Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back

Step aboard our podcast Millennium Falcon as Dakota and Anthony pilot you through a galaxy of cinematic sagas and virtual battlefields. From the icy plains of Hoth to the sands of Arrakis, we dissect the intricacies of "The Empire Strikes Back" and juxtapose it with modern a modern epic like "Dune Part 2". With a special focus on Austin Butler's performance as Feyd-Rautha, we cross the stars to bring you insights that promise to deepen your appreciation for these beloved franchises.

Our journey doesn't end at the silver screen; it extends to the gaming universe, where we marshal forces against interplanetary threats in a game heavily inspired by "Starship Troopers."(Helldivers 2) Discover how this online multiplayer sensation encapsulates the essence of cooperative strategy and community triumph. We'll also share a piece of our childhoods, unwrapping the magic of Disney trading card collecting – a nostalgia that rivals the anticipation of opening a fresh pack of Pokémon cards.

Closing the hyperspace route, we honor the wisdom of Master Yoda, analyzing his enduring legacy on Jedi lore and the profound lessons he imparts in "The Empire Strikes Back." Anthony and Dakota, basking in 20 years of friendship, invite you to relive the film's most iconic moments and embrace the camaraderie that only decades of Star Wars fandom can forge. So, grab your lightsaber and join us for an adventure that celebrates the triumphs of the Rebel Alliance, the mysteries of Jedi training, and the treasures that unite us across galaxies.

Twitter handles:
Project Geekology: https://twitter.com/pgeekology
Anthony's Twitter: https://twitter.com/odysseyswow
Dakota's Twitter: https://twitter.com/geekritique_dak

Instagram:
https://instagram.com/projectgeekology?igshid=1v0sits7ipq9y

Geekritique (Dakota):
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBwciIqOoHwIx_uXtYTSEbA


Twitch (Anthony):
https://www.twitch.tv/odysseywow

Music:
Eric Godlow Beats: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRpkcYps82PdSo0tK5rEIPA

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Welcome back to Project Geekology for our 72nd episode. Today we are following the Rebel Alliance as they're being absolutely tormented by the Galactic Empire. It's been three years since the battle of Yavin where Luke Skywalker daring pilot little kid from Tatooine might have heard of him blew up the Death Star, you know, the biggest weapon that's ever been created in the entire galaxy. And yeah, they're on the run. He's still trying to learn how to become a Jedi. They're sending probes out all over the galaxy and they finally find them on Hoth, the Rebel base, and it's just a crazy whirlwind from there. So we're gonna be talking all about the Empire Strikes Back, the second Star Wars movie or the fifth, chronologically, in the saga. I'm one of your hosts, Dakota, and I'm joined, as always, with Anthony. And before we begin any of that, Anthony, what have you been up to?

Speaker 2: 0:56

my friend. You know, man, I've just been up to extra nerdy stuff. Well, I've only really been up to If you say persona.

Speaker 1: 1:08

I'm gonna rage, quit this call right here. Well, I mean, I mean, come on, man, you know, I'm always playing persona but I want to go see.

Speaker 2: 1:18

In the time of our last episode we recorded, like our previous few episodes, like pretty quickly, so within this past week I actually want to go see that Demon Slayer movie. I really wouldn't call it a movie, though. It's not a movie, it's a. It's like a prolonged episode, but it's.

Speaker 1: 1:42

Is it like feature length?

Speaker 2: 1:43

Yeah, yeah, it's like a long episode, but it's really the end of season three and then like, maybe, like, yeah, like the first episode of season four, and so I went and I got to go see that and of course you know I like Demon Slayer, so I really enjoyed that. I haven't seen Dune 2 yet. I really I'm. You know, I actually might see it today as a recorder.

Speaker 1: 2:10

What are you doing to me?

Speaker 2: 2:12

Well, I mean, I've just been busy actually, so that's really like what's been messing around, but I do plan on seeing it, you know, maybe today as a recording or sometime this upcoming week. Yeah, I've seen that it's been getting some pretty good reviews and, yeah, I mean I really enjoyed the first part. Is this? So? Is this movie broken up into three parts or is it just two parts?

Speaker 1: 2:38

It's kind of hard to explain. It's not super hard. The first book is broken up into two movies, so Dune Part 1 and Dune Part 2 are both comprising the first book. Oh, okay, denis Villeneuve wants to make a third part about the second book. That's like his goal, like he would want to do a trilogy, even though the story goes on like way past that point. But he wants to do like the basic Paul Traides arc of him becoming like the this evil emperor basically of the galaxy. But yeah, so the first part of Dune is very much like him, paul Traides coming to Arrakis and seeing his family brutally murdered or, you know, just eradicated by the Harkness. Second movie is him creating an uprising. You know, I don't want to spoil too much about it, but it is. I mean, it's an insane movie. I watched it on Thursday like opening night. I saw it at my local Alamo draft house and man Any special glasses.

Speaker 1: 3:46

No, no, no, no, it was just beer glasses because I was drinking beer, no, otherwise it was pretty amazing. I was trying to see it in IMAX yesterday. I had tickets to go see it yesterday, but I ended up spending the day in the hospital. Not anything with me. It was a family member, but yeah, everything seems to be okay, so no worries currently. But yeah, I'll have to try to see it in IMAX. That's the preferred showing, by the way, there are scenes filmed in IMAX.

Speaker 1: 4:22

So if you can, especially with that soundtrack, with that booming soundtrack dude, it'll shake your socks off.

Speaker 2: 4:30

Well, that's how I saw the first part, so that's what I plan on saying the second part. So these first two parts cover, like Remember, like the OG movie, where the OG movie pretty much covers, like you know, from them coming to Arrakis, all the way up to the uprising, so these two movies covers that whole period.

