In this installment of the Inner Persona miniseries, we’ll continue to expand our mental ‘word-hoard’ by adding some words and phrases from the Star Wars galaxy you can use to spice up your in-universe speech. If you’re portraying a character from the rougher side of the Galaxy, the saltier the better!
While we on modern Earth—depending on the decade—use words like swell, cool, awesome, or lit to express appreciation for something we like, the GFFA has “wizard” (Episode I), “rugged” (Rogue Planet), and “prime” (Galaxy of Fear)!
– “As stars live and die!”
– “Blast!”, “Blast it!” (can’t go wrong with this classic)
– “By all the souls of Alderaan!” (Rogue Squadron)
– “Chuba chips!”, “Chuba chunks!” and “Chuba lips” are all used by Ratts Tyerell in Jabba’s Game Galaxy
– “Emperor’s bones!” (Rogue Squadron #2)
– “Emperor’s black bones!”
– Flaming: as in, “this flaming coastline is full of coves,” (Last of the Jedi #4: Death on Naboo)
– “Force-forsaken” used as a replacement for Godforsaken; I’m not a fan.
– Frell, frelling (Republic Commando)
– Frip, fripping (often used in Death Star, all the way up to “un-fripping-believable!”
Author: A.H.
Galactic Style Guide – Hats I
Welcome back to another installment of the Galactic Style Guide, where we break down the ‘Star Wars aesthetic’ in order to help you create a more authentic ‘outer persona’! For this month’s installment, we’re taking things from the top and talking Hats!
Our main cast of characters tend to go hatless, but for secondary and background characters, hats are very commonplace. While certain styles tend to work better with certain settings, covering your head in some way is a great way to remind your audience that you are portraying an inhabitant of the Galaxy Far Far Away.
When I put a call out to the SWLH facebook group for style suggestions, the immediate first response was ‘Caps with flaps!’. As this type of hat is readily available as military surplus, such hats are a no-brainer way to make yourself quickly blend into the galactic populace:
It’s worth pointing out that the hats of the Hoth hangar techs are essentially a WW2 US Navy deck hat, so if you’re handy with a sewing machine, stick around at the end for a free pattern.
Continue reading “Galactic Style Guide – Hats I”On the subject of bounty hunting ‘trophies’
As I’ve talked about a few times before, when reenacting any setting (historic or fictional) one of the best ways to add depth to an impression is by including small details or items of ‘pocket trash’! One of the ideas I frequently see discussed in online Star Wars cosplay circles is the idea of ‘hunting trophies’, and a recent thread made me realize I definitely have some thoughts on the subject!
Whether it’s bones and claws from critters, crystals from Jedi lightsabers, battle droid fingers, or actual lightsabers, the notion that a bounty hunter or mercenary character should have a collection of tchotchkes taken from past kills dangling from their belt, blaster, or backpack is one of those trends that the costuming community has really latched onto. However, I submit that this type of decoration is A) actually an impediment to such work, and B) a fan reenactorism not seen in either primary or secondary sources. Be sure to stick around til the end for some ideas on how to more authentically portray these kinds of character in true ‘living history’ style!
