They'll Take My Generation X Card Away

I’ve never seen a single episode of Star Wars in it's entirity.

Despite the fact that I had a Princess Leah Barbie doll. Yeah, I took the buns out of her hair and never got them back in.

When people learn this about me, they are stunned. They ask how this is possible. They’ve threatened to release me from Generation X, especially after the two new ‘first’ episodes hit theaters.

I had to think about it, and here’s the answer:
The first Star Wars movie was released in what 1977? My parents didn’t really take us to movies. I saw maybe 5 movies in a theatre before I was 16 years old. On top of that, we lived in the country and didn’t have access to cable television, which is how most people saw certain movies 5 to 10 times before the advent of VCRs. My parents didn’t get a VCR until I was in college. By then, catching up on Star Wars required dedicating 8 hours of my life to watch what amounts to an old movie.

Mr. Burns learned all of this last weekend. We both bemoan the fact that there is never anything good on TV despite the 400 some channels he has to choose from with his satellite service. (is anyone surprised that I don’t even have cable?!) We were flipping through the channels and he landed on the middle of the first new Star Wars episode. Episode One I presume. He wanted to watch it. That led to revealing all the information that I have just shared with you.

Okay. So we pick up right about where Anakin’s mother dies. The next thing I know, there is a battle that never ends. If at some point the good guys appear to be making progress, more droids enter the battlefield. Droids that aren’t even remotely similar to the first ones seemingly assigned to the battle. This doesn’t seem fair. You can’t challenge someone to a fight and then keep replacing the foes they manage to defeat. More importantly, this means that the battle never ends. Boring! How interesting is it to watch the same fight for 40 minutes?

I started shifting in my seat. Now, I work in television, and I have been responsible for the production end of a number of shows. I start thinking… there had to be a point where George Lucas and the film editor thought; “This is getting long. Tedious even. Maybe we need to shorten the battle scene.” And they choose not to!

I thought, this is about as interesting as watching some on screen couple kiss – nothing else – just kiss - for 2 two hours. Fun for them, but not really interesting for anyone else.

I finally got up and told Mr. Burns that I was going to the other room to count the hairs on my arms, just for the change of pace.