Did Han know what a parsec was?

If you've seen the original Star Wars you may recall the (in)famous line where Han Solo boasts about the speed of the Millenium Falcon:

Han Solo: Han Solo. I'm captain of the Millennium Falcon. Chewie here tells me you're lookin' for passage to the Alderaan system? 
Obi-Wan: Yes indeed, if it's a fast ship. 
Han Solo: Fast ship? You've never heard of the Millennium Falcon? 
Obi-Wan: Should I have? 
Han Solo: It's the ship that made the Kessel Run in less than twelve parsecs. I've outrun Imperial starships. Not the local bulk cruisers mind you, I'm talking about the big Corellian ships now. She's fast enough for you old man.

Now, it doesn't take much of a physicist to tell you that a parsec is a measurement not of time, but of distance. A light year is a distance measured as the distance light can travel in one year. A parsec is approximately 3.26 light years (that's around 19 trillion miles). So is Han being dense?

Well, the Star Wars Expanded Universe writers concluded not, and developed an explanation where the Kessel Run is a smuggler's route from the mining planet of Kessel that skirts a cluster of black holes called the Maw. The faster the ship, the closer you can skirt to the Maw, and therefore the shorter the distance, hence parsecs. This explanation quickly became canonical and until recently I assumed it was correct.

Until I read Darths & Droids a few days ago. If you haven't seen it, it's an excellent webcomic that imagines a world where Star Wars exists as nothing more than a D&D-style game master's imagination, and the events of the movies are reinterpreted as the actions of a group of role-playing friends. According to the annotation on this one, in the original script, Obi-Wan was supposed to treat Han's claim with derision, as it showed he didn't know what he was talking about.

It really was just a heap of junk after all. Who knew? Source.

Apparently a minor change, but when you think about it, it makes a big difference to the character. He's always portrayed as a slightly reckless but fundamentally competent character, whilst the Falcon was not much to look at but was genuinely fast. Yet in the original script, Han started out as a bit of an idiot (although he's clearly supposed to have matured by the Empire Strikes Back), and perhaps the Falcon was really no more than a heap of junk without even speed as a redeeming feature.

Crazy stuff. I'm not going to lie, my world was temporarily rocked. It rather changes the interpretation put on it by just about every content creator since, simply because Alec Guinness didn't portray quite enough derision.

The Piano Guys: Excellent and clever cover songs

Recently on YouTube I discovered a group of musicians called the Piano Guys. Their general approach is to combine a piano (that travels more than most people get to!), a cello (in varying numbers through secret cloning techniques) and fantastic locations to produce cover songs and mashups that are often better than the originals. They have loads of videos online, but here are some of my favourites:

And some of their more lighthearted and inventive efforts:

Every Star Wars game ever

Great video from Gamespot with a very quick overview of nearly every Star Wars game ever that's worth noticing. Emphasis on nearly: they missed Masters of Teras Kasi (basically Star Wars Tekken), Shadows of the Empire (I never played it but supposedly brilliant), Republic Commando (shockingly), Bounty Hunter (again never actually played) and Force Commander (not the greatest but worth a mention).



Some of the criticism was a little harsh too - Racer on the PC was absolutely awesome, and Yoda Stories was one of the most fun time-wasting games I've ever played on the PC (maybe better as a casual desktop game than as a GBC game).

Still, all in all, a pretty good effort at covering the many many that have been made.

3D without screens through coloured lasers

Maybe one day we will manage to achieve the Star Wars-style holographic displays.

Of course, there are still issues I'd have thought around capturing images that give you 3D that can be viewed from all sides - even 3D cameras only get a 3D perspective of one side. That said, it's still quite exciting:



And as the article says, you can get R and B as well as G - so full colour is possible :)

Credit: CNet

Audio gives the most bang for your buck

I tweeted earlier about how listening to the Dark Knight soundtrack makes even mundane tasks like tidying your wardrobe feel slightly heroic. And that reminded me of a comment I half-remembered from George Lucas.

In this interview, George Lucas comments on how he believes that audio is 50% of a movie's impact, and a good soundtrack gives you the most bang for your buck in terms of impact.

Given that he worked on Star Wars I can see why he thinks that. But it's probably true, if you ever watch a scene (esp. the threatening ones) and consider what's actually happening onscreen vs. the way the music makes you feel, you'll realise what an effect it has.

I was searching for a source for the quote when I came across this interview with John Williams about the Star Wars soundtracks. The most interesting part for me were his comments on how an orchestral score appealing to the traditional nature of the stories was an important factor in its popularity, his thoughts on George Lucas' modifications to the original films, and a nice story about how the cantina band tune came about. Worth a look.