Away with the Wookies....

(Chewie's family, in "the Star Wars Holiday Special")

And now for something completely different, an anecdote.

A long long time ago, in a galaxy far far away, my six year old self sat down in front of the t.v. and watched......this, this thing.

This "thing" is none other than the 1978 Star Wars Holiday Special (an early tribute to the Christmas replacement the great yearly "non denominational holiday" P.C. is strong in the force Luke.).

This was, even by George Lucas standards, a giant turd floating in the bowl of low brow 1970's popular culture.

Lucas only allowed one showing of it, in any of the European countries it made it's insidious way over to, and one showing in the U.S., he wanted to protect the mass hallucination of "Lucas as cinema auteur". He needen't have bothered, as Emporer Lucas was soon discovered to have been naked all along.

The plot, such as it is, involves Luke Skywalker and Han Solo battling the Imperial forces in order to help Chewbacca reach his imperiled family on the Wookiee planet - in time for Life Day, which oddly enough was the most important day of the year. Apparently in a vote it pipped "incredibly painful death day" to the post.

I have not seen it since, and to be honest it's probably for the best. However this is not so much a review of the Holiday special, as the telling of a story that is connected with.

Roll forward many years from the showing, and back a few years from the present, and I sat, stoned amongst stoners when the inevitable Star Wars conversation took place, sigh, again.

We eventually got around to the topic of Chewbacca. Then it hit me, sometime in the distant past I had seen a planet of peacefull wookies, sons, daughters, wives....of....Chewie.

Now no one in that band of brothers had seen it, and after being dragged to the floor, and having a cathetar brutally inserted, I had the piss relentlessly taken out of me, for what must have been an hour, it was generally believed I had lost my mind, and was imagining things.

From then on, for a period of two years, whenever I made a faux pas or said something that was against the group consensus, everyone giggled and said "FatherCrow's away with the Wookies!!".

"Away with the Wookies."

Two years, two long years of "away with the Wookies" "away with the Wookies" again and again and again.

They said I was insane, again and again and again.

I was starting to believe them, starting to believe that I had never seen it, that any memories of it was more than likely the result of some hallucinogenic childhood fever.

So, when I looked up "Star Wars" on the Internet Movie Data Base (IMDB), and found this curious entry for the "Star Wars Holiday Special" which turned out to center on my fabled "Planet of the Wookies" I leapt up from my desk in work, yelped for joy, and shouted at the top of my voice, "I was right dammit, I was right".

It only took me thirty seconds or so to realise that If I kept it up, I would most likely be facing an Imperial disciplinary hearing. So I sat down, printed out some information took it over to my mates gaff and showed it to my detractors.

They Shame faced, have now been banished to "the planet of the Wookies" where they are forced to endure endless terrible anuerism inducing dialog that can even be discerned if you don't actually speak Wookie.

Thank you IMDB, thank you so much, their humiliation is now complete.

Now I have never been a fanatic Star Wars fan, though I did like it, the new movies I have always viewed as absolute trash. This is more a piece about the IMDB, which more than likely saved me from malicious mates. Mates who were on the verge convincing the two doctors needed to sign on the dotted line, on the basis of the aforementioned Wookie story. Thus commiting me to a dank asylum and regular courses of Electro Convulsive Therapy.

So thank you IMDB, for keeping me on the streets, and in the ethereal realms of the Blogosphere.

And as for my "friends", damn you, damn you all to hell........especially you Fentor.

I wouldn't advise it but if you really want to, and have Realplayer, you can see the Godawful Holiday Special

Peace and Hope.

FatherCrow