The Ronto Roundup: “The Force Awakens” Teaser Aftermath, Rebels Takes a Break
By Daniel Berry
Good morning, Dork Siders! Welcome back to DSOTF and our regular weekly feature, The Ronto Roundup!
We trust that you all had a great holiday weekend! By now, we’ve all watched that teaser trailer for Star Wars: The Force Awakens forty times. Let’s make it forty one!
Here it is, again because Star Wars.
Immediately following the release of the trailer on Friday morning, the internet pulled a Death Star and exploded in a glorious fireball of nerd energy. Thankfully, most of that nerd energy was expressed in an overly positive manner.
Perhaps the most revealing and instantaneous source for reactions to this celebrated “88 SECONDS” was Twitter.
The ever poignant and reliable Club Jade worked tirelessly this weekend to compile the greatest tweets related to The Force Awakens following it’s first “teaser trailer” release. You can find both of her “Star Wars Tweets: Special Edition” posts, here and here.
We’ve included a few of our favorite tweets from the holiday weekend below…
"1:48pm ESTSaturday, November 29th 2014“Hey @bad_robot – I better get some damn ewoks in this new movie. #TheForceAwakens #StarWars”~ @lindsayccw 5:08am ESTSaturday, November 29th 2014“In the 90 minutes following the Black Friday release of the teaser trailer for #TheForceAwakens, we received over 150 voice mails!”~ @RebelForceRadio 10:17pm ESTFriday, November 28th 2014“By the way anyone else notice that none of the scenes in #TheForceAwakens trailer were in space? #coolsubtlety @starwars”~ @JATactor 9:30pm ESTFriday, November 28th 2014“Thanks for eating my day @bad_robot I cannot stop watching #StarWarsTheForceAwakens trailer! ;)”~ @PaulRMQ 12:30pm ESTFriday, November 28th 2014“OH MY GOD I’VE SEEN IT SOMEBODY HOLD ME I CAN’T HANDLE THE WAIT LOOK AT ALL THE PRETTIES #TheForceAwakens”~ @chaosbria 12:28pm ESTFriday, November 28th 2014“I know that @AMANDAJEANNN is totally with me about that cute droid being so unbelievably adorable, right!? Eee! #TheForceAwakens”~ @BlueJaigEyes 12:27pm ESTFriday, November 28th 2014“@RegalMovies X-Wings and the Falcon. Shut up and take my money. #TheForceAwakens”~ @choochb71 12:24pm ESTFriday, November 28th 2014“Today is a day we all put aside our fandom differences and come together as one @starwars fan community. #TheForceAwakens”~ @justinlasalata 11:56am ESTFriday, November 28th 2014“@missingwords Millennium. Freaking. Falcon.”~ @amy_geek"
There was also an instant wave of creativity among the more social media savvy in the artistic community. Many took to Twitter and Instagram to post their Star Wars: The Force Awakens inspired works, some of which we have included below…
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Francesco Francavilla @f_francavilla
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Chrissie Zullo @Chrissie_Zullo
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Luis Altadill @laf_user
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For a great collection of even MORE of The Force Awakens inspired artwork, check out Johnamarie Macias‘ post over at Making Star Wars!
Of course, the internet also spewed forth a vast collection of fun YouTube videos following the release of The Force Awakens trailer. There were “reaction videos”, spoofs and much more. We’ve included a few of our favorites for you…
First, there was the now famous “Lego Stop Motion” version of the teaser trailer. Finished in under 24 hours after the premiere of the original trailer, filmmaker Snooperking‘s work is most impressive:
Perhaps even somehow trumping the enterainment value of the trailer itself, the reaction video from YouTube comedian Tyrone Magnus is the greatest thing on the internet right now:
Isn’t it true? Star Wars fans really are the greatest.
Well, many questions remained on the minds of fans all across the globe after the teaser trailer dropped on Friday morning.
One question was, is that truly all new John Williams music playing during the trailer?
Well, we got our answer directly from the source!
