Otaking's 'TIE Fighter' Is The Star Wars Anime Tie-in We Deserve

The Force is strong with this year. While sci-fi afficiandos and movie-goers patiently wait on further news and publicity concerning the seventh Star Wars film slated for release this December, Paul "Otaking" Johnson's fan-made short TIE Fighter only proves that the franchise's future continues to resonate long after the films.

The short follows a troupe of rebel X-Wings embroiled in a deseperate fight against a fleet of Star Destroyers and their host of TIE Fighters. Accompanied by Zakir Rahman's inspired heavy metal soundtrack riffing off of the musical troupes of early 90's anime, TIE Fighter is an impressive fan-short that takes as much inspiration from Lucas' iconic space-opera as it does from the works of anime titans such as Yoshiyuki Tomino (Mobile Suit Gundam) and Leiji Matsumoto (Space Battleship Yamato). And to top it off, not only is it painstakingly well-animated, it's canonically accurate as well! Now that's what I call dedication

Chen Nambiarooran Transforms Darth Vader into a Cabal of Monstrosities

Remember that spotlight we did of over 30 Darth Vader illustrations from Brainstorm's fantastic January community event? Well, there's still one artist in-particular whose work from that event I wanted to feature and would be remiss in not highlighting. 

That artist would be London-based Chenthooran Nambiarooran, who went above and beyond painting one recreation of one of Star Wars' most iconic adversaries and instead chose to create an entire series of 30 illustrations depicting Vader in all his aspects as a legion aristocracy of cenobite centurions, limped-legged abominations, and eyeless flesh ghouls prowling the ridges of space to swipe out at any inkling of the light side of the Force.

Chen's paintings prompt an interesting What-if scenario; What if the name Darth Vader wasn't just the title adopted by the fallen and disfigured Anakin Skywalker, but rather an terrible and ancient honorific; Passed down throughout the annals of the Dark Side to be worn only by the most ruthless and tyrannical Sith Lords to roam the darkness of their times? Sort of like the members of Berserk's God-hand, only with midichlorians. Check out Chen's entire series below the break!

Brainstorm Breathes New Life Into The Dark Lord of the Sith

Klaus Wittmann

Darth Vader. Savior-turned-slaughterer of the Jedi Order. The Dragon of Darth Sidious. A name synonymous with the labored exhale of a respirator and the silhouette of a hooded executioner marching through the smoking chasm of a laser-blasted airlock door. From the moment he premiered on-screen in 1977, Darth Vader had captured the collective imagination of popular culture at large with his unpacifiable ruthlessness and impenetrable aura of unwavering stoicism.

Vader has been re-imagined so many times it almost seems like a rite of passage for any fledgling Cintiq art-padawan. So when the Brainstorm page announced that they were hosting a month-long community challenge to re-interpret the fallen Jedi Knight and the Imperial Storm troopers, I knew we were in for something special.

And I wasn't wrong; Out of the hundreds of illustrations submitted, these are but a few of the most jaw-dropping entries to be submitted this month. The Force is strong with this post.

J.J. Abrams Unleashes The First Trailer For Star Wars: The Force Awakens; Internet Collectively Loses Its Shit

What can be said about Star Wars that hasn't been already? The 1977 classic, the monumental 1980 follow-up, the critically-lackluster but commercially triumphant early-aught prequels. The action-figures, video-games, theme park dance recitals and art installations; all culminating into the definitive sci-fi space opera epic of the past 50 years. After nine long years, we finally have our first look at the first proper sequel to the pop-cultural juggernaut; Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens.

Details surrounding the sequel are understandably scant and under ludicrously tight lock and key, but there are whispers on the winds and rumors in the taverns. Set 30 years after the fall of Emperor Palpatine and the redemption of Darth Vader, Force Awakens follows three intrepid youths aided and mentored by the likes of Han Solo and Luke and Leia Skywalker as they confront an awesome and terrible new power in the Galaxy.

And a new enemy rises...

I'm not ashamed to admit that I had an involuntary fan-boy fit when John Boyega popped up on the screen (I love Attack the Block) and Daisy Ridley riding that land-speeder across the dunes of Tatooine got my heart racing. Tie-Fighters, The Millennium Falcon, and of course what would a new Star Wars installment be without a ridiculous new light-saber design? Premature as this assessment might be, but I think J.J. Abrams might actually nail this one out of the park. December 2015 is so far far away now it's cruel.

ARST ARSW: Star Wars Sorted Alphabetically

Holy crap! Youtube user Suckerpinch wrote a special program to organize all of the English dialogue in Star Wars, split it into words, and sort the results alphabetically. At a total running time of 43 minutes it's an absolutely bizarre experiment, but some interesting data was extracted throughout the process. I've seen the fandom do some interesting studies of the original trilogy, but this one takes the cake. Oh and in case you were wondering, Suckerpinch admitted to using the 'Han short first version' in this analysis to troll purists of the revised version.

Fun facts:
The word 'lightsaber' only appears once in this film.
There are 43m5s of spoken English, 81m39s of other.
The most common word is 'the,' of course, said 368 times.
The word with most screen time is 'you,' at 52.56 seconds.
There are 1695 different words, and 11684 total words.
The longest words are 'responsibility,' 'malfunctioning,' 'worshipfulness,' and 'identification,' all 14 letters.

SUPER SMASH WARS 2: The Empire Smashes Back

Animator James Farr is on a rampage, albeit an extremely awesome mashup-y one. After the fantastic first part of Super Smash Wars uploaded a few months back, he's returned with a two part sequel and it's pretty dang cool.

Compared to the first entry, Super Smash Wars 2 is far more action packed and ends up playing out like an old school side-scroller than a game of Super Smash Bros. Farr does an incