Star Wars Day

I know it is a late but I have started to watch The Mandalorian, well more like binge as I finished the first season today. The series reminded me of the original Star Wars and the Prequels (we don't talk about the sequels) and how those movies have expanded the boundaries of cinematic story telling and  the sci-fi genre its self. I believe that it is because of these movies along with some other influences that I have had a fascination with science fiction.

Star wars has been a massive hit over many years, which brought out the many marketing ideas such as toys and games. This bobble head is just one of them and is just left sitting on a shelf in its box, but thinking about it, who doesn't want a little baby Yoda sitting around. Maybe I'll get one.

Darth Gilroy Serious

This afternoon we ended up at the Ngwenya Glass Village sipping on Gilroy’s Serious Royal Dark Ale while a muso played 80s music. The Gilroy has an interesting crest, 3 dolphins representing the original Irish Gilroy family coat of arms, a beer tankard signifying the brewers, and then well what can be said about the gauntlet displaying a Hawaiian Good Luck sign, nothing much.

Later on we explored the few stores in the village that were still opened and found a Darth Vader brazier, awesome find but way too expensive.

The Force Awakens

A lot of expectation awaited this release of Star Wars since the last episodes. I remember a time I fought the crowds with my brother in-law Hans to watch a Star Wars launch night viewing at Montecasino. Now I am older and a lot wiser, I hope, with the crowd mania not my thing.

And so Matthew and I chose a quiet Friday morning, two days after the hype of the first showing, to go view Star Wars – The Force Awakens. Well please excuse the photo above as I had to at least document this occasion and there were no Stormtroopers or Darth Vader around so I had to improvise with me pretending to hold a lightsaber.

Not to give away any spoilers so those who have not watched it yet stop reading any further... Oh you can come back afterwards as I have an important question near the end.

I hate 3D movies as they are always slightly blurry and it looks like a tiny screen and not the big screen to me eyes. In all Ster Kinekor’s wisdom there were no normal screenings close by to me so I had to go to the 3D rendition which spoilt the whole experience for me.

Anyway I have a question for those who have seen the movie which should be all who are reading this far down. In the Star Wars canon, see the Star Wars Expanded Universe, Hans and Leia had 3 children, the twins Jacen and Jaina, and later another son Anakin. So now to my question, in this Star Wars – The Force Awakens we find out that Kylo is the son of Hans and Leia which according to canon becomes Darth Caedus but is Rey his twin sister Jaina? Now that The Forces Awakens, we have to wait until the next Star Wars movie to find out and endure a lot of speculation of whom Kylo and Rey are.

Astromech R2-D2 Droid

Monday blues has arrived after a busy slow weekend. And after a full day at work, I arrived back home without taking my daily photograph. Looking around my lounge for something to photograph, my eyes fell on this Astromech R2-D2 Droid that was sitting on the welsh dresser. You can’t go wrong with Star Wars.

Astromech Droid R2-D2

Okay here is the final assembly of the Lego Star Wars astromech droid R2-D2 which Matthew took just under 20 hours to build. It now stands proudly in my lounge. Matthew is now thinking of ways to mechanise the droid with his Lego Mind Storms robotic kit which he took out of storage and is rummaging through. Three motorised legs, touch sensors and an infra red sensor. I mentioned to him that maybe; he should make a slightly bigger droid so that all the Lego motor parts can fit.

Bidi bidi bidi, oh oh,sorry that was Twiki, wrong droid, wrong century ;-)

Skywatcher R2-D2

Well Matthew got two major gifts today for Christmas; the first one is a Skywatcher telescope. It is only has a 90mm aperture and a focal length of 1250mm but the best part is that it has an adaptor ring to fit a Canon camera. Move over Matthew. Now we have to wait for the rain to go away.

In the meanwhile Matthew is enjoying his other Christmas present, a Lego kit of the Star Wars astromech droid R2-D2. Matthew has been busy the whole day and he is just over half way assembling R2. Well not quite the whole day as I had to drag him away to eat lunch. I am not sure, but it looks like he won't stop assembling until his droid is in prime condition.

The Force is strong with this one.