I don’t know if you’re aware, but there is a new Star Wars movie coming out really soon. JJ Abrams is directing it, and you can buy CoffeeMate with Chewbacca on it. Because when I think Star Wars, I always think creamer. Even in my youth when I didn’t drink coffee, that Wookie would growl and I’d be like “Yeah. let’s take the edge of some bolder tasting morning brews. Thanks, space rebels.’

OK, so anyway. Star Wars. We’re all clearly excited about it, because as a fandom we’ve already spent enough money to rebuild a wrecked third world country on merchandise for characters we don’t know anything about.

I’m excited too, but I’ll tell you right now, I’ve got some conditions. Some expectations, if you will, before I agree to like this movie. Some chores that need to be done before I let JJ Abrams go to Tosche Station to pick up power converters and waste time with his friends.

These are the five things I, the Uncle Owen of Star Wars fandom, demand of Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

Extremely shitty looking computer displays

The original trilogy was made during a time when computers were stupid and didn’t even have Oregon Trail on them, and as such the computer displays a long time ago in a galaxy far far away were the dumbest things. A planet killing battle station was run on two color computer displays and big walls of blinking lightbulbs. Why did they need to do all that crap with the torpedoes in the vents? Just try to run MS DOS and watch the whole place crap out.

Guys, this is the Amiga 1000.

A few years have passed between Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens, but those computer displays had better still be garbage. Just olive screens with light olive triangles clonking around. The moment somebody Tony Starks some holograms, I don’t care how long I waited in line, I’m fucking leaving the theater.

Boring fight choreography

Remember Return of the Jedi? Luke is hiding and Vader is all like ‘Oh shit you have a sister, maybe me and the raisin in a cloak can turn her to the Dark Side!’ And then Luke screams in anger and they start swinging lightsabers like medieval knights?

The fight choreography in Star Wars was so, so boring. Alec Guinness was no spring chicken in his Vader showdown, and Luke and Vader mostly just glared at each other across from crackling blades. And yet, these fights were amazing. Because we gave a shit. There was so much emotional weight behind every fight in the original trilogy that Darth Vader didn’t need to do anything super cool to kill the Emperor. He just bear hugged the guy and dropped him in a hole and we cry every time we see it.

Compare that to the prequels, where everyone fought like Ong Bak on uppers and I could have cared less. The Phantom Menace had the cool Darth Maul showdown, but any feeling of ‘oh my shit this is amazing’ was entirely John Williams scoring and Liam Neeson forcing you to care about him. He has a certain set of skills, you see.

worst.

What I’m saying is that I’m pretty sure there were only three, maybe four flips in the original trilogy. Probably not even that many. I remember Luke flipping while training with Yoda and maybe jumping off of Jabba’s sand barge. In comparison, there are 17,000 flips in the two Yoda fight scenes in the prequels.

I want emotional connection, not flips. The new ones get eight flips between the three of them to adjust for inflation. Nine flips and these movies are garbage.

The yub nub song

Remember when the greatest sci-fi trilogy of all time ended with teddy bears singing and playing drums on storm trooper helmets? Remember how Lando was just clapping his ass off and having a great time? Remember how it was GREAT?

The yub nub song marked the most important event in the galaxy: the destruction of the second Death Star, the death of the Empire, and that one scene in Clerks that the guy at Comic Con you had to wait in line for the bathroom behind could still quote word for word. He even did the voices.

What I’m saying is that just like the bombardment of Fort McHenry saw the birth of the Star Spangled Banner, so the Battle of Endor gave the galaxy the yub nub song, which should have been adopted as the galactic anthem in the New Republic, or whatever they’re calling it. Before every senate meeting, and before every podrace, everyone rises to sing the yub nub song.

More racist characters

Look people. The prequels happened. We can’t go back in time and prevent that …

Yet.

There were a lot of weird characters in the prequels. They talked weird and made no sense and were bizarre to the point of offensiveness. And that’s just Hayden Christensen!

STILL GOT IT.

Also there were weird Japanese aliens and a weird Jewish alien and a really hilarious shucking and jiving comedic sidekick who got into so many hijinks. I’m talking of course about R2-D2, the most problematic droid of all time.

No one actually talks like that, R2.

So, then we get to the original trilogy and the Empire is in control and pretty much everyone is a xenophobic white dude. Because the Empire is space Nazis, you see. The aliens are nowhere to be found, because they’ve probably been rounded up and imprisoned and persecuted and killed. Relegated to fringe worlds.

So go with me here. The Empire is gone now, and that means the galaxy is safer for George Lucas’s weird racist aliens. So that means a galaxy with more racist stereotype aliens safe from persecution is a safer, better, more progressive galaxy. So if you don’t want those offensive Japanese businessman stereotype aliens around, you’re basically a space Nazi. You’re welcome.

Dope 70’s haircuts

What’s the first thing you think of when you think of Star Wars? Exactly, you think of boss as hell sideburns. Star Wars: The Force Awakens had better be full of them. Nothing but sideburns. I don’t want much CGI in this movie, but if they have to add Fever Dog strips to everyone in post then so be it.

Who needs your old religion when you can be devoted to these bad boys, Lord Vader?

Think about it. Like, 50 years have gone by. The galaxy has been through it’s 80s coke phase, it’s 90’s neon phase…I promise you that there are some X Wing pilots that wore some Starter pullovers for a while. Enough time has passed that fashion wise, the galaxy is back to throwback 70s, and that means a lot of hip young characters with tan shirts and chinstraps. And by the third movie, they’ll be back to 90’s neon. Won’t that be fun?

“That boy was our last hope.”
“No. There is another.”

So, I’m super serious about three of these five and the other two are jokes. I’ll let you work out whats what. Hint: Completely serious about the yub nub song. Did I leave anything out that you’re expecting from these new movies? Let me know in the comments, preferably in the form of various gifs.

Follow Joe Starr on Twitter if you want. It’ll be fun.