God of W...hat the fuck?!

If you thought that the Star Wars Kid was retarded, you ain't seen nothin' yet...

YO SOY KRATOS!!!!!!!!

I was going to make a clever soccer-related headline here...

...but then I thought, "You know what? Fuck soccer!"

How did soccer become hip all of the sudden? That's all I ever hear about anymore. Blah blah, "Brazil this" and "red card that." I mean everywhere! From friends who NEVER, EVER talk about sports down to goddamn video game sites, it's been buzzing around in the background for the past 3 weeks or so now. Did I miss something? I mean, we are talking about the same old soccer that I used to play on rec-league when I was a kid, right? They don't allow kung-fu or guns or chainsaw-equipped-robot-tanks out on the field, right? It's still just a bunch of assholes with high socks trying to kick a ball into a net, right?

I just don't get it. Maybe FIFA finally got around to changing their ad campaign to something with a little more kick (Edit: oh dear god, no pun intended) than their previous outings: "Soccer! If Argentina thinks it's cool, then it must be cool!" or "Soccer! The only sport more boring than Baseball." Either way, I ain't buyin it...

Aw, now thith thucks...

I burned my tongue on my coffee this morning and now it's gonna feel weird all day. I tell you this because, as an artist, I think you'll understand...

Urgh.

This is an update simply for update's sake. I am not feeling too hot today and would really just like to go back to bed for a little while but it looks like that's not going to happen any time soon. Grr.

The other thing is, I'm going to try and check out "Spaced" tonight (the new Simon "Shaun of the Dead" Pegg sitcom,) if I can figure out how to DVR it. I suggest you do the same, if you get BBC America. It's on at 8:00 tonight and I think they're showing the first 2 episodes back-to-back. I'm not entirely sure what it's about (I think there's some sort of Three's Company premise behind it) but I'm almost entirely sure that it'll be funny.

Ok, I'm gonna go die now...

Current Obsession Countdown: #3

3. Preacher (Vertigo Comics):



An ass-kickin' Texan preacher possessing the Word of God along with his on-again-off-again gunslinger girlfriend and an alcoholic Irish vampire, travels the world searching for the Lord. That, coupled with the promise of unbelievable amounts of violence, profanity, nudity, blasphemy, etc. makes this hands-down one of the best comics ever. I can't remember the last time I read through these (my first college girlfriend got me into them back in '96 or so) but they're just as good, if not better, the second and third time around. I can only hope that if they make a TV series of this, they can do the books justice. But at a scant 70 or so issue run, they'll hopefully have plenty of time to nail down the appropriate tone. It's not gonna be easy, but if they include the right people in the creative process, it could end up being one of the most amazing things ever produced for the small screen. Of course, that's only if they can get Sam Elliott to play the Saint of Killers. A man can dream, can't he?


P.S. Look at this crazy-ass picture of some dude made up as Arseface I stumbled across. It was on some Italian site but I'm pretty sure it was a makeup test for the movie they were talking about shooting a little while back. If that doesn't get me droolin' for the idea of a TV series...well, actually, i guess the drool is probably just the power of suggestion, it being "Uhhfehh" and all...

Obsession countdown: #4

The Starlight Mints - Drowaton:



I can't remember the last time I went to a show. Two months ago? Three? A lot of bands I like have come through here recently...so many, in fact, that I can't even remember who they were. This is kind of unbelievable to me since, for as long as I've known, I've tried to see pretty much every show I could stomach but I guess, as a lot of people do, I've mellowed out in my old age (that's a nice, cliched way of saying I'm now officially fucking boring. Great.) So when I found out these guys were playing in Baltimore, I decided that I was going to prove to myself that I don't 100% suck by making sure I was there. Unfortunately, that no-suck policy only covered me since I ended up having to fly solo, after everyone either straight out bailed on me or just didn't bother to call me back. Thankfully, I got there late enough that I only had to spend the 15 minute or so set change standing around by myself looking like the loser scene grandpa that I am. But whatever, once the Rhino Stomp kicked in, all my apprehension and self-consciousness took off down the fire escape (whatever the fuck that means) and were replaced by the reverence of sheer indie rock awesomeness. Hell, I'm grinnin' just thinking about it 5 days later.

