"Never!"

Somewhere around twenty-two years ago, in a city not so far from here, my brother and I sat in a movie theater, transfixed by the images onscreen. I was nine at the time, my brother eleven, and when John Williams' score crescendoed, a deep-bass chorus chanting in the background, I remember Jerry pleading audibly with the screen, uttering exactly what I was thinking:

"Don't turn, Luke! Don't turn!"

Watching Return of the Jedi at that age, we didn't particularly care that the Ewoks were a particularly silly addition to the series; we didn't think that trees, stones and sticks shouldn't be effective against a high-tech army; nor did we have the slightest notion that getting stuck in the trash compactor was (spuriously) analogous to Joseph Campbell's "In the Belly of the Beast" mythic element.

We just loved Star Wars, and the Last Temptation of Luke was a bit much for our pre-adolescent minds to bear.

After repeated viewings and the first two prequels, however, Star Wars nowadays is something of a disappointment. The nostalgia is still there, but it's not unlike watching Krull for the first time as an adult and realizing that the movie sails along on an ocean composed entirely of cheese.

A couple of weeks ago, ludditerobot pointed me at some hype for Robert Rodriguez' upcoming Sin City, and we had a brief discussion of the perils of looking forward to a movie too vehemently. We're both being a bit wary of watching the trailers for Batman Begins and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, although I did breakdown and watch them on the last couple of week's Coming Attractions.

All this week, Cartoon Network has been airing the latest episodes of Star Wars: Clone Wars, Genndy Tartakovsky's animated bridge between Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith. Those of you who are fans of cartoons may know Tartakovsky's name from Dexter's Laboratory or the utterly brilliant Samurai Jack. When Clone Wars was first announced, I had to question if it would be a good thing or not. Just today, I picked up the first Clone Wars DVD at Costco and watched the Behind the Scenes feature "Bridging the Saga."

Having seen both Clone Wars, the latest trailer, and all the other assorted hype-goodies for the upcoming movie, I, despite myself, have now got the full on mental salivation for the Revenge of the Sith to come out.

Dammit.