This movie is like a heavenly bugle horn calling to resurrect the fans from their 15 year death slumber. I, like many others, grew up on the original trilogy, loving those films like childhood Bibles enriching our Imagination Fountains and teaching us the meaning of adventure. Action figures, plastic light sabers, video games, and Lego sets all fueled our immersion in this rich universe we were certain really existed in a galaxy far, far away. Every kid wanted to be Han, Luke, or Leia, and it was that way for decades after the films first left their indelible mark on cinema.
Then The Phantom Menace happened. While children of the time probably couldn't be convinced there was anything wrong with it, there was nonetheless a slow and unyielding erosion of our attachment to Star Wars, and by the time we were graduating high school and the credits had rolled on what was to be the final film in the franchise, we honestly couldn't be bothered to spend our breath on any related work any longer. That ship had sailed, and many of us moved on with our lives.
Whether you think the prequels are bad, mediocre, or just fine, there's no questioning that the average opinion on Star Wars took a hit. Even as new generations are being brought up on Anakin, and the sci-fi fantasy continues to rake in sand skiffs of money, the fanbase remains a splintered faction. The stalwarts fight an unwinnable battle to change the views of the critics, and the jaded rebuke the apologists with anger or indifference (or they just cling to the TV series).
When the impossible was announced, that Lucas had sold his film company and all its properties to Disney, hope for the lost fans was rekindled. When a new film was announced, with JJ Abrams as director, some well-oiled skepticism began to reemerge. When the first teaser trailer released, everyone shut up. When the second teaser trailer released, everyone promptly shit themselves.
Now it seems time for the two divisions of Star Wars fans to finally enjoy an uneasy truce, as excitement for Star Wars boils over to levels we haven't seen in over a decade. Not since I was 12 years old have I been this fan-hard over The Force, and it's a revelation for me and other cynics out there who never thought this day would come. It feels like I'm 8 years old again, sitting in my aunt's gigantic living room watching Star Wars VHS tapes on her massive 32" tube and 4.1 surround sound. I'm reliving the excitement of seeing Luke fight against the Rancor for the first time, only I'm a disbelieving 28 year old who thought those emotions had long since died.
Everyone young and old are going crazy over the series revival, but one aspect in particular has people awestruck and cooing all at the same time. And it's this little bastard right here:
BB-8, the newest droid mascot for the lightsaber swashbuckler has the entire world in a frenzy. It's cute, it's small, it's cool, it's nimble, it's pudgy, and it's cute. But most of all it's adorable. It makes R2-D2 look like an old crotchety trash bin, and sets feminine hearts aflutter faster than WALL-E trapped in a waste incinerator.
Search Tumblr for BB-8. Go on, I dare you. It's chock full of cute-ophiles blowing their maternal loads all over screen. People are in love with the little beach ball, and not just because you could melt a mammoth's permafrost heart with just its beeps and boops. But also because the damn thing is real. It's not CG, or tethered to wires, or any other fakery. Somone built the friggin robot, an object conceived in a universe supposedly lightyears more advanced than our own.
This is both fascinating and terrifying. It's a symbol that we as a race are not as primitive as we once thought, or rather, our machines. These are things that are supposed to serve us, but as so many apocalyptic sci-fi films have taught us, the roles could very well reverse one day if we aren't careful with our genius. In fact, this sweet unassuming little droid bot may be the harbinger of that event.
It turns out the magic behind BB-8 started not at Disney, but at a company Disney's CEO Bob Iger scouted as an investment opportunity for Disney's technology pursuits. The company is called Sphero, and if you've recently set foot inside a Best Buy you might already be familiar with some of their products.
Sphero is a small tech company that makes robot toys, their signature one being based on their namesake—a literal ball that you can control and play games with using an app on a mobile device. As it happens, this has many applications for Disney, not just in the film world, but also in the merchandising of said film world. Using their existing expertise, there's a good chance BB-8 won't just be easy enough to produce for a movie, but possibly easy enough to produce as a toy.
Now, picture this. That irresistibly charming robot you just saw on a movie screen, with its novel floating head and seamless spherical body, is also available on store shelves as a fully functional toy doing exactly what it did in front of cameras. Picture the hordes and hordes of nerd girls and boys who were swooning over the cutebot months earlier catching wind of this as well. You have the makings of Armageddon.
The riots over a BB-8 will make Tickle Me Elmo look like a Chinese knockoff of the Stone Protectors. Everyone will be clamoring for a piece of movie magic, and they won't care how many skulls they crush getting it. Nintendo will cling to their retailer-exclusive Amiibo muttering to themselves about how people need to calm the fuck down. The entire country of Iraq will be shaking their heads at us in dismay at our anarchy.
Empires will fall.
Nations will crumble.
Stockboys will be trampled to death.
The intelligent among us will hole up in our homes, grasping at some tattered sense of safety. We'll sit in our computer chairs, sipping nervously at our coffees, and holding onto the memory of the time when Star Wars was about hope in the face of hopelessness, belief in the unbelievable, and adventure in a new and unfamiliar place. And not about being briefed on another retail tragedy on the 6 o'clock news.
Star Wars Episode 7 has the chance to reanimate the corpse of a once grand and respected film empire. Our childhoods (whether "raped" or not) have a new opportunity to relive themselves through an exciting cinematic vessel, as seen through the eyes of a new set of creators who grew up as fans themselves. But fuck all that, none of it actually matters. It'll all go to dewback shit this Holiday Season once the bloodbath begins, and the sirens ring out their endless calls.
Brace yourself, Earth. BB-8 toys are coming. And humanity may never recover.
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