Oh, right, I got sidetracked. Anyway, I guess the whole point of this was that you should go out and buy Drowaton like, right now. I mean it. As good as this band was before (that first song of of The Dream that Stuff is Made Of, is just about as fun as album openers get,) this is the one that should make them huge. I mean, the volume of applause for the new songs vs. the old songs was like 2:1. And rightfully so. This is a fantastic piece of head-noddin', hip-shakin', sing-along rock right here, and if you don't run out and buy this album right away, then the terrorists have already won. Now if only it was out on vinyl...

So this counts as irony, right?

New rule: Baltimore City busses should not be allowed to have those "250 poisons in every breath" ads on them detailing the dangers of second-hand smoke until they're fixed to the point where they aren't spewing pitch-black deathclouds of exhaust. That's only fair, right?

Plus, just think of all the valuable adspace those anti-smoking activists are stealing from HIV, Hep-C, Paternity Testing, and 48-hour detox clinics. Lord knows, we don't have enough of those ads around here...

A.K.A. iNdentured Servitude?

Oh great, now not only do I have to hear about whatever other bullshit reasoning you sickeningly sanctimonious cracker-ass turdburglars come up with about why you'd never ever buy an iPod, but now it sounds like I've actually got a legitimate reason to feel guilty about owning one (...or three, as the case may be.) It looks like these awesome little sons-of-bitches may not exactly be sweatshop safe. Apple is refuting these claims, saying that all manufacturers conform to a certain code of conduct, so I guess it's just a matter of time before this is all worked out. Until then, I suppose I'll just have to take my rock (and/or roll) with a teaspoon of humility...

Obsessions (a list in 5 parts)

5. Rockstar's Table Tennis (Xbox 360):





Not only is this the perfect way to deflect the general public's image of Rockstar Games (Publisher of Manhunt and the Grand Theft Auto series) as purveyors of smut and mindless violence, but as far as games go, it is just about perfect (not to mention a hell of a lot more fun to play than GTA.)

Since Launch, I wouldn't exactly call the amount of new 360 games "scant" but the fact that they don't come out at the rate of say, PS2 games do, 360 owners tend to pay attention to what's coming down the road. I've got to admit, when first I read about Table Tennis a few months ago, I thought it was one of the dumbest fucking ideas I'd ever heard. I mean, if even Mario and company hadn't been able to make me want to play video tennis, why in god's name would I ever want to play video ping pong? Let me just say, I was very, very wrong. Everything is so solid, from the graphics that are so realistic that you can actually see the players sweating when the game heats up, to the minute-to-learn-lifetime-to-master control scheme, to the ability to spectate on highly ranked matches over Live. No, this is not your father's Pong (or mine, for that matter,) and aside from being an intensely fun gaming experience it's also the perfect snapshot of just how far gaming has come in the last 30 years.


1975

2006

Notice any differences?

Inferior hardware indeed...

So aside from the multitude of ways it can help me to waste my life (something that it truly excels at) my Xbox 360 now has its own blog (thanks, in part, to some very intelligent nerds with far too much time on their hands.) Now, all I have to do is play and the damn thing will automatically write a daily update accordingly. I swear, we're truly living in the future and it's genuinely fucking awesome!



$50 says the Xbox updates its site more often than I do this one...

A brief diversion.

I've been asked to shoot a bunch of pictures for a slideshow at work showing diversity in our Systems department. While the idea of this is filling me with dread, it's not all that interesting to anyone else, I'm sure. It did, however, remind me of a small quarter-page ad in the back of an airline magazine that caught my eye recently. The bright yellow text at the top exclaimed "CELEBRATE DIVERSITY! in Birmingham, AL." and was accompanied by a photo of, I shit you not, a black family eating fried chicken at a cookout. So, yeah, aside from the fact that there was absolutely no diversity in that picture whatsoever, they chose just about the most stereotypically racist image possible to promote diversity in a city that is...well...not exactly historically known for their tolerance and brotherhood.

To me, the whole thing smacks of a half-assed community service requirement. It's like, "Ok, Birmingham, I want to hear an apology from you...and you'd better make it good!" And Birmingham's response was, "Fine! Y'all love n*****s so much, here's yer fuckin'n*****s! Y'all happy now?!" I guess we should all just be happy there weren't any burning crosses in the background or anything. Let's hear it for progress!

I wonder how long this'll last...

