Tantive IV Pursued! (2)
Last Updated (Wednesday, 01 September 2010 23:14)
I love the 'John White Presents' bit. I see now that I should have put this page up earlier in the sequence, so I'll rearrange things in a few days or so.
Art Notes
Our dog Polly preferred Star Wars to Blake's 7 - it seems. Nicely chewed-up back in 1977.
The childishness of the drawings is charming. The early version art was obviously based on a single viewing of the film and nothing else. Lacking any visual references. I didn't even have the Marvel comic for this part of the film. I basically had to try to remember what the ships looked like: hence the peculiar appearance of the rebel craft. Microphonic! - like a Shure SM 58; or a backwards Blake's 7 ship (This one's for you Rod).
Howard Chaykin's Hyperspace (Marvel Comic)
The hyperspace positive/negative banded effect is from Marvel. When Howard Chaykin depicted the Millennium Falcon in hyperspace, Lucas' Industrial Light & Magic team still hadn't tackled how the heck they'd depict it themselves. Chaykin had to get creative and obviously his early take on it was good enough for me. It's funny how quickly you get used to leaving the blackness of space as white isn't it?
Last year, someone on Flickr saw this image and said "The Imperial Empire - I love it!" I stopped and wondered what was so funny about it. When I was in school we called Tie Fighters T.I.E. fighters. My friend Niall - who you'll hear more about - suggested that it stood for "The Imperial Empire" or 'twin ion engine' - you could take your pick. Sounded plausible. Because I was only 9 or 10, I didn't realise that this was a bit like saying "Your High Highness" or "The Stinky Stink". And just as I got used to the whiteness of space - it also never occurred to me how silly "The Imperial Empire" is. When Mike McGinnis made his remark about its silliness 30+ years later he gave me a good laugh at myself!
Comments
Oh, and funny about the Liberator. I used to have that old Corgi diecast toy thing too. I still do somewhere. The paint started flaking off at some point so I did what any proactive child would do and used White-Out (whatever you call the equivalent in Ireland / UK) and painted over it. The result was a blotchy thick paint job that makes it look like the toy was badly sculpted. Sigh...
The true 'collectors' out there will grieve...