The Orange Gunner
This week we are celebrating our German Jedi-Con appearance with a series of Jedi-Con and Jedipedia crossover strips. There will be no less than 4 NEW BMS STRIPS this week as a result (Today, Friday, Saturday and Sunday), before we return to our regularly scheduled ROTJ storyline NEXT week.
The star of today’s strip is Magnus, the Orange Gunner, a cosplayer who does extensive charity work across Germany to benefit children with his cheerful colors and teddy bear Gunner mascot. We’ve known about Magnus’ work for a long time now and we always thought an Orange Gunner was just crazy enough to belong in the BMS universe. A little information about Orange Gunner and his charity work can be found here.
STAR WARS REBELS!
Leanne and had the opportunity to attend the Washington, DC preview screening of Star Wars Rebels at the AMC Theatre. Thanks to an invite from our friend, Charles Wright of the Rebel Legion’s Terrapin Base. I know what you are thinking, “Rod, you didn’t like Clone Wars, you won’t like Rebels.” Well, I was concerned for those reasons, but I’m not a complete jerk. I want Rebels to be awesome as much as anyone else.
The surprise is that I enjoyed it.
I really enjoyed it!
My concerns going in were the cartoony look, and the continuing presence of lightsabers in post Order 66 continuity. The character design (unnatural cartoon colored hair) is a bit misleading. Yes, the purple-haired Ezra is basically Aladdin with latent force abilities, but none of the main cast is off putting or out of place. This is much closer in feel to Star Wars the Original Trilogy than I expected and that makes it very palatable for me.
The various John Williams themes from the Original Trilogy that are used throughout helped with the atmosphere, as did the superficial with the classic Stormtroopers, TIE Pilots, TIE Fighters, Star Destroyers, Imperial Officers, speeder bikes etc. The blaster battles were a welcome change from a million lightsabers out the yinyang. There are a lot of nice comic touches with the Stormtroopers. Somehow, I like seeing Stormtroopers clowning around a lot more than I do their predecessor cronies.
The small group of ragtag rebels actually creates a situation that feels close to the Original Trilogy with the underdog vs the evil Empire theme. The smuggler side of Star Wars is once again alive and well. I won’t give any spoilers, but there was a nice preview of whats ahead in the season, and some familiar characters from the OT trilogy will be making an appearance. Cool beans!
Overall, I’m still wary about how the Jedi stuff might develop later in the series, but I can’t really find any legitimate fault with Rebels. I was expecting it to be more of Clone Wars, but it felt fresh to me.
A huge thank you to Charles Wright and the Terrapin Base Rebel Legion and Madalorian Mercs for putting on the armor and entertaining the kids in attendance, of which, I’m happy to report, there were many. Never seen so many lightsaber balloons in my life!
On Thursday we will be touching down in Germany for the Official German Star Wars Fan Club’s Jedi-Con event. The Three day show runs from Oct 3 to 5, at Düsseldorf Maritim Hotel. The highlights for us are guests Garrick Hagon (Biggs Darklighter himself!), Anthony Daniels and Kenny Baker.