So it looks like it's been one month shy of a year since the last time I posted anything on here. Hell, it's probably been just as long since I've even considered logging into this site. I suppose I gave up on this Blogger site for 3 reasons:

1. I didn't have anything interesting to write about.
2. Far more people read (as in past tense) my Myspace blog than this one.
3. I'd have to kick my own ass for even thinking of using the word "blog."

Now that Myspace has made me want to turn the gun on myself once again (unlike a lot of people, I can't possibly bring myself to blame Rupert Murdoch for that, I mean we all know that Myspace sucked long before The Emperor sunk his greedy Aussie claws into it,) I suppose I've come crawling back to this toilet in an attempt to avoid verbally vomiting all over my self.

Yes Internet, we've got a lot of catching up to do, and I can't promise it's going to be fun (or even remotely interesting, for that matter) but dammit, I'm going to try and at least make it frequent! Now the last time I promised to try and keep to daily updates, I was met with a bunch of "Yeah, good luck with that" responses. If you were one of them, feel free to sit back and bask in the wonderful feeling of being right all the time. Then, when you're done that, go fuck yourself for being such a smug jerk.

Anway, this time I'm not promising daily updates (which clearly won't matter since the chances of anyone actually keeping up with this are roughly the same as me getting that Superchunk reunion I keep praying in vain for) but I think I can make a semi-weekly effort to get something up on here, even if it's just a brief rundown of what was in my pockets after I got home at the end of the day or some-such. So, here's to that.

The Numbers Game

I guess I'll just post something short since I haven't really felt like blogging recently. I don't know why...I just feel kind of drained, creatively I mean. So it's ID4-plus-1 and here I am, back at work again. It's pretty dead here because everyone else was smarter than me and took the day off...well, actually that's not true. I basically ended up getting screwed (again) because my coworker decided to schedule a shoot for today and then take off, leaving me to deal with it. I guess I don't really have any right to be bitter, when I've been here as long as he has (and, by the way, shoot me if that happens) I'll make sure to dump as much crap as possible on the new kid, if only so that the cycle continues in perpetuity.

Anyway, like I started to say...I'm back. For those unfamiliar with current events, I've been at the Jersey Shore (Long Beach Island, to be exact) for the past couple of days. I've never been there before but I guess I pretty much knew what to expect. Pretty standard beach community, if not a little cleaner than what I'm used to. Now I'm by no means a "beach person," I burn too easily...but whenever the opportunity presents itself, I still manage to be the first in line. Family, high school pals, girlfriends, it doesn't matter. Something about the ocean gets me every time (though the beach itself is a whole 'nother thing. I hate the sand, it's coarse and it gets everywhere...) This time, the rogues gallery incuded some guys that started out as "my video gaming friends" but evolved at some point into actual friends. It was initially myself, Kevin, Jon, Dennis, and Paul but at some point, the roster expanded to include x-factors Nick (Kevin's brother) and Kelly (Paul's girlfriend.) The point of the trip? Relaxation. Mission accomplished? Not so much...

Here's a breakdown:

-Number of days spent at the beach: 3 (essentially)

-Amount of time actually spent ON the beach: 45 minutes (at about 4:30 in the morning)

-Number of hours spent "relaxing": 6

-Number of hours spent "recovering": at least 20

-Dollar amount of electronics contained in the house before we arrived: >$300

-Dollar amount of electronics contained in the house after we arrived: <$2500

-Number of episodes of "Chapelle's Show" watched: 4

-Number of times "Chappele's Show" was quoted: Approx. 200

-Number of times Jon refused to laugh out loud at either "Arrested Development" or "Reno 911," (even though you could tell he really wanted to): at least 10

-Number of clubs visited: 4

-Number of cover bands seen: 4

-Number of cover bands that thought they were hot shit: 3

-Number of cover bands that were actually hot shit: 1 (and it was 2 middle aged guys playing oldies covers on a guitar and keyboard for a bunch of senior citizens)

-Number of Bon Jovi songs heard: 2

-Amount of times I heard those same 2 songs: at least 6

-Number of times I actually wanted to kill myself after listening to aforementioned Bon Jovi songs: 5 (it was novel the first time, being Jersey and all)

-Number of increasingly bizarre text messages sent to friends while krunked: 5 (I think Matt ended up with the 'A' material...)

-Number of drinks consumed: 30 (counting homemade Beam & Cokes)

-Average price of a drink at the bars: $6.00

-Number of well poured drinks: 2 (and they were both at the wood paneled oldies bar)

-Number of meals eaten: 8

-Number of meals actually eaten at mealtime: 0

-Number of meals I'd describe as "fucking awesome": 1 (and, of course, I cooked it myself. Jon, and whoever else ate either the shrimp or the veggies, can back me up on this.)

-Best name for a dish: Stoner Pancakes

-Best time to eat Stoner Pancakes: 3:30 am

-Number of times I was burned by Nick Kelly's cigarette while waiting to order Stoner Pancakes: 3

-Number of "attractive" girls seen: Hundreds

-Number of girls I actually found attractive: 3 (maybe 4)

-Number of templates used to create the rest: 2 (the molds used were "Blonde W.A.S.P." and "Irritated Jewess.")

-Number of douche bags with pink shirts: 5

-Number of douche bags with their collars up: 13

-Number of smartass comments made about said douche bags: Infinite

-Amount of fun had by all: At least 5 trash bags full

-Number of drinks we all owe Kevin for being the ship's captain: Several

So there you have it. While it's a little longer than I'd originally intended, that's a pretty accurate representation of the trip...save a few boring details. Chances are, other pieces of the whole story will be available via everyone else's blogs (hopefully Jon'll do one about the meals on his Food Blog) and there'll be some good pictures up soon. Hm...I guess I should probably get back to the part of working that makes vacations actually mean something... Woo! Aught Five!

Part 2: A refusal to name names...

So I guess I was going to have to finish the Chicago report sooner or later. It's been almost a month, so I guess it's kind of a moot point now, but whatever. It was a genuinely quality trip and, while I didn't get to have a threesome with our stripper friends (it was brought up...and not by me...but never followed through on) or do any illicit substances off of explicit body parts, the bar has been raised yet again. That's all the words you're getting. Whatever, you'd rather look at pictures anyway...

We were all more attractive before 8 hours of drinking and 3 hours of dancing...

Andy and Chris are intrigued by 2 completely different things.

This didn't work out as well as we'd hoped...

Chris was behind the camera singing "Happy Together" by the Turtles.

I like stuff that's on an angle.

The fake moustache makes its first appearance...

...but not its last.

Is this not the scariest thing ever?

Erin, it almost looks cute on you...

Where would we be without Myspace?

Wow, that really does look like a diaper...

I'll miss you, Chicago...

Coming soon to a retard near you!

As if I really needed any reinforcement for my feelings that MMOs are just about the dumbest thing to happen to video games since the Virtual Boy, along comes some jackass and does the legwork for me. For those of you that don't know what an MMO is, it's a Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game (for those of you that don't care, come back later when I'm done being a geek...I'm sure I'll be talking about drugs or tits or rock and roll or some such hot shit in no time.) An MMO means that you create a character that inhabits a virtual world populated with other online players from all over the world. These games come in lots of different forms. There's one based on Star Wars, one taking place within The Matrix, one in the Final Fantasy world and dozens of others. As a (primarily offline) console-based gamer, I first became aware of these games when I dated a girl was was addicted to this game called Everquest. 

Now apparently this game was so highly addictive and integral to some peoples' lives that they would start to replace their reality with this false fantasy world. You'd hear about people losing their jobs, marriages failing, or becoming addidcted to amphetamines all in the name of being able to play for "just one more quest." I personally never got into this whole thing because I've got a short attention span and can't really get into any game that I can't pause or turn off at any time. I'm even reticent to play shit like Halo online, just in case the phone rang or I wanted to smoke a cigarette or something.

Anyway, like I said, evidence of the hold these games have on certain can be seen in their real world reflections. People will dress up as the characters and spend RIDICULOUS amounts of real world money on eBay for leveled up characters and items and shit. This concept just seems unbelievably fucking dumb to me, but I spend money on some stupid shit too...so who am I to judge? The thing that really gets me is just how serious some people take this. According to my friend Jon, there are entire sweatshops in China and other places where there are just rooms of dudes chained to computers spending all day on these games gathering experience and items to be sold over the internet. Now apparently, over there they do things a little differently when it comes to the concept of "virtual property," something I'm not incredibly clear on in the first place. This sometimes leads people to take the law into their own incredibly inept hands...which is what spawned this rant in the first place. This is an article from the gaming site ign.com that basically sums up just how fucking insane people are over these games:

Gamer Murdered Over Virtual Property

In Shanghai, one MMORPG player crosses every line.

by David Adams

June 8, 2005 - In an extreme example of gamers taking a hobby (obsession?) too far, Shanghai gamer Qui Chengwei stabbed Zhu Caoyuan in the chest, killing the fellow gamer, according to the BBC News.

