The Revenge of the Sith experience

Hello everyone!

I have one more short breakdown to write about regarding my Indianapolis trip, but I thought I would take a break to write about my Episode III experience yesterday. Of course, I went to the midnight showing, and spent the whole day in line for it.

I arrived at the new Lowes Alderwood Mall theater at about 10:15am, and found a small group of guys were already there for the wait. It turns out they had actually arrived at 12:01am that morning, for the full 24 hour experience. I was not quite that fanatical, and I thought that a good night's sleep would do me better than an overnight at the theater entrance. The guys were quite cordial, though, and we quickly became line friends. I met two Chads, a Nick, a Garth, and a few other guys who's names escape me at the moment. It was pouring down rain on and off the whole day, so it was good that I arrived at 10:15. I was one of the few that could sit under the building awning instead of out in the elements.

After chatting a while, a couple of the group decided to throw down with a vicious lightsaber duel in front of the theater. That's when we met the matinee manager, who we lovingly nicknamed Jabba. She came out, looking surly and like she just ate a wookie, to yell at the two combatants. "Stop!" she bellowed. "Stop! That's enough. You are in front of my theater, and I won't have you doing that. One of the customers could be hit." Interesting theory, definitely. But I would venture to guess that unless a patron were to actually stick his person into the middle of the fight, a plastic lightsaber duel is fairly contained and free of audience peril. We informed her that this activity had been going on periodically throughout the morning, and no one had yet been taken to the emergency room. She said, "Yeah, well now I saw it, and it is going to stop. I am the manager. Ho Ho Ho, bantha poodoo!"

So, the fun spoiled before I even had a chance to swing the blade, we turned to more benign entertainment. A rousing game of Star Wars Trivial Pursuit. Unfortunately, all of the questions were so blasted easy for true Star Wars fans like ones that would wait 14+ hours in line for a movie, we had to set question answering limits to make the game more bearable for the teams. In the end, my team (me and a Chad) won. We then broke out another version of SW Trivial Pursuit (yes, there are actually two versions), which had decidedly more difficult questions. Example of a great question: "How many times did Luke clash sabers with Vader in the Dagobah cave before Luke cut off his head?" If you don't know the answer, you will just have to go watch Empire Strikes Back again! :-) Anyway, my team (with new members) was ahead again, leading everyone to call me the SW guru, when the game was called on account of boredom. It was about that time that my friend Mike Borg (friend that got screwed out of coming to the Celebration) arrived with lunch! Very tasty, very large lunch. Then the wonderful folks from the Jamba Juice store across the parking lot came over and offered us all free Jamba Juices for waiting in line. They are pretty awesome, those Juicers!

It was about 2:30 or 3pm after I finished lunch. I started to get restless, and wandered around a bit. Jabba hadn't seen fit to let the line into the building yet, and she pretty much had no plan whatsoever for the people that were showing up. Again, thank goodness that I was under the awning! We even saw some lightning once during an afternoon downpour. One of the guys there had gone to Toys R Us and purchased a new Star Wars Stratego game, so Mike and I started putting it together so we could have a game. It was a mighty showdown....light vs dark side. After a mighty battle, the dark side triumphed, when the light side ran out of attackers to throw at the dark.

It was at this point when the evening manager came out to greet us. Apparently, Jabba had gone home without so much as a farewell belch or threat. The evening manager was much nicer, and he actually had a plan for all of us who had supported his theater. He cancelled some evening shows, and was going to let us enter our respective theaters (12:01, 12:10, and 12:20 showings) at 6:30! Not only that, but he waived the "no outside food" rule for us. He rocked. So, we packed up our chairs and games, stowed them away in vehicles, and strolled into the theater at about 6:30 or 6:45. Mike and I got AWESOME center seats about 5 rows back, for our wives and us. The wives showed up at the theater around 7pm or so, and we hung out for a little bit, just relaxing. We watched some aisle lightsaber duels, and saw some guys breaking out Star Wars Monopoly on the floor of the theater. There were a group of high school girls dressed in black with black capes and mascara, etc, as dark jedi. They were having quite the lightsaber battles of their own, and were quite impressed with my Jedi outfit and homemade saber. I got a few pictures of the festivities, which I will hopefully post soon.

So Mike and his wife went to dinner together, and when they got back, Sandi and I went over to the Alderwood Mall food court for dinner. We got back at about 9:45pm, and spent the last hour or so relaxing before the movie. Then, the film!

Holy Shneikies. This film was SO EXCELLENT. It was really sad and depressing. About everything that could go wrong in the film does. It spirals downward into a black abyss of death and mourning. I loved every second of it. It was wonderfully put together, and ties up both trilogies quite nicely. I want to see it again RIGHT NOW. But alas. I have child. Must plan these outings around child. Anyway, I am determined to see it a few more times in the theater if possible. I give it 10 thumbs up. If you are reading this, stop now. Go see it this instant. I MEAN IT! (why are you still reading? go see it already!)