Don’t know if you realise but Christmas is fast approaching. If the endless ads on tv didn’t alert you to this, nor the lights on every street, nor the 7 miles queues for every shopping centre in the land, then that’s just because you’re either stupid or, like me, in denial. But you can only deny so far. In fact, so far, far. Because Far Far Away on a distant galaxy…

That’s really how you know its Christmas, because a new Star Wars movie is coming out. Disney, having paid over $2billion for the franchise, gotta fast-track the income stream to recoup the investment. So last year we had a Star Wars Movie, official, number 7, I made it (though lost count about a decade ago and lost the chronology long before that, or maybe soon after that). This year’s is NOT number 8!!! No. Its a ‘spin-off’!!!! Wow.

In a normal Star Wars movie (and don’t get me wrong; I fucking love them, live them, buy the little toy soldiers and would give my left arm to be Darth Vader except he lost it in part 5 to his own son’s light sabre!!! ungrateful little bastard…) you get a bunch of good people, which you can tell because they’re dressed really shabbily, about 5 of them, armed with water pistols and slingshots, and they go up against 725,000 heavily armed, nuclear-powered, armour-plated, laser-shooting bad guys (dressed really well; Dolce & Gabbana Titanium Collection; Black Capes by Armani; smart, powerful, clean) and they destroy the baddies ship/planet/space station with three toilet roll holders, an empty washing up liquid bottle and loads of cunning and ‘grit’. And ‘the force’. Can you feel it? I can. But I’m ‘special’.

Whereas in ‘Rogue One’, this year’s, un-Star-Wars, spin-off, its all different (no spoilers. Mainly because I know virtually nothing about it). In this one the goodies are all really scruffy and they beat the very elegant baddies using ordinary household waste, and are really heroic and there’s probably some really cool robots that they polish up at the end to receive their medals of valour.

See, its totally different. Spin-off, innit. Luke Skywalker has turned into Felicity Jones, (I would willingly die by those teeth), a nod to the transgender acceptance currently showing popularity everywhere except where Trump is, and there’s no Vader, there’s no Hans Solo, none of our old faves. Harrison Ford’s care home refused to let him go out unaided.

Having a ‘lead woman’ should mean nothing. But Disney have a bit of a reputation. Walt himself was famously a sexist, racist misogynist and his ‘spirit’ seems to have endured. But by 2017, even the great Disney Empire (the one that didn’t strike back) is prepared to have women and even people of colour(!!!!) in the movie.

I can’t wait for this new un-Star-Wars, Star Wars movie. I don’t even know what that means.

Happy Wednesday

A xxxx