The motive for the murder? Zhu sold a virtual sword in the online game Legend of Mir 3 -- a sword Qui Chengwei had loaned him.

Qui had apparently tried to take the virtual property dispute to the police, but China lacks laws covering virtual property like an online sword. Zhu had offered to pay Qui the money he'd earned from the sword, but Qui refused.

Qui Chengwei now faces a suspended death sentence, meaning he could spend his life in jail, but that he may also be released on "good behavior" in 15 years.

Victim Zhu Caoyuan was 26 years old. His parents are currently seeking appeal for an immediate death sentence.

 

Need I say more? Between shit like this and that retard who ran over those two cops a while back while he was trying to reenact his little Grand Theft Auto-erotic fantasies, it's no wonder video games are getting such a bad rap these days. I understand that when you're in a business that takes in more money than the porno industry (in the same, highly coveted, demographic) you're going to eventually come under fire for something, but c'mon guys, let's not go fanning the flames...

Hell of a town...(Part 1)

I really wanted to write this yesterday while everything was still really fresh in my head but hopefully I'll still be able to do it justice.

Ingredients for a successful Chicago trip:

Step 1: Fly into Midway Airport. Fuck a whole bunch of O'Hare. You will end up sitting on the runway, bored out of your skull.




Step 2: Find a free place to stay, preferably with someone who has a nice place. That way you'll be able to save enough money for Step 3...




Step 3: Drink. A lot. Yeah, drinks there ain't cheap...but they're not any worse than in DC.

Step 4: If you end up in a ultra-trendy bar or club by mistake, find the most down-to-earth people in there and chat them up. Chances are, you won't want to stab them nearly as much as the nouveau glitterati.

Step 5: If any of those people give you their phone number before leaving, put in the correct name. This will eliminate any awkwardness when you go through your phonebook the next day and can't figure out who the fuck "Spanky" is.

Step 6: If, for any reason, you are invited back to some girls' apartment to hang out after closing time, make sure that her stupid drunken boyfriend isn't wandering around there shirtless and talking shit about you like you're not in the room. If you do find yourself in this situation, bail before you have to fight him. It'll save everyone a lot of trouble the next morning.

Step 7: Don't forget to eat! Also, make sure you don't go anywhere that serves white-people food. That shit fuckin' sucks!

Step 8: Find out from a cool local what will be going on while you're in town. It'll save you a lot of trouble down the line. (Mad props to Bree, for telling us about the Q101 Block Party)

Step 9: Drink. A lot. It will make you like Interpol far more than you did before. Queens of The Stone Age, however, need no assistance in kicking ass.




Step 10: If you're at a show, wearing a t-shirt with a joke about strippers on it, and the girls standing in front of you keep stealing glances at your shirt and giggling, find out if they are A) On mushrooms or B) are, themselves, strippers. If it's both, make sure and get at least one of their phone numbers.




*So apparently this is running a little longer than I thought it would. I think I'm going to break it here and continue with Part 2 a little later. Your crappy little attention span will thank me for it...*

Photo Dump, 5/25/05

I was going through my work hard drive today and found a couple of pleasant little Photoshop hackjobs that I'd made back a few months ago and kind of forgotten about...

Enjoy!

I made this one back when all that wholly unnecessary Evolution vs. Creationism bullshit started popping up.

Yeah, okay...this one was kind of obvious but you'd be surprised how much time it took to do the lettering, so here it is anyway...

Unmasked! Halo 2.5's surprise twist ending...Master Chief finally removes his helmet, to reveal...Uncle Jesse?

This was the first propaganda "poster" for the Pokemon Defense League.
It will not be the last.

The Dark Side? You're soaking in it!

News!!

Awww, damn! You got SITHED!!

Reviews!!

C.H.U.D.!!

The New Yorker!!

The Village Voice!!

Opinions!!