On Friday, the official Star Wars Twitter account confirmed what we’d all basically assumed…
"11:52am ESTFriday, November 28th 2014“Yes, that’s new John Williams score in #TheForceAwakens teaser.”~ @starwars"
Okay, great. Now that’s cleared up… but whose voice is so creepily narrating this thing? Fans were quick to jump to the conclusion that it was the infamous Benedict Cumberbatch, who was previously confirmed as NOT appearing in the new film. Other fans thought that they had heard some of Max Von Sydow in the menacing performance, while others jumped right to actor Andy Serkis.
If you guessed Andy Serkis, you get a point!
This morning, the insanely popular television program Good Morning America promised to reveal their “exclusive” on who exactly was actually narrating The Force Awakens teaser trailer. Few fans were willing to wake up early and sit through the morning news show but those that did learned the truth first!
"7:49am ESTMonday, December 1st 2014“EXCLUSIVE: The voice in the new @starwars #TheForceAwakens trailer? We can officially confirm it is @andyserkis.”~ @GMA"
Bravo, Good Morning America. That was a tough one to figure out.
All of this The Force Awakens hoopla is great, but what about Star Wars Rebels?!
Well, 2014 has officially seen the last of this incredible new animated series. The second episode of the two part mid-season finale, Gathering Forces, aired last Monday, November 24th. It was intense. More on that later.
The harrowing episode left us fans hungry for more but it’s going to be awhile before any of our burning questions are to be answered…
That’s right, Dork Siders! You’ll now have to wait until January 5th, 2015 for the next exciting episode!
Per Tracy Cannobbio, publicist at Lucasfilm via her Twitter feed:
"4:13pm ESTTuesday, November 18th 2014“Hi @BlueJaigEyes! That’s correct. We will have a break for the holidays and return on January 5th with new episodes.”~ @Tcann13"
The next new episode of Rebels is titled Path of the Jedi. You can catch a short preview clip of the upcoming episode during the latest installment of Rebels Recon, which is hosted by the fantastic Andi Gutierrez.
More NEWS from the Dork Side:
The folks over at Jedi News picked up on a story reported by Variety concerning the hiring of Oscar award winning production designer Rick Heinrichs for Star Wars: Episode VIII.
Rick Heinrichs has worked alongside such well known directors as Tim Burton and The Coen Brothers.
Heinrichs has won an Academy Award for “Best Art Direction – Set Decoration” during his work on 1998’s Sleepy Hollow.
The British tabloid site The Daily Mail posted a short piece on Star Wars veteran actor David Prowse on Saturday.
Prowse, best known to fans as having portrayed the villainous Darth Vader in the original six films, was revealed to have been suffering from dementia. He apparently would have loved to accept a role in the upcoming film Star Wars: The Force Awakens had it not been for his health issues.
From The Daily Mail:
"The 79-year-old, who lives in Croydon, South London, told the Daily Mirror: ‘It wouldn’t have mattered what it was, I would have loved to have done something in it – even if it was just a cameo.’Diagnosed with dementia this summer, he began taking medication in recent weeks.‘Sometimes I can’t remember things I did yesterday. That worries me more than not remembering something 20 years ago.’."
The internet can be a cool place, sometimes. Other times, it seems it’s a breeding ground for morons… actually, that’s most of the time.
Following the premiere of The Force Awakens teaser trailer, which heavily features young British actor John Boyega, some more simpleminded folks took to social media to express their confusion and concern over the reveal of a [gasp] “black stormtrooper”.
Following the online criticism, Boyega took to Instagram to express his thanks to the fans for their support and also to his “haters”… well…
"“Thank you for all the love and support! The fan mail and fan art has added to my joy! Isn’t it crazy that Star Wars is actually happening? I’m in the movie but as a Star Wars fan I am very excited! A year is a long time but it will be worth the wait.To whom it may concern…Get used to it. :)”"
Whether or not Boyega was directly responding to his critics or not remains to be seen, but most Star Wars fans agree that he is awesome.
Well, Dork Siders! That’s all the Star Wars news for now. Stay tuned to DSOTF and we will keep you posted as more news comes along!
Thanks for reading and MAY THE FORCE BE WITH YOU!