star wars Archives » Drewprops Blog

Where Is Dragon*Con?

I understand that my pals The Cardboard Troopers had a wild time this past weekend. They arrived in Atlanta for the 2009 edition of Dragon*Con, but they couldn’t actually seem to find a trace of the convention and the hotel people kept looking at them funny. I sure hope that they come back for the 10:00am parade on Saturday, they always seem to enjoy that.

Which reminds me that last month the Fall issue of the Georgia Tech Alumni Magazine hit the stands and I was simultaneously delighted (97%) and mortified (3%) to read the article about me that staff writer Van Jensen composed after we met prior to my surgery this summer. Entitled “How Did That NERD on the Left Become That PIRATE on the Right?“, the article does a really nice job of catching people up with the kid who won the Batman contest back in the 80s… and the second page features a certain cardboard trooper standing in front of a line of “real” troopers at Dragon*Con.

VaderPainter’s Big August 2009 Sale

Last week our friend Bob announced that he was going to sell a few old Star Wars toys he had laying around his house. This of course piqued my interest, as I’m one of those millions of children who were imprinted with the plans for the Death Star back in the summer of 1977. Like many of those kids, my formative years were spent poring over pre-production illustrations by Ralph McQuarrie and building my own models of the ships out of balsa wood and styrene. Looking back, I thought that I had a pretty great collection of lovingly-used Continue reading VaderPainter’s Big August 2009 Sale

Star Trek is This Generation’s… WHA??

Do you know what hyperbole is?
Do you know who Kirk Montgomery is?
Do you know what you get when you mix the two?

I just heard an advertisement for the new Star Trek movie in which Mr. Montgomery is quoted as saying that the new Star Trek is “this generation’s Star Wars”. ORLY? I thought it was supposed to be this generation’s STAR TREK!!!!

Cretin.

::sigh::

Following this new variation on logic I can only surmise that:

“House” must be this generation’s “Gone With The Wind”.
The new Will Ferrell remake of “Land of the Lost” must be this generation’s “French Connection”.
“Transformers 2” must certainly be this generation’s “Citizen Kane”
and who could deny that “Operation Runway” represents this generation’s “From Here to Eternity”??

Alls I know is that THIS generation have their heads up their collective asses and that Mr. Montgomery is leading the charge. Just like Humphrey Bogart in “Ironman 2”.

Now THERE was a classic.

Awesome 1978 Star Wars Yearbook

I have a little present for you… keep reading!

Anyone who’s been within a mile of a geek is aware that the Star Wars franchise continues to exert its influence on popular culture. Yet, in the 30+ years since its initial release, I think that we’ve forgotten the ferocity with which that space opera seized our collective imagination… it was a massively incredible time to be a kid… a time when words like “wookie” and “darth” and “R2-D2” were alien and exotic and felt wrong and strange and Continue reading Awesome 1978 Star Wars Yearbook

The Price of Nostalgia

Last weekend I got a call from someone who was working on a film project that required a slight tip of the hat to that most iconic space operas of our modern age. While I was busy digging out some of my old reference books two tiny scraps of paper fluttered to the ground. When I picked them up my eyes practically goggled as I realized that I’d discovered a couple of really old movie tickets that could have only come from a trip to see one of the installments for the original Star Wars Continue reading The Price of Nostalgia

Revenge of the Heatwave

HowStuffWorks.com’s Senior Staff Writer Tracy V. Wilson was once heard to remark that her cousin’s Star Wars figures were ruined because he’d stored them in their attic, where they were quietly baked into runny little puddles of non-action figures. Something to do with How Attics Get Really, REALLY Hot. As she related the story I quietly bit the inside of my cheek and thought to myself “Dude, you so have to check your Star Wars figures, up in the attic.”

But of course I didn’t.
It’s strange… sort of like when your inner hypochondriac insists that you have contracted some terrible, loping disease of the soul and yet you avoid going to the doctor to have him Continue reading Revenge of the Heatwave

Chewboxxa

I’m undeniably proud of the Cardboard Craze that I started at Dragon*Con back in 2005, especially of the guys who have been such dedicated cardboard costumers along with me since that time! After our great success as cardboard troopers last year, a lot of people have expressed their desire to join us in at the upcoming convention in September. Several folks have expressed that, while they have the desire, they just don’t have any good ideas on exactly how to build a good costume out of cardboard. So, as a service to those people, I’m going to begin a series of posts that will continue up until September, designed to provide you some design ideas and construction techniques. First out of the blocks is my design for Chewboxxa, a “Booxiee” from the planet BoxxaHarveyKorman.
Continue reading Chewboxxa