Speaker 1: 4:55

Yeah, I would say that in the book the more interesting half is the first half, Just because you have the political intrigue, you're learning about the galaxy as a whole, and the second half of the book it's easier to overlook, just because it's, I think, a little bit less substantial. You know, he's hiding in the desert, he's learning how to ride sandworms and stuff like that, but they really the director really did his all to like bring this side of the story to the front and I think that's something that the original David Lynch 1984 movie I think it was didn't really capture. I think most of the film took place in the first half of the book and then they kind of like jumped forward to the end, you know, like in a quick succession, basically After Paul and his mother were kicked out of their home on Arrakis. But but yeah, the first, the first book is pretty much everything that happens in that 1984 dude movie.

Speaker 2: 5:58

Okay, so that's what we get. So the second part is capping that off pretty much.

Speaker 1: 6:06

Yeah, and man. Some excellent performances like just a crazy cast. Austin Butler he was in that Elvis movie a couple of years ago at this point. He did a fantastic job as Fader Altha. If you remember from the David Lynch movie that was the character played by Sting.

Speaker 2: 6:24

Okay, yeah, I was wondering which was the Sting equivalent. Yeah, he is the Sting equivalent and great job, dude.

Speaker 1: 6:32

Like, oh, there's a scene that blew me away and it takes place on Geity Prime, which is the Harkinen homeworld, and it's like it's like in an, like in an arena or something, and you know, there's this big like fight that happens in an arena, like off planet, on the Harkinen homeworld, and I don't know. I mean, I'm guessing this is how I interpreted it, but like the, the, the light on that planet is such that like all colors, like drained from the sky, basically, and it's just like like very harsh black and white and it's such a cool aesthetic, Like when you see it, you'll obviously know what I'm talking about. But yeah, it's, it's just so cool. I don't want to talk too much about it because we can do a whole podcast on that, but well, I mean we, we still have to.

Speaker 2: 7:24

That was actually a plan like a while back.

Speaker 1: 7:27

To do one and do two, yeah, yeah, correct, we did see.

Speaker 2: 7:32

We did cover the OG Dune which, like that, was a while back. That was a fun podcast. Yeah, it was, it was. There are some instances I was saying that original movie that's a little bit hard to watch because you don't know what you're watching or what you're seeing it's if you don't know what's happening.

Speaker 1: 7:51

Yeah, yeah, I actually really liked the movie and in some ways, like there are things in that movie that are more true to the story of the book than this current movie is, even though, like the adaptions that they created for this Dune movie just make more sense in this setting. You know it's hard to explain without like having you read the book and then read the watch the movie and all that. So I don't want to get too much into it, but what I will say is I watched Empire Strikes Back to to, like you know, ready myself for this episode. I've seen it a hundred times.

Speaker 2: 8:26

I see Same, same. I've seen it a hundred times. At this point it's like. At this point it's not. We weren't even watching it to to prepare for the podcast. Background stuff Like it was like a treat, you know.

Speaker 1: 8:38

Yeah, yeah, I just put it on the back, like I had a whole bunch of like Larkana cards that I was opening. I put it on in the background, just like occasionally, like oh, I love this scene, I love that shot.

Speaker 2: 8:47

Oh, so are you into that? The Larkana, that's the Disney card game. I am?

Speaker 1: 8:51

Yeah, I've. I'll talk about that in a little bit. Yeah, I was. I watched Empire Strikes Back and I'm happy I did that before watching Dune 2, because there are there's clear evidence within the Dune movie that these two movies are very similar, because you're dealing with you're starting with a bunch of rebels, you know, who are hiding away.

Speaker 1: 9:13

Right, you're on a planet full of, like you know, either snow in one case or sand in the other, and it's just a very harsh, arid landscape.

Speaker 1: 9:24

But you also have, like, the Empire that's trying to bring them down. You have, like, the Harkinans, who are like constantly bombarding these people, or the Galactic Empire, who are bombarding the rebels. So there's just a bunch of a bunch of parallels and like there's even, like you know, I don't want to get too much into it, just because it does get a little spoilery, but there is significant proof that George Lucas took a heavy inspiration from the Dune book and it's really cool how it all kind of plays out. So it might be a fun experiment. If you haven't seen the Dune movie yet, then the new one that's in theaters right now, to watch Empire Strikes Back before seeing it. You'll find a lot of really, really fun parallels, even to the extent of like them bringing down, like the ad-ats in Empire Strikes Back. You know, like that scene where they're going around the ad-ats and like finding unique ways to bring them down. You get that level of action in the Dune movie.

Speaker 2: 10:22

It's cool. Yeah, yeah, dune good, awesome man, yeah, and just been well. I think I told you last time that I had been playing this game called Hell Divers 2. You mentioned it. Yeah, which is yeah, yeah, which is which is like a. It's a mix of Halo and.

Speaker 1: 10:43

I'm not sure that you mentioned it on the podcast we actually. So I visited Florida and Anthony got to hang out with me and my family for for an evening, and I think that's where you mentioned it to me. But, yeah, you've been playing Hell Divers. You were saying that it's like Halo and what.

Speaker 2: 10:58

Right, right. So there's a good bit of it. That's like Halo. It's a lot.

Speaker 2: 11:03

It's got a huge, huge inspiration from Starship Troopers, because you're coming down onto these planets and you're fighting bugs, but then you're also fighting like these they call them automatons and some of the other worlds, so it's really fun.

