be staring in Anchorman: The Legend Continues! The announcement was made by the sequel's director and co-writer Adam McKay on his Facebook page ("Kristen Wiig is officially on board for Anchorman 2. Couldn't be more excited," he wrote) and Veronica Corningstone herself, Christina Applegate on her Twitter, where she told followers, "So excited Kristen Wiig has joined our cast for anchorman2. Going 2 b best movie ever made. Besides the best movies ever made." RELATED: 'Anchorman 2' Will Be Like 'The Newsroom'... But with Musical Numbers! Wiig, whose name became attached to the long-anticipated project back in December, will reportedly play the love interest to the lovably idiotic Brick Tamland (her Despicable Me co-star Steve Carell). Is this the lucky lady that Brick goes on to marry and have 11 children with? One can only hope. Still, does the announcement of Wiig's addition to the cast spoil a little bit of the fun? In the 2004 original, some of the biggest laughs came with those surprise cameos from Vince Vaughn, Ben Stiller, Tim Robbins, Luke Wilson, and Jack Black showed up to take part in the madness. Or, is it to Anchorman 2's benefit to not fall into the trap that The Hangover 2 fell in of making the exact same movie. We'll find out when the eagerly anticipated comedy hits theaters on December 20. RELATED: 'Anchorman 2' Gets Release Date: 12 Ways to Prepare for Ron Burgundy's Second Coming Of course, if Wiig re-teaming with her fellow SNL alum Will Ferrell is even half as funny as their appearance together at the Golden Globes, it will be, as Applegate put it, the "best movie ever made." Just remember Kristen, it's anchorman, not anchorlady! [Photo credit: WENN] You Might Also Like: Biden? Ford? Surprisingly Hot Young Pics of Politicians Who Wore This Crazy Hat? Stars Who Changed Their Look After Love
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Sam Witwer on Darth Maul's 'Clone Wars' Fate: 'He's Playing a Long Game' — Q&A
February 01, 2013 12:36pm ESTTrust me, you're gonna want to talk about "The Lawless," the last episode of Star Wars: The Clone Wars' Season 5 to feature Darth Maul and his apprentice Savage Opress. In fact, Lucasfilm and Hollywood.com knew you would have so much to say, that we've set up a live chat on Google Hangouts Saturday at 1:30 p.m. ET/10:30 a.m. PT with actors Sam Witwer (Maul), Matt Lanter (Anakin), Ashley Eckstein (Ahsoka), and supervising director Dave Filoni, to discuss the episode's unbelievable revelations. Tomorrow you yourself will have a chance to ask a question you've been dying to have answered. Today, though, we've pre-gamed the chat with an in-depth interview with Witwer, who's majorly creeped out — and entertained — everyone in our galaxy and that Galaxy Far, Far Away with his virtuoso vocal performance as Maul. He takes us through the two episodes we've already seen, "Eminence" and "Shades of Reason," talks about that little matter with Jon Favreau's Pre Vizsla that happened last week, and teases arc-capper, "The Lawless," in which Maul has a Sith reunion with his old master, Darth Sidious. He also sheds hints about Maul's ultimate fate and long-term impact on the show. Warning: There be epicness ahead. Hollywood.com: Let's start with the first episode of the Maul/Mandalorian arc, "Eminence." It’s also possibly the first Clone Wars episode ever to be seen entirely through the perspective of the villains. Sam Witwer: Yes, indeed. I loved that aspect of it, and it was a strangely challenging episode to do because it was so talky. It’s the first episode with Maul that’s just a character episode, just a bunch of guys talking to each other. So if those guys aren’t interesting, we lose. HW: With what we now know from the follow-up, "Shades of Reason," it's pretty much a given that Maul and Pre Vizsla were playing each other the whole time, right? SW: Oh, from the beginning for sure. Look at Pre Vizsla’s face when Maul starts choking Katee Sackhoff’s character Bo Katan. He has this look on his face like he was hoping something like this would happen. And when Maul leaves the room, Vizsla and Katan exchange a look like, “Yeah, this is our guy.” The way I read that is that they’re realizing that if they want to retake Mandalore they have to have the Force on their side, because Satine is supported by her old boyfriend, Jedi Obi-Wan Kenobi. So how the hell do they counter that? HW: By the end of "Eminence," however, the Mandalorians already seem ready to get rid of Maul. SW: Well, the fact that Maul started out as a little bit of a team player and as time went on he became more arrogant and really ended up showing his cards as far as the disrespect he has, or the lack of respect, he has for the