continue readingEven more galactic whittling: Gozanti cruiser
For my latest ‘galactic folk art’ adventure, I decided to make a civilian-model Gozanti cruiser, partially inspired by the post-Disney Imperial incarnation featured in ‘The Heiress’. This ship has been around since at least 32 BBY (its first appearance was taking off outside Mos Espa in Episode I), so it’s a solid fit for any of my personas to carry in a pocket:
Whenever I’m feeling stressed out, in a funk, or down on myself (usually after spending too much time on social media and comparing my own slow progress and accomplishments with other folks’ flashy projects!), I find a great coping mechanism is to pick up some small project that can be completed with short turnaround. Whittling is a great choice for these kinds of projects, as I find the act of whittling by itself to be very grounding and meditative. However, the ‘in the flow’ quality of the work means that I always forget to take in-progress pictures, reinforcing my FOMO of not keeping up with the social media Joneses! (Aaahh, what difficult-to-navigate times we live in. 😉
Continue reading “Even more galactic whittling: Gozanti cruiser”Searching for AgriCorps style
It’s somehow been several (4.5?!) years since first I first ventured forth to do some first-person galactic interpretation, and as you would expect in a hobby geared towards constant tinkering and improvement, I’ve made plenty of changes to that impression since then. In the coming months, I plan to roll out some ‘complete kit’ breakdowns for my various Star Wars living-history personas. In the case of my ex-Agricultural Corps Jedi impression, I realized that a kit breakdown wouldn’t be the right place for fully detailing the research that went into said impression…especially since I portray him long after the Corps has been dissolved!
What’s more, a recent addition to our community in the SWLH facebook group expressed great interest in pursuing an AgriCorps impression, so I wanted to use this post and lay out the few bits of information I’ve been able to dig up–not only for their benefit, but for anyone else who might be thinking about such a persona. If you have an interest in gardening, botany, biology, geology, or environmental science and want to apply it to the Galaxy Far Far Away, consider the AgriCorps!
Compared to the larger Order as a whole, our sample size of analyzable visual examples for the Service Corps (and AgriCorps specifically) is a miniscule—only nine.
This generic Mohawk’d fellow comes from the Power of the Jedi Sourcebook (2002), while The Jedi Path (circa 115 BBY) gives us six more individuals, plus a generic Service Corps member:
Continue reading “Searching for AgriCorps style”Thoughts on ‘The Rescue’
Aaaand just like that, I think I’m done. Erm, I meant…Welcome back to my commentary series on Season 2 of The Mandalorian; for this installment we’re breaking down the Season 2 finale, Chapter 16 ‘ The Rescue’.
We open with Slave 1 chasing a Lambda-class shuttle, and wasn’t it nice to hear those high-pitched lasers again? We see the inside of the shuttle, and it was amazing how much more open the cockpit feels versus what we saw in Episode VI—is it something to do with being widescreen, depth of field, or is the set here just twice as big? It just feels like we’re seeing two totally different ships to me.
Continue reading “Thoughts on ‘The Rescue’”Galactic Style Guide – Shoulders II
Happy Boxing Day, and welcome back to the Galactic Style Guide, where we break down the ‘Star Wars aesthetic’ in order to create a more authentic ‘outer persona’! For our final installment of 2020, we’re wrapping up our look at the archetypal exotic space-fantasy ‘wide-shouldered’ look.
We’ll begin by teasing out some examples of armor-based wide shoulders from the earlier phases of galactic history (pre-1000 BBY):
I don’t have a ton of interest in (or access to) much material from this period, so it’s totally possible I’ve overlooked some key figure. Is there anyone I’ve missed? Please let me know!
As we’ll see, more modern characters from the Clone Wars all the way into the Legacy era have also worn armor that widens the upper body: Continue reading “Galactic Style Guide – Shoulders II”
Thoughts on ‘The Believer’
Welcome back to my commentary series on Season 2 of The Mandalorian; for this installment we’re breaking down Chapter 15 ‘The Believer’. Aside from the first episode, I haven’t been too especially fond of any of this season’s installments; after the on-rails themepark ride of ‘The Siege’, the poor direction of ‘The Jedi’, and the mindless action of ‘The Tragedy’, I had low hopes for the next episode. As we will see, having lowered expectations meant I was able to be pleasantly surprised.
The episode opens with a scruffy-looking Mayfeld on a New Republic prison work detail, where he’s busting up wrecked TIEs. Right off the bat, I’m onboard, because while Star Wars might refer to prisons from time to time, we almost never get to actually see people in prison, much less doing menial labor – it’s a nice bit of worldbuilding. (Off the top of my head, all I can think of is the Jedi Knight novella which saw Alphonso Obata incarcerated by the NR on Milagro, jackhammering a city glassed by orbital bombardment).