Speaker 2: 11:25

It's a game that's a live service game, so it's always online. So a lot of the times you're fighting for control of these planets. So the bugs where they call them terminates they're trying to take over a planet, and so all the players, or a lot of players, will go to this one planet to really fight to liberate this planet from the bugs attacking. And so it's pretty cool to see because they have the, there's the stats and everything. They'll show how many people are fighting here, how many shots are being shot, how much ordnance is being used, and it'll show the percentage of it being liberated and stuff, and then at the end of a mission, it'll show how much your squad contributed to that liberation and stuff. It's really cool saying that. It's a really fun game and like, the harder you make the difficulties, it just gets so insane. It's a yeah, yeah, that's awesome.

Speaker 1: 12:33

Cool man.

Speaker 2: 12:34

Yeah, it's a great time.

Speaker 1: 12:35

My brother's playing it. He's having a good time with it and I've you know a bunch of people are playing it, so it's a huge game right now. I think it's bigger than the developers thought it was going to be.

Speaker 2: 12:45

Oh, absolutely. Like the developers wanted it to be successful, obviously. But I mean, dude, like they had server issues for like a few days, like maybe like three to five days. They were having server issues where, like you'd have to kind of sit in a queue and it'll say, you know, servers are full, and then it'll like kind of retry like every 20 seconds, oh wow, and so you would essentially just have to sit there until you know you got put into the game. But they eventually they worked on the server issues. They got those done. They've got that figured out, and so there's some other bugs that they're trying to figure out. But the game is definitely starting to feel a lot more fine tuned. And you know, even then I was still having a fun time with it. I had watched a few of my friends play it before I got and I was like yo, this game looks really fun and yeah, man, it's a good time and it's not like a full price game. I think it's like 30, $30, $40 that.

Speaker 1: 13:51

I had bought. That's awesome. That's awesome, man Cool.

Speaker 2: 13:55

So yeah, man. So how about you? What have you been up to?

Speaker 1: 14:00

What have I been up to?

Speaker 2: 14:01

I mean, we talked about Dune, we talked about you watching Empire, which I did also, yeah, anything else.

Speaker 1: 14:08

I mentioned, I visited Florida. It's my home state. I was born and raised there. I lived there until I was 13, but I go pretty regularly. I've maybe like two, maybe three times a year usually around two times a year just to visit family. Sometimes I go to Disney World when I'm down there and I did get the opportunity to visit the parks for a couple of days I did Magic Kingdom and Animal Kingdom Always a good time.

Speaker 1: 14:31

But while I was down there speaking about Disney's Lorcaana trading card game, which I've been into for a while now for a couple months so I've been just collecting the trading cards. I'm not so much into actually playing the trading card game. I'm a collector at heart. I like the look of seeing a binder full of like a full set or whatever. I don't have any full sets yet, but they were releasing the third set of Lorcaana cards on the trip that I was out in Disney World. So at Disney Springs they had this huge line like an opening release thing and I thought that for sure like I was not gonna be able to get anything, because when I got there I was even I was like 30 minutes early, but there were so many people online waiting to grab cards, that I didn't think that I was gonna be able to snag any of the new merchandise and lo and behold, dude, they were stacked Like the walls were lined in the you know, the big world of Disney store in Disney Springs.

Speaker 2: 15:43

Yes.

Speaker 1: 15:44

Like where the cash registers were, like all the walls were lined with like boxes and boxes of those cards dude it was. They had so much stock. I was so impressed because, like Lorcaana up to this point has been kind of plagued Well, not so much anymore, but like the first two, three months of Lorcaana being a thing, you couldn't find cards anywhere Like Disney Springs was completely sold out of them, the parks were sold out of them, hobby stores were sold out of them, target you could never find anything. Anywhere you were you could buy like trading cards. It was just out of stock.

Speaker 1: 16:17

Recently the company that's been printing them, ravensburger, has been, like you know, really upping their the output, basically because they didn't expect it to be such a huge hit right off the bat, but it turned out. It was like absolutely massive. So basically what it is, if you guys don't know, it's Disney trading cards. So you have hundreds, maybe thousands of Disney characters out there. So every set of cards there's three now has about 204 cards in their mix and they take a number of like they take a handful, maybe like 10 movies and they'll make fresh new looks for characters from those movies or they'll use like songs as sort of like action cards or, like you know, you have item cards based on like what the characters have.

Speaker 1: 17:09

So you know, like there's like the magic brooms from like the Fantasia movie. You have obviously characters like Mickey and Minnie and like tons and tons of different variations of outfits, but like, what's cool about them is that the art is so creative and it's most of the time really beautiful. So I've been collecting that for a little bit. You know, now I'm not breaking the bank or anything, it's just, you know, passively, oh, I'll buy a couple packs today while I'm here, oh, I'll crack a couple cards open. So that's been fun. I actually brought my cards with me to Disney World and I had some of the characters sign cards for me.

Speaker 1: 17:48

You know how, like you can you know how, like they always have, like the autograph books at Disney World and you can have kids sign like or have the characters sign their autograph and the autograph books.

Speaker 2: 17:58

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 17:59

I well, I brought my cards and the cat, like the people in the costumes, are so excited to sign the Loracana cards and so, yeah, that was fun and yeah, while I was there, I had I was there for like the third set pre-release, so that was really fun. So that for me, was been like the highlight of my last couple of weeks.

Speaker 2: 18:22

Oh, that's cool. Did you line it up to do that, or was that just like a happy coincidence? I?