Mandalorians, that was a fun thing to see. When you look at the early conversations between Vizsla and Maul, there was a mutual respect there and it takes no time for that to become simmering animosity beneath the surface. HW: It's hard to believe that when "The Lawless" airs, wrapping up this arc, it'll only be the fifth episode in which we've seen Maul. What do you make of his transformation so far? SW: Dave and I from the very beginning talked about this storyline way back when we were doing the "Maul in a cave" episodes. We knew how he would evolve, and it would require Maul to be different every time you saw him, to be evolving all the time. From madness, to gaining some of his humanity back but really being full of rage, to simmering down on that a bit, to now evolving to this strategic and diplomatic place. So when we first aired the insane Maul stuff some people loved it, but others said, “Hey, that’s not Darth Maul!” To which I can now say to them, “Hey, it’s not good storytelling if we just give you Darth Maul right away, if we don’t deal with the consequences of him being cut in half and left behind.” There’s gotta be a major cost involved. So when people made those comments, what we wanted to say was, “Hey guys, give it a chance. You don’t judge a movie by the first five minutes.” Now he’s resembling the Darth Maul we know from The Phantom Menace. He cuts down Pre Vizsla as ruthlessly as he does Qui-Gon Jinn. And yet there’s even so much more to him now. We know now that there is this madness underneath. We know he has this incredible mind that no one has previously seen. We’re into the good part of the story now. HW: In "Eminence" and "Shades of Reason" we saw a degree of leadership in Maul that we never got to glimpse in Phantom Menace. SW: On The Clone Wars, we had to show that Maul was capable of being a general. Darth Sidious chose him to be his apprentice and trained him well. Maul wasn’t just a mindless hitman. And this was the version of the character that I’d been waiting to do for a long time. I mean, it started with Filoni telling me he needed Maul to be like Gollum, and when I read the script I said we’ve also got a little Apocalypse Now here. He’s also Col. Kurtz. Dave agreed. So Maul became the combination of Gollum and Col. Kurtz, with a little bit of Peter Serafinowicz as Maul from Phantom Menace. Now, though, we've seen a change. NEXT: How Darth Maul has become an intellectual character. And also, how he may have inspired Darth Sidious to keep in faith in Vader even after that little swan-dive into a volcano.HW: Now we get to see that Maul's actually an intellectual character. He's not just a blunt instrument, an assassin, like it seemed in the movie. SW: He had to be. The Sith as a culture realized, "Hey, we’re all bad guys, we don’t work well together, so let’s keep it to two. Otherwise we’ll be killing each other left and right." So if you follow the Rule of Two, you have to pick your apprentice very carefully. You don’t just pick a guy because he can do cool flips and swing a sword good. You choose a guy who is brilliant and gifted in so many ways, physically and mentally, and can carry on the Sith tradition proudly. A thuggish hitman would be a hindrance when trying to take over the galaxy. You need someone who can work with you and to whom you can pass the baton when the time comes. And that’s a theme in the Star Wars saga as a whole. It’s so very much about Sidious trying to find that successor. He thinks he’s found that person in Darth Maul, but then Maul is cut down. And then he thinks, “Well, I’ll pick a guy who’s already trained really well,” but it doesn’t work out with Count Dooku because he quickly has his eye on this Anakin Skywalker guy. But sadly Darth Vader never becomes as good as he could have been because he’s disabled. And finally he sets his sights on Luke Skywalker, and that’s the guy who does him in. HW: It’s a continual streak of disappointment for Darth Sidious, in a way. SW: Well, it’s professionalism, man! There are things he could do to assist these people and help them along, but that’s not really the Sith way. Palpatine is looking for someone who could ideally defeat him and take the Sith mantle from him, and he does find that guy. The only thing is that guy has no interest in becoming a Sith. And that’s Luke Skywalker. So, it’s the perfectionist streak that Palpatine has. And what’s really fun to note is that Darth Maul, having survived his grievous injuries, plants the seed in Palpatine’s head that maybe you don’t give up on these guys so quickly. If they’re dead, or you think they’ve been killed, maybe they’re not. Maybe they can survive, maybe they can amount to something. That’s