The Acme called me while I was writing in my journal this morning. Could I come in and work for 8 hours? Um, no. It was past 9 AM by then, and that meant I would have had to be there by 10. I ended up telling them I'd be in around noon.
Ran Sailor Moon during breakfast. Minako and Chibi-Usa are the only ones in town who don't come down with the flu during an epidemic. Mina's attempts to play nurse to the other Guardians meets with limited success at best. Turns out Esmeraude sent a virus from the future to make everyone too sick to fight her negative energy...but she wasn't counting on one person to escape the illness.
Finally finished out my Star Wars story after breakfast. Luke, Leia, and Lando go in separate directions. Luke and Leia, having just figured out they're brother and sister, take the Falcon, Cecil, and Arthur to the Enchanted Woods and the Dagobah Swamps to find out more about their heritage from Yoda and get him to repair Luke's hand. Lando is off on Chewbacca to the dry, barren Kingdom of Tatoon to pursue Boba Fett and his carriage. They wish each other well and head off into the horizon...but Luke swears he sees a huge, dark creature watching them as they leave...
This was the perfect day to finish my second venture into the Star Wars Universe. May 4th is considered Star Wars Day by many fans - it's the date the original movie opened in 1977. In honor of Star Wars Day, A Star Wars Fairy Tale: Empire is now up at Fanfiction.net, Archive of Our Own, and my writing blog.
A Star Wars Fairy Tale: Empire at My Writing Blog
A Star Wars Fairy Tale: Empire at Archive of Our Own
A Star Wars Fairy Tale: Empire at Fanfiction.net
Had a quick lunch while watching more Sailor Moon. Artemis, Minako's talking white cat, is in the spotlight in the next episode. Fed up with the girls and Luna calling him a klutz, he goes in search of a way to be a hero...and finds it when he sees an old man rounding up stray animals. But there's a lot more going on at this shelter than what it appears to be on the surface, and Artemis may be in way over his furry head.
I did make it to work by noon. They called me in because a cashier was borrowed from the bakery when one of their morning people called out. While I appreciate the extra hours, I think they could have done without me. It was pretty quiet for most of the early part of the afternoon. I stood around and wrote a lot of notes for the next part of my Star Wars fairy tale. By the time it started picking up, I was back to my usual bagging duties, mostly doing returns and rounding up carts. (I did have to take a register for 20 minutes while a cashier went on their break.)
When I got home, I made leftovers for dinner and had Orange-White Cake for dessert. Continued to celebrate Star Wars Day with the second prequel film, Attack of the Clones. (I'm saving the Original Trilogy for when Lauren visits. She's never actually seen them in full.)
Anakin Skywalker (Hayden Christensen) is now the apprentice and partner to Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan MacGregor). They're the hottest Jedi team going, but rebellious teen Anakin is chafing under Obi-Wan's strict teaching. It doesn't help that his first solo assignment is to protect the beautiful and intelligent Senator Padme Amidala (Natalie Portman), whom he has a huge crush on. Meanwhile, Obi-Wan is investigating a bounty hunter who had attempted to assassinate Padme. Obi-Wan's path leads him to a factory that's creating a clone army for the Republic...and to the heads of a group of planets that want to separate from the Republic, lead by the dashing-but-evil Count Dooku (Christopher Lee). While Anakin grapples with his feelings for Padme and his leanings towards the Dark Side of the Force, Obi-Wan is captured by Dooku and his men. It leads to an epic showdown between droids and Jedi in an arena on a desert planet, including Yoda's memorable encounter with Dooku.
I like the second half of this one a LOT more than the first half. Anakin and Padme's run through the droid factory, the fight in the arena, and the arrival of the Jedi cavalry is all pure awesomeness. I know people have problems with the Dooku-Yoda duel because Yoda is CGI...but I remember people going absolutely wild over that scene in the theater, and it still holds up pretty well today. Lee brings his typical debonair evil to Dooku, MacGregor is appropriately gruff as Kenobi, and Samuel L. Jackson acquits himself fairly well as Jedi Master Mace Windu.
Saddled with the heavier dramatics and George Lucas' inability to write romantic dialogue, Christensen and Portman are stiff as boards (though they do perk up a little when they hit the factory). Their lack of chemistry and the poor dialogue bogs down the middle act, despite Obi-Wan's rather interesting little mystery with the clones. All the political rambling doesn't help, ether, nor does some very obvious and dated CGI throughout.
Though it has some good things, I don't recommend either Clones or The Phantom Menace for anyone but major Star Wars fans. Really, a lot of this backstory simply wasn't necessary. Go to Revenge of the Sith, the darker movie after this one, if you want a better taste of the prequels.
No comments:
Post a Comment