Speaker 1: 18:29

found out, like the week before, that the third set was releasing in the parks early when I was going to be in the parks. So we were in the parks Wednesday and Thursday and we were leaving Friday and they were releasing the Disney Loracana third set on that Friday at Disney Springs. I was just like, oh my gosh, that's perfect. So I'll just, you know, wake up early in the morning on Friday, leave the resort that we were staying at and you know I'll wait in line, grab a couple of cards, and it totally worked out.

Speaker 2: 19:01

Oh, that's sick, that's cool.

Speaker 1: 19:02

It lined up perfectly.

Speaker 2: 19:04

Yeah, for sure.

Speaker 1: 19:05

Yeah, so that's been pretty fun. I'm just really. It's just what's fun about that is? It kind of brings me back to like my days as a kid, you know, playing Pokemon or Yu-Gi-Oh. The feeling of cracking open a pack of cards and seeing what you get. There's really nothing like it. You know, I love it. Yeah, it's cool.

Speaker 2: 19:25

We were, you know, built to enjoy these, or we grew up to enjoy these, like you know. That's probably why you like the gotcha games, because it has that same effect. Yeah, no, I agree there's. So there's A lot of card games that I only collected that I didn't really play. Pokemon, obviously, was one of them. I didn't, I didn't play the game, I only really cared about. I would say the first two generations were the ones that I really, like, pressed the most to collect and the Yu-Gi-Oh cards, you know, like the first, like maybe A couple of releases for those you give us huge when we were kids, man, oh, so was Pokemon you know, but it was, it was.

Speaker 1: 20:15

Pokemon first and then Yu-Gi-Oh came and, like all the kids who look collected Pokemon, were suddenly really into Yu-Gi-Oh and it's just kind of funny how that happened. But you give Yu-Gi-Oh.

Speaker 2: 20:24

Really set themselves up for that because it was a card game Within the the show. So you're like, oh yeah, I want to get these. You know, I want to get that dark magician. You know, I want to get that blue eyes, white dragon.

Speaker 1: 20:36

There's only three blue eyes white dragon in the world.

Speaker 2: 20:39

Yeah, right, right, you know when really there's, like you know, thousands, but but, yeah, that I totally get what you're talking about. I did play magic though, but you knew that, like that was probably one of the few card games that I actually like sat down and played.

Speaker 1: 20:58

Magic is the one that is probably I would say Yu-Gi-Oh to is a really fun game, but magic is is probably the most enduring of the actual Trading card games that are actually still played regularly and still releases cards regularly. You know, as far as like market cap and like how much Cards are sold, pokemon is still by far like 90% of the entire market of how much you know trading cards sell. But when it comes to like magic, the gathering I respected so much more because they're the og trading card game and Like their art is just unparalleled.

Speaker 2: 21:39

They're the, they're, they're the D&D of the of the trading card world. I mean they're both they're both created by.

Speaker 1: 21:46

I mean, I know D&D wasn't created by Wizards of the Coast, but they're both currently owned by Wizards of the Coast, right, right.

Speaker 2: 21:53

Yeah, so yeah, they do a lot of crossovers too. They did the Lord of the Rings.

Speaker 1: 21:59

Oh yeah, I have a whole bunch of Lord of the Rings Magic the Gathering cards. So, funny enough, I started. I started with Lorcanah, like you know about a like last summer I started trying to get into Lorcanah but because there was never any Lorcanah in stock and I was just like I Kind of want to get this fix out of my system, just like to cracks up and open. So I started getting some of the Lord of the Rings Magic the Gathering cards. They had a doctor who magic the Gathering said, and I've gotten a couple others, not a lot of cards, but you know, just enough to like oh, this is fun, I'll see what I can get. Same with Pokemon I grabbed a couple packs of that.

Speaker 2: 22:36

Oh, wow, yeah, but like the one that you were really like set on, like actually collecting, was Lorcanah or Lorcanah, yeah.

Speaker 1: 22:44

Lorcanah, but for the longest time it was just unavailable anywhere, or like if you wanted to buy it like a pack of cards, like a normal booster. It was like upcharged like 10 to 15 dollars, no matter where you were, it was just like. That's crazy double or triple what the pack is worth. But anyway, it's supply and demand. I'm all right, alrighty you want to jump into Empire.

Speaker 2: 23:09

Yeah, I was gonna say we're almost 30 minutes into the podcast. Yeah, let's talk. Let's talk about.

Speaker 1: 23:15

Empire. I wonder how many people like Get super pissed off about it, like us just like rambling for about random stuff in the first like half of our episodes. But it's just, it's part of the fun. So I mean, if you're either here with us or you're against us, Look y'all.

Speaker 2: 23:33

we've known each other for over 20 years, so there's gonna be a lot to talk about, yeah, so this is it's.

Speaker 1: 23:39

It's kind of funny when I think about it, just because Most podcasts don't do like our little preamble where we just like catch up on each other's lives. But we're best friends like we've been hanging out for literally since like what third grade.

Speaker 2: 23:55

And I think earlier than that maybe yeah, it's.

Speaker 1: 23:58

It's been a long time. So every every time we go to record, it's also a time for us to catch up. So that's kind of part of the charm of what we got going on here. But all right, without further ado, empire strikes back. Anthony, have you ever seen this movie?

Speaker 2: 24:13

It's all for the first, 100th time your first, you know it's absolutely man. I've seen Empire strikes back so many times. It's often heralded as the best out of all of Star Wars movies.

Speaker 1: 24:32

It's actually the first Star Wars movie I ever saw, so my dad, I must have been five or six and they they re-released the videos and or they released the videos on VHS in the 90s or the movie I mean.

