Star Wars: 10 Fanfilms That Did It Way Better Than Lucas
5. Star Wars Gangsta Rap
Not since the days of Weird Al's "Amish Paradise" have I been so amused by a rap song. True, the majority of the dialogue is lifted directly from the Original Trilogy, but there are some instant-classic lyrics that sum up whole scenes of dialogue, and add a decidedly "street" flavour to the universe. Some choice examples:
"Yoda, why you bein' a playa hater? You know that I still must confront Lord Vader." "Obi-Wan would never bother Telling you about your father." "I got a layaway on a power converter but now you're treating me like a scruffy nerfherder."There may only a couple of characters featured from the movies, but it's still a joyous fan film. I'm actually torn as to whether the original or redone version is better: the original is a classic, but the remastered version has better animation, choreography and visual jokes. Either way, when you've got Vader with his posse of dancing stormtroopers, it's a win...
4. The Knudsen Menace
Many years ago, I read a 7,000-page story that is still my benchmark for bad fiction. It started with "Callista sat in space" and went on to kill, resurrect, rape and otherwise demean every character known to Star Wars. It was very George R.R. Martin coming to Star Wars. Then it started producing babies and went on for several generations, never getting better. Emotion was expressed as "OH GOD, LUKE, THE PAIN, THE PAIN!" Every person of a certain species was a terrorist. The only insult any character ever knew was "You b*stard!" to which the villain would always say, "My parents were happily married!" The reason I tell this story is that after forcing myself to finish reading over the course of months, I contacted the author and offered to proofread if he wanted to rewrite the whole thing to make it better. He said that he'd quit his job and gone on welfare for two years to write it and it was perfect the way it was. So, that proves to me that even as a huge Star Wars fan, I could be a lot worse. I wear a Only Once You Live shirt, but I don't wear plus-size metal bikinis. I will get into debates with friends about Palpatine, but I will not ditch friends because they don't like midichlorians. I am a geek, but I'm not embarrassing with it. #4 on our list is about the embarrassing side of the Star Wars fandom. "Darth Curtis" is a guy in his 30's who has made fanfilms in his back yard every day for the last six years. He has half the archive room of the online fanfilm awards to himself. His projects range from "Justice: For a Price?: A Requiem in Two Parts " ("I'm gonna take them down to Chinatown...4") to "Jedi Apocalypse" ("We will feed on the Ewok children for their flesh tastes of victory!"). Worse, Curtis has a sister named Susan who just wants to play in her big brother's games. When Curtis won't let her be the prom-dress-wearing princess in one of his films, she starts sending in her own submissions and a flame war ensues that one of the directors of the "Fannies" awards describes it as "The beginning of my dark period." This movie makes fun of itself in so many ways: Curtis is hilarious, whether trying on a metal bikini over his t-shirt and boxers or screaming in "Rage of the Fallen" while his frumpy mother walks across the yard behind him. While we're on the subject of the sister, Susan is played by a familiar face to anyone who saw #8 before it went on its sort-of-nationwide tour. Amy Earhart, who accidentally flashed Obi-Wan Kenobi and introduced herself to Palpatine with "OH GOD! Let's talk moisturizer!", plays Susan. She seems to live in her Star Wars jammies and glasses, is always sniffling through her clogged sinuses and wears no makeup whatsoever. The only reason she is more pathetic than Curtis is that she takes everything he does seriously.For such a gorgeous girl as Amy Earhart is, her director/husband Terry Matalas makes her hideous and that makes it even more hilarious. 3. George Lucas In Love
This is THE definitive fanfilm: it was even given the Pioneer Award at the first Lucasfilm fanfilms contest. The way the story was told to me, Joe Nussbaum has a friend who worked with/for Spielberg, and that friend showed the funny little Star Wars homage to her boss and Spielberg featured it at a birthday party for Lucas. Or that could be urban legend - it's hard to tell. The plot is obvious to anyone who's ever seen Shakespeare in Love. For those of you who need a refresher, the plot is about a young George Lucas trying to get real inspiration for his final screenplay at USC: 3XR-259.7. Even with an advisor who talks like Yoda, a mechanically-minded yeti of a friend who sounds like Chewbacca and an asthmatic nemesis, he can't get past the problems of a young space farmer having a bad crop of space wheat. Enter a young woman with an iconic cinnamon-bun hairstyle who believes in him and his project. Surprise, surprise, she's his inspiration. And no surprise, the ending of the movie explains where Lucas got that awkward brother/sister unwitting romance from the Original Trilogy. The movie is a classic: the execution is flawless and the music is flat-out adorable... 2. The Sith Apprentice
Darth Trump... I mean Sidious is looking for a new apprentice and it's down to Darth Maul, Count Dooku, Darth Vader and Jar-Jar Binks. You should be trembling in your jackboots at the idea that 3/4 of these people ever made it to the finals. This is obviously a mockumentary of The Apprentice, right down to the moronic mentor and the histrionic figures of evil. Flanked by Admiral Daala and a Starfleet officer, Darth Sidious announces that the next task is... a talent show. Um...what? Okay, so now that we've gotten over that, we realize that there's no love lost between the contestants. About his foes, Dooku says, "I was wielding supernatural powers when these two Darth Wannabes were still in diapers." (He claims to have only come because "I thought Pete Cushing might be here.") Vader complains about Darth Maul: "And what's with this constant revenge of the Sith thing? It's like it's the only line he knows!" Darth Maul spreads the rumor about "midichlorian abuse when was younger; the guy's jacked up!" I won't give away everything, obviously, but Vader steals the show. Yes, Dooku trying to channel Tolkien is great and Darth Maul "could have gone better," but the Vaderdance makes a powerful, and ultimately unanswered claim...