something we get to see coming up, Sidious realizing that. That ultimately leads to Darth Vader. HW: Yeah, I mean why did Palpatine still think Vader could be a worthwhile apprentice after his little brush with molten lava? SW: Common wisdom would be, you find this guy lying by a volcano, his flesh smoking and burned up, with no limbs, and you’d say, “Hey stormtrooper, put a blaster bolt in this guy. Put him out of his misery.” You don’t rebuild that guy. That’s ridiculous. Unless maybe you’ve already seen a guy getting cut in half and crawling through garbage for ten years, clinging to life with every ounce of determination he has. That’s the nature of the Sith, they don’t see anything beyond their corporeal existence. They live completely in the moment, but in the most unhealthy way. They’re self-obsessed, selfish, narcissistic, so much so that they can’t see that there’s any significance beyond their own lives. That’s not like a Jedi who’s wounded in battle but realizes that his death could mean something or inspire others, and thus can let go. If a Sith lies near death, they look at it like, “I can’t! I can’t! There’s still so much to gain. There’s still so much I want. Because if I die I lose everything.” So they continue to push themselves well past the point of logic. You have Darth Vader, who lives a terrible life, he lives a pathetic, tortured existence but it’s still preferable to having nothing, which is how he views death. Same thing with Darth Sidious, you look at him in Return of the Jedi. He’s over 100 years old and is a bent old man. But that’s better than the alternative, which is nothing. I mean, the fact that we’re learning more about the core morality of Star Wars is really fun. We’re learning things from The Clone Wars that informs how we even watch the original movies from over thirty years ago. HW: So, in "The Lawless" Darth Maul is going to have a little Sith reunion with Darth Sidious. How do you think he views his old master these days? SW: When you’re a liar, a person of low moral fortitude, really any explanation you need to be true can be true. Especially if you’re smart enough. You can figure out a way to justify anything. Part of Maul thinks, “Yes, I would like to reclaim my spot as the apprentice and I want to prove why I deserve that.” And then there’s another side that’s like, “Screw Palpatine. I’m the master now. Savage is the apprentice, and I’m going to show him how it’s done, and if he has a problem with that, I’m going to take him out.” The Sith training is nothing short of torture, so there’s always a great deal of hatred built-in to the master-apprentice relationship, an intense animosity. We see that between Vader and the Emperor in the original trilogy. So he may want both things, depending on what he needs to desire at any given point. HW: Is there a developing rivalry between Maul and Savage? Maul doesn't quite treat his brother like a brother. SW: Maul keeps calling Savage “apprentice,” and will never call him "brother," absolutely. But they do need each other, and there’s an element of, "Together we’ll talk on all of them!" And I love that they threw in a moment of them being comrades when Maul tells Savage how he’s going to screw over the Mandalorians, and even rests his hand on Savage’s new robot hand. The Sith are dicks. What can I tell you man, they’re trouble. They don’t have the "working together" thing down, but they do know how to have people work for them. HW: I realize you probably know Maul's ultimate fate on the show. But what would you, as the person who's given vocal life to Maul, like to see his fate be? What do you want for him? SW: (laughs) Oh, boy. What can I tell you? What would I like to see happen to Maul? Yeah...I can say this. What I’d like to see happen to Maul is what Dave Filoni has told me is what happens to Maul. None of this is taken lightly at Lucasfilm. This is George Lucas’ doing, all of this stuff. He’s the one engineering these stories that me, Dave, the other voice actors, and the animators are implementing. So there is a long game here. Look, the effect of Darth Maul on the show is a pronounced one. Maybe he dies after these episodes. Maybe he doesn’t. But either way, his effect on the show will be a lasting one. That’s all I’m gonna say. Follow Christian Blauvelt on Twitter @Ctblauvelt [Photo Credit: Lucasfilm] More: 'Star Wars: The Clone Wars' Recap: Jon Favreau's Pre Vizsla Gets Mauled 'Star Wars: The Clone Wars' Recap: Darth Maul and the Mandalorians Don't Like It Hutt 'Star Wars: The Clone Wars' Recap: Point of No Return You Might Also Like: Biden? Ford? Surprisingly Hot Young Pics of Politicians Who Wore This Crazy Hat? Stars Who Changed Their Look After Love