Speaker 1: 24:47

And I remember being at Toys R Us and my dad saw, you know, a copy of Empire strikes back on VHS like on a shelf, and I know that he knew that a new hope was, you know, the first one, but he was really excited to rewatch Empire. So he bought Empire and that was the first Star Wars movie that I was introduced to and I Absolutely loved it. So I remember, like as a kid my mom would always like put, starting with Empire strikes back, we would eventually get the other VHS's in the set and I would just constantly, every day, watch at least one Star Wars movie and my mom, I used to ask my mom like the dumbest questions like who is that guy, who is this person, why did they do that? You know, like stupid kid stuff and and I guess the point where, like, my mom had no answers Just like that's just a Weird spider thing in Jabba's Palace, I don't know, stuff like that the classic parent answer.

Speaker 1: 25:52

Yeah yeah, but um, that was that was really fun, just growing up like that and it's. It's really hard to Talk about a film like this that both of us are so familiar with, and like give an honest review, because it's something that's always been in our lives, I think right.

Speaker 2: 26:10

Well, and what the thing is is that, like the consensus for this is that it's a really good Star Wars movie. You know like it's the best Star Wars movie. You know, even outside of of what you and I say, it's so, it's owns, it's. You have such a like a deep memory of Of when you watch Star Wars. But like me, like I knew that that my dad showed me these Star Wars movies at a young age and I remember, I just remember seeing them. I don't remember, you know, like periods of time like that where, like I sat, would sit down and ask questions about this, and that I just remember seeing them and I just, I just don't have like a a deep memory like that. But I will say that that this movie does have a lot of my favorites and it has like one of my favorite Battles, which is the battle of Hoth dude. I absolutely love the battle Hoth. You get these those, those giant AT-AT's. You get the AT-ST's in there.

Speaker 2: 27:14

For as long as I remember a lot of like Star Wars games and the ones in the arcade Always had like this battle of Hoth. You would have to go, you would have to go in the snow speeder and try to take down the AT-AT's with the, with the toe cable and harpoon and and it's. It's always been one of my absolute favorites in like battlefront, the battlefront games I. That was always in rotation for me, so I always like to play the rebels, but every once in a while I would hop on the Empire because you can actually like use the, the AT-AT's and they. Those are like just super unfair to you, absolutely unfair to use.

Speaker 2: 27:58

Yeah, man, the I. It has one of my favorite like. That part has one of my favorite tracks. It was which is like that about the battle of Hoth medley. Hmm, okay, and it's really cool because I also looked at the, the history of or like. I looked at like where they, where they shot for this like battle Dude. They were like out there in the middle of nowhere in freezing cold temperatures, bro, and what was it? Like Finland or Norway, I don't know.

Speaker 1: 28:33

Yeah, I actually have no idea, but it probably was no, yeah, yeah, they.

Speaker 2: 28:39

It was, yeah, it was. They were like deep out and like it was like a glacier it could have been Iceland, yeah, let's so this up.

Speaker 1: 28:48

Where was the battle of Hoth filmed? Okay, so they were at the Harden, hard, hard anger Yoko and glacier and Fintz, norway. Norway, yeah yeah, okay, so because I remember watching a YouTube.

Speaker 2: 29:06

It was like a YouTube video of this group that they actually made that like trek out there and yeah, man, it's just, it's just they. I remember reading that that like the cast and crew had to really deal with like Subzero temperatures yeah, it wasn't, it wasn't a joke.

Speaker 1: 29:27

Yeah, it's so. Yeah, they were.

Speaker 2: 29:28

They were freezing in real life, like you saw how it seemed like they were freezing in the film. Yeah, that was like real life, you know. But love it. It's just. It's so cool that they just they set up a space and then and then like the miniatures, like you can tell, like the moments that they're that they're using Like the miniatures, yeah, but I absolutely like, I love it, man, like just the use of, of the technology that they had back then. It just looked great, man, I loved it. I loved, I love every moment of this film.

Speaker 1: 30:04

Honestly, part of the stop motion miniatures you know within this movie is, you know, part of its charm, because you have the, the use of, like actual live-action people running, or you know, like planes flying around these miniatures are not planes but you know, like the speeders, right, right, and you have these Big machines that are moving super mechanically, or you know the tauntons that aren't perfect, but that's, that's part of the charm of this and it doesn't look yeah it doesn't look bad.

Speaker 1: 30:38

It just looks right it looks like it's like meant to be that way, just because the movie has always been that way, you know.

Speaker 2: 30:45

So I that's something that I've always really, really appreciated and it and they, they have those like practical Tauntaun effects too. So it's cool, like you have, you know, the miniatures and then that's actually have like the life-size Tauntaun. Yeah, they really like went. They went like just so deep into this to make the. I would say like, when I think, when somebody talks about movie magic like this is like a perfect example of movie magic where you're not using, you know 90% CGI, you know you're using, you know, practical effects and then some of the CGI Well, their version of CGI I Complimented it. You know, like the blaster fire and all that stuff.

Speaker 1: 31:36

Yeah, and they really were at the height of, you know, hollywood innovation at this time. You know, in the first movie they were at the height of the Hollywood innovation but like they really stepped it up to another degree with this sequel, they had Phil Tippett who was doing the stop motion and he Kind of pioneered that just incredible look and feel of not only how do I describe it? It's it wasn't like just Shot for shot and you could see like the you know each frame, but there's a little bit of motion blur in all of these frames that he pioneered, that they incorporated in these movies. That just brought it to life. Yeah. So the battle of Hoth, it's gorgeous look at. It's also Just strikingly different from everything that we saw in the first movie. So the first movie we saw a lot of Tatooine, we saw a lot of the Death Star and you know small locations like Yavin. We got the, the pyramid in Yavin, and then the Mayans.