In this opening we see Boba has repainted his armor, and it looks…Not At All Star Wars-y. While one could easily make the argument that ‘Everything was new once’, seeing him with a refreshed paintjob and how weird it looks really underlines how key the ‘Used Universe’ look is to the Galaxy Far Far Away. If you, dear reader, have just finished assembling and painting your own Star Wars kit, don’t stop now! It may feel wrong to intentionally ‘mess up’ something you’ve spent a lot of time and effort on, but if you really want to do right by the aesthetic, you need to bite the bullet and do some weathering and aging to really sell the look.
Also, is this the first time we’ve seen a light-up identification doodad? I can guess what all the fancy propmakers and Batuu-bounders will be upgrading to this winter…
Continue reading “Thoughts on ‘The Believer’”Thoughts on ‘The Tragedy’
Welcome back to my breakdown series on The Mandalorian Season Two. I’m about a week behind, but we’re looking at Chapter 14 ‘The Tragedy’ this time around.
Boba Fett (played by Temuera Morrison, nice continuity!) has somehow tracked our Lone Wolf and Cub to Tython. I really have to wonder…HOW? Last we saw Boba, he was watching the Titular Mandalorian swooping into the sunset on Tatooine. After walking back to Mos Eisley, they went sublight with Lady Gecko to Spidery Ice Planet, then to Fish Planet, took a detour back to Navarro, then to Dead Forest Planet before heading to Tython. We know the ship has been tracked since Navarro due to Gideon’s spy, but how would Boba be able to follow that convoluted-ass trail?
Anyway, Boba shows up and I’ll be damned if he isn’t packing around the longest gaderffii I’ve ever seen…over five feet by my calculations, so literally as long as his long-ass Tusken rifle! Also, as this hobby includes an element of approaching on-screen things through a realism-and-practicality lens, I have to ask: just how is that gaffi staying on his back? (Note that we never see Boba take it off his back, he just magically has it in his hands in a different shot.) His rifle has a sling, but the gaderffii just seems to hover on his back, which is silly and purely just for ‘cool points’, to give a ‘Hollywood swordsman’ silhouette.
Continue reading “Thoughts on ‘The Tragedy’”Thoughts on ‘The Jedi’
Welcome back to my commentary series on Season 2 of The Mandalorian; for this installment we’re breaking down Chapter 13 ‘The Jedi’, and I gotta say, while everybody was losing their minds this time around, I really wasn’t feeling it. Call it jumping the shark, but something just felt…off about this chapter, which is profoundly disappointing to me because there was such potential.
A few folks’ comments I saw praised Dave Filoni’s directing in this episode, saying ‘it was just like an episode of The Clone Wars come to life!’ But to be honest, several times this episode I almost found myself nodding off…too many long, lingering shots with nothing happening made it feel very poorly paced.
Right off the bat—literally, just 40 seconds in—we have our first view of live-action Ahsoka…and boy, was I underwhelmed.
I feel like the cold open where Ahsoka picks off mooks in the darkness had the potential to be a really visually-dynamic sequence, but what we get just struck me as humdrum instead of artistic. Considering the murky setting and the lightsabers involved, I think this chapter’s opening could’ve been a great exercise in chiaroscuro as a Lucas-style “tone poem”: make the scene darker, use the lightsabers sparingly, with some mook POV shots as you hear (but can’t see) her getting closer, a snap-hiss and a scream in the distance, then see a dark shape zipping from place to place…in my mind’s eye the scene is way better than what Filoni gave us. The best parts of the sequence are early on, when Ahsoka is obscured or seen in silhouette (in a hood she has a great silhouette), and given the reputation of the character you’d think she would merit a better reveal than what we got: I wish she had been teased early and then been properly revealed later in the episode, but…nope.
Living History in the Star Wars Galaxy 