Looking back on Episode III almost a week later...

The Good:

• Some of the vehicles were kinda cool
  
  
• That once scene between Anakin and Palpatine at the aquatic Cirque de Soleil or whatever the fuck they were watching. (That must have been one of the ones punched up by Tom Stoppard.)
  
  
• That part with Yoda and the Emperor's Guards
  
  
• The inception of the Vader armor
  
  
• Yoda and Palpatine's fight in the Senate (I just wish those box seats could have been filled with Gungans and E.T.s at the time)
  
  
• A good portion of that final fight between Marv and Kevin in LavaTown USA.
  

The Bad:

• NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1
  
  
• Um, pretty much everything else.
  

The Ugly:

• What's with all the hand chopping?! So according to Lucas, it's okay to have sex with little boys but masturbation is absolutely out of the question? I mean yeah, I guess the clergy motifs are pretty obvious if you think about it...but jesus George, that doesn't make it right!
  

Obsessions!!

Oops...looks like we're all going to HELL! Well, I had a good run...

The scariest thing in the world is knowing that when these people breed, they breed with eachother...

No way we're getting out of here without a good power converter joke...

Mind, flayed.

So Lightning Bolt played last night and SWEET ZOMBIE JESUS!! It was, if not one of the best, easily one of the most uniquely memorable shows I've ever been to. If you've ever been to the Talking Head, you can imagine that it would be an unbelievably BAD place to see them, since they play down on the floor with the crowd around them in an arrangement like this:

Now imagine 200 people crowded into the first floor of the Talking Head, which is pretty much the size of my combined living/dining rooms, all rocking out with their cocks out. Sounds like a terrible idea, doesn't it? Yeah, well, apparently the band agreed and they ended up playing outside in the alley behind the club (territory that I'd "marked" more than my fair share of times back when it used to be the Ottobar.) Luckily, I've got friends with their ears to the ground and when we heard the rumors that they were going to move the show outside, we shoved our way though the now overwhelming crowd and set up camp outside. The tip paid off and there we were, mere inches from having our teeth knocked out by a stray tuning peg from dude's bass. Then it began...and we prayed at the altar of the almighty rock, distilled down to its purest essence. Bodies compacted into one sweaty heaving mass all vibrating in time with the beautifully brutal aural onslaught. The feeling was indescribable. About four or five songs in, it started to rain. Luckily, it wasn't going hard enough to make them quit and actually helped to cool us all down a little bit, though really not nearly enough. So pushing on, they continued their assault for another handful of songs before the cops showed up and forced us to scatter.

In retrospect, it was probably for the best since I don't think my brain could have taken much more before either shutting down or just melting completely and running out my ears. Either way, words can't really do it justice. It was easily the best show I've seen all year and a definite contender for top 5 of all time. I can't stress this enough but if you've never seen them, then make it a point to do so.

There's still a couple more chances this tour for you east coasters:

• May 23 - Philadelphia - Pygmy Street


• May 24 - NY - North Six


• May 26 - NY - The Hook


• May 27 - Providence

Results may vary, however, I can guarantee you won't regret it. If you've never heard them, get the hell over here now and prepare to be mind-raped. These guys don't fuck around...

Episode III, summed up in 3 words.

Actually, I'm halfway between "IT'S A TRAP!" and "I'M A MONSTER!"

That's really all you need to know for now. I might write something else about it when I've fully processed everything and it comes full circle back to the point when I actually kinda liked it. Right now I'm somewhere between, "Wow, that one 5 second part was pretty cool." and "Why doesn't anyone on the crew shake Lucas and just be like 'George, what the fuck?! Midichlorians? Darth Plageius? R2-D2's little hand thingies? Infantry robots built with emotion engines and self preservation units? The whole Bush/Cheney thing...it all needs to go!'"

Also, apparently, there's a Jedi named "Kit Fisto." It doesn't really have to do with anything but seriously...what the fuck?

Also, also...this movie is pretty gay. No, that's not just a figure of speech. I really mean it.

Also cubed...I happened to be lucky enough to see some real life "Jedi" showin off their moves! (It's a known fact that Jedi can move so fast, half the time they cannot even be caught on film. Luckily, through the magic of digital photography, we can make out what is, most assuredly, an intense lightsaber battle taking place on what looks to be Asphaltia, the Parking Planet.)