Speaker 2: 32:44

Yeah like.

Speaker 1: 32:45

It's like a Mayan Aztec pyramid in the middle of a forest. It's cool. It's cool concept. Yeah, it kind of evokes the fact that there's, like this ancient civilization that no longer exists and they're just like using this base. This has a base, but, um, yeah, you have a couple of those places that Kind of give you a feel of what Star Wars is, and then this movie Changes that entirely.

Speaker 1: 33:07

You have the battle of hot early. You know the Hoth planet in general, it's just like a big ball of ice and snow and that's strikingly different from like the the desert I in the first movie. Then you have Dagobah, which is purely a swamp planet, and it's just the coolest set you've ever seen Lots of like fog and snakes and like lizards and stuff and a little green guy, little freaky green guy. And then you have the asteroid that has a space slug in it and it's just like what the heck they really went all out in, like just giving you new venues, new vistas to really just soak in and understand that this universe, this galaxy, is so much bigger than what you saw in the first movie.

Speaker 2: 33:57

No, yeah, I agree, and I mean, like can we really appreciate like how awesome they made like space, look in these old films and like the shot of like the entire planets, like for back then, like it, just it looks so it was, so it's so believable that they're in space.

Speaker 2: 34:20

It's so believable that they're looking at some other planet. You look back at a lot of these, like older films, and you think about what they had available to them and like they maximized what was available to them. You know, like I was, just it blows my mind. You know we talked about that, this exact thing, when we covered Godzilla. Like you know, they might have not had all the technology in the world, but they used what they had and and they made it work. They were at the height of whatever it was back then. You know.

Speaker 1: 34:54

Yeah, they made it work and they made it believable. You know if, if we can still believe it today, how much more so would people who've never seen anything like that in 1980 have felt like going to the theater, you know.

Speaker 2: 35:08

Oh, yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 1: 35:10

You know talking about new vistas, the city in the sky, cloud City, like dude, there's, so, there's so many locations in this movie the asteroid field, like on board Vader's Star Destroyer, it's, there's just. It's such a cool movie like it just oozes cool and like you said it, the individual shots of space and like the vehicles flying through it or at the astronauts, the planets.

Speaker 1: 35:43

Yeah, the overhead shots of the planets as it like pans down. All of this looked so believable and I'm sure, like you know, audiences in the 80s or, you know, 1980, were just floored by what they were able to accomplish. And outside of all of that, you know it is sci fi, it is science, fantasy, but outside of it it's a very human story. I think that's what the real heart of Star Wars is. You know, outside of like how cool it is, outside of the lightsaber battles, is that, like these characters are believable, they have human issues, they they want to be noticed by the princess, they want to, you know, train to be the best that they can be, but they also want to save their friends and they make mistakes along the way, they don't finish their training, blah, blah, blah. It's, it's all believable stuff, even though it's like on a fantastical scale. And I think that's that's the real charm of Star Wars and I was thinking about it this time around While you know I was rewatching the movie is that there's not a whole lot that's happening If you really boil it down.

Speaker 1: 36:49

You know, these rebels are on the run. Luke goes to get training. The rebels that are on the run get, you know, in trouble with the empire. Luke has to stop his training, and then there's the final battle. Right, that's five sentences.

Speaker 1: 37:04

Yep, the empire strikes back, you know that's, you can boil it down into five sentences, and the fact is they made an entire movie out of that. They made a whole script about like what that story would look like, and you're on the run after a pretty massive victory. Yeah, yeah, and dude, they made it perfect. I love it. What would?

Speaker 2: 37:29

you say, yeah, what made this film click so much, more so than the first film? The first film, obviously we'll, we'll always love it because it's original, it established this world, it did a lot of the world building, but it goes without saying that empire strikes back is a lot better than the first film, at least for me, it is what made it work Because remember, we talked about this when we covered a new hope George Lucas was not betting on this film, he was betting on somebody else's film to be successful, not his old film.

Speaker 1: 38:06

Yeah, when it comes to empire, I don't know. I don't know that I would say it's significantly better than the first movie. I will say that I like it more. I will say that I do think it's the better film, but it I don't think it's necessarily like something that clicked more for audiences. I think people that liked the first one were going to like the second one. You know, there there are actually like reviews out there from like early days of empire where, like there were negative reviews about empire strikes back like a poor sequel, blah, blah, blah. But obviously those opinions have just faded into the ether at this point just because the vast majority of people absolutely are stunned by it. So what?

Speaker 2: 38:56

I think every beloved movie is going to have naysayers yeah. I mean there's, I would say, like we very hardly will ever see, like a perfectly scored movie.

Speaker 1: 39:08

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 39:08

Even like dude, like I mean, we talked about Dune 2. There's people who have gripes about this, but you absolutely loved it, right, yeah?

Speaker 1: 39:16

And don't get me wrong, I have my gripes about Dune 2, mostly in the fact that it changes some things that I really liked about the book. But I understand that it's 100% the vision of the director and he nailed it.

Speaker 2: 39:28

Whatever he changed, he nailed, but anyway say it's the same fact for for empire strikes back. You know, whatever, whatever it is that, whatever it, whatever like movie vision that they had for this sequel, just nailed it. You know, like they, they followed whatever path that they had in their minds and it worked.

Speaker 1: 39:53

So I think a big factor, outside of just continuing the story and like following the characters that you've grown to love and seeing their interpersonal relationships grow, is the the new additions to the lore surrounding the Jedi and the mysticism that the power that Jedi's wield can hold. Like we didn't know after watching the first movie that you were able to lift a whole ship with your mind, you know, until Yoda was able to do it.

Speaker 2: 40:23

Right, Yoda is a cool Jedi you know, yeah, anyway, you know what?

Speaker 1: 40:33

let's, let's talk about that actually. So I had an email address, like my first email address was Yoda is a Jedi and it was like I forget even what it was called like it was a hotmail address. And then you had one where it was like Yoda is a cool Jedi and I was like pissed a little bit because you had the, you had the battery.

Speaker 2: 40:51

Oh my gosh, dude kids with their dumb emails. God.

Speaker 1: 41:02

It's a little cringe, but it's like the kind of cringe you just got to like just let out in the in the open, Anyway, yeah, so I think part of it is just like the new additions to the lore and like understanding the world a little bit better what Jedis are capable of. And you know the fact that this 900 year old green guy was teaching Jedi for 800 years and he's like the most unlikely person to you know. Actually be like a trained Jedi master is such a cool concept because it kind of treats the audience like they already have that prejudice. You know like, oh, this guy's annoying, Like let's, let's, get rid of him because, like I want to see Master Yoda, I want to see Luke get trained by the guy with the, the wise beard, you know like who's sitting on a rock somewhere out there. You kind of expect that when you hear about, like you know, a mystical master of some sort, but then you have this little guy with the cane who's crazy and throwing Luke snacks everywhere.

Speaker 2: 42:07

I know, yes, seriously, when you get the, the introduction to Yoda he, he really does act like this like senile, old, like alien creature thing that's just like. And then like the like him, just like. Have that like tug-of-war for the snack between him and R2 and he's just like hitting him with the game Mine mine, mine, mine.

Speaker 2: 42:32

Yeah, it's so funny. And then you, and then like, as years go, you know, they go by, we, we have a bit more of a fuller picture of of who Yoda is and how he is, this revered Jedi master, through, you know, through the prequels, through the books, through the comics, yeah, totally, now we understand, like you know, why this, this Yoda guy, is who he is, who he is.

Speaker 1: 43:04

Yeah, and I like still, you know like, let's say, was that 1980?

Speaker 2: 43:11

What is that? 40? How many? 44? 44 years and we still don't know his species.

Speaker 1: 43:19

Yeah, we don't know the name of the species, which is pretty crazy.

Speaker 2: 43:24

Him and Yaddle. Even though they try to bury her, we still remember Yaddle.

Speaker 1: 43:29

Yeah, did you ever see tales of the Jedi? It was like that I did not they have an episode it's sure it's.

Speaker 1: 43:36

It's a dooku based episode about like how he chain, like how he became Darth Sidious and like his final act was having to basically kill Yaddle. And it was so good, dude, dude, it's like 15 minutes. You should definitely give it a watch. It's so, so, fantastic. Yeah, so I like the scene when they're in the hut, like Yoda's hut, and he's trying to get Luke to just, you know, eat some of the food that he has prepared. And Luke's like what am I doing here? I have things, I have better things to do. And Yoda's like he finally like cracks and he's just like I cannot train him. And you hear Obi-Wan's voice again, and it takes Luke a second. It takes Luke like five seconds to realize wait, wait, wait, that's Yoda, and it just kind of shows.

Speaker 1: 44:24

His his built-in prejudice and probably the audience is built in prejudice because up to that point, we probably didn't realize that this was the master that, you know, we were supposed to be. You know seeing, and he's basically just being like the drunken master at this point, you know.

Speaker 2: 44:40

Right, we're thinking, you know, possibly that this person might lead Luke to the actual Yoda. Yeah and no, it's, that's Yoda. But you know what I actually love that they went with a small green guy as one of the the the best Jedi masters ever. I absolutely love it. Yeah because it Really does go to show, look man.

Speaker 1: 45:09

So you know everything.

Speaker 2: 45:10

Yeah, right, right, that he doesn't have to be this big Brawlik Individual to be able to do some of this amazing things. And I love that moment where Luke tries to lift his X-wing out of the swamp, but he can't do it. But but Yoda does it and he says I can't. You know, he's like I can't believe it and Yoda's like that is why you fail. Yeah, yeah, so, so good, and it's so good.

Speaker 1: 45:41

It's just like it hints at all like the More major, like Jedi tenants that you learn about later in the prequels. You know right, right and it's just. It's just a. I think what's great about is that like it gives you just enough Information about who the Jedi are, what they believe. Like that you need patience, you need to be kind, you need to not have these built-in prejudices and it actually even like goes into like how, like the Jedi would teach younglings because he said that he's he's too old at this point. He's like what 21 at this age in this movie and you think of a 21 year old? You know you and I are 32 you think of a 21 year old as someone who is very young.

Speaker 1: 46:27

Someone who's very susceptible to learning a new skill, a new trade. But the Jedi, they train kids, you know, into a right right.

Speaker 2: 46:36

Well, and it kind of makes me think, you know, in a way, that it does make sense, because a lot of people who Learn some you know, like even martial arts, you know, I mean technically, technically, you're never too old to like learn, but the best age is to learn is at a younger age. You know, you don't really have a lot of these Distractions. You haven't really lived life that much so you. So you're pretty much an open vessel to learn. So Lucas has lived life at this point. He literally just blew up a Death Star. He's experienced war a bit, so so it's definitely a lot tougher. He's got a lot more on his mind and so I really, I really like that. There's that cave that he goes through, oh yeah, and it's so important and he, and so it kind of drops a hint of who Darth Vader is before he finds out who Darth Vader is.

Speaker 1: 47:36

Yeah, and speaking about that, me you have that foreshadowing of you know when, when he cuts off Vader's head and sees his own face reflected there, that was probably really confusing for people. But I also, I also like, like you know, when he realizes that his friends are in trouble over in Cloud City, that he makes a run for it and Yoda's like don't do it, don't do it. And then Obi-Wan, you know, as he leaves, you hear Obi-Wan's voice. He was our, he is our last hope. And then, like it fades on black and Yoda goes no, there is another. And it's just like wait what?

Speaker 1: 48:11

there's another and yeah yeah, and what's cool about that? What's really cool about that, is it? It teases the audience that, like Luke might die, luke might not make it out of this, because Yoda said that there's another hope outside of Luke. So you're, you're suddenly like, oh, luke is actually expendable In like the grand scheme of things. Obviously nobody wants to dispense with, but yeah, that's kind of the vibe that that gives and they were talking about a soka at that point.

Speaker 2: 48:42

Yeah, or Ezra?

Speaker 1: 48:46

Yoda's like, or a cow Ezra's not too far away, guys, oh.

Speaker 2: 48:55

My gosh.

Speaker 1: 48:56

No, we're talking about Leia, but anyway.

Speaker 2: 48:58

This is the movie that we get. We get Boba Fett also dude.

Speaker 1: 49:03

We get Boba Fett, we get Lando. Boba Fett is huge. The fact that you know so much has been built around like the show Mandalorian Wouldn't exist if Boba Fett wasn't a thing right, right, it's crazy how like little stuff like that changes the course of like how franchises work, just like you get a cool character with a rocket launcher and it just changes the the whole fandom and nights of the or nights of the old Republic kind of perpetuates that also.

Speaker 2: 49:35

Oh yeah that they have man Mandalorians, and then there's this whole. Mandalore also yeah, yeah, yeah, like a Mandalorian Wars back then. Yeah, dude, is there's a lot. But yeah, we get that. This is Han, han Solo and and or, yeah, well, han Solo gets, gets captured and for Boba Fett takes him.

Speaker 1: 50:02

You know he gets his his bounty from, oh, and probably the best line in the entire movie is when you know he's going into the carbonite freezing chamber and Leia goes I love you and he goes. I know it's so cocky, it's so perfect. It's so Han, it's so Han, yeah, and it's. It's just clever, it's just really just clever. Writing like the. They make these people so human. But you know, this all leads up to the final battle with Luke and Vader, and we find out. You know, luke mentions that you killed my father and then Vader says the iconic line no, I am your father. Like, basically, obi-wan lied to you. I'm actually your father. And up to this point, like, vader's been having conversations with the Emperor They've been talking about like the son of Skywalker and we had no idea that Vader is the son of is actually the Skywalker in question because he's so divorced from that role he's not right, and you get that in the Obi-Wan yes series, where he's just like you know you didn't kill Anakin, I killed Anakin.

Speaker 2: 51:17

Yeah that this is where this is actually one of those movies where there's a Mandela thing that happens, yeah where everybody thinks that it's. It's Luke, I am your father, but it's no, I am your father, yeah.

Speaker 1: 51:35

I mean, it's a pretty simple one, but, like most people remember it as Luke, I am your father, which is funny.

Speaker 2: 51:40

But they even, they even put it into like TV shows and stuff like it's yeah it's bad, it's bad.

Speaker 1: 51:47

Yeah, what's great about this one, besides the fact that the whole movie is great Is that it ends on such a crazy cliffhanger. We find out Luke is Vader's son. Yeah, han gets frozen in carbon eye and taken by a bounty hunter to Jabba Jabba the hunt. Well, up to this point we don't know, because he wasn't in the first movie originally. We have the, the rebels, basically on the run again and Luke has lost his hand after his fight with Vader and Basically all hope seems lost. You know, by the end it's just like a crushing thing. Like you, you feel for Luke because, like the worst guy in the galaxy is your dad and Everything's just been brought down on you and Luke didn't finish his training Right.

Speaker 2: 52:38

So it's just the worst possible Case scenario, but like the best possible cliffhanger for fans to keep, you know, theorizing and waiting for the final Movie in that trilogy you also get a glimpse of of who Leia truly is, because she kind of has like a forced moment where she connects with Luke, because Luke calls out to her Remember when he's like he falls after that that battle with Vader. That's, that's hanging at the bottom of One of the, like you know, the platform like an intent on the bottom.

Speaker 2: 53:12

Yeah, yeah, and so he calls out to Leia and Leia like Feels it and was able to like guide to where Luke was, and so that's like her first like force moment you know or that we know of, yeah.

Speaker 1: 53:29

It's an. It's an incredible scene and it foreshadows the fact that she's also Skywalker. She's also a hope that you know Yoda has in store, you know, if Luke doesn't fall through. Yeah, so, like, all those cliffhangers combined leads to some of the like one of the most perfect endings to a movie. And then they have that beautiful shot of like it almost looks like a galaxy, even though, like, technically they're in the galaxy. So it's kind of confusing, you know they it's almost like a Milky Way Nebula type thing. But yeah, anyway, guys, thank you for listening to us here for our 72nd episode of Project Geekology. We hope you like Star Wars, because we love it. Yeah, we can't wait to talk about return the I was gonna say return to the king. We can't wait to talk about return of the Jedi. But next, next time you catch us, we're probably gonna be covering a something a little bit different from our usual fare. We're gonna cover saving private Ryan. You might have heard of it.

Speaker 1: 54:28

Yes, yes, that really good World War two movie but yeah, you can check out our socials in the show notes down below and we look forward to having you with us next time. Thanks, guys.

Speaker 2: 54:41

Thank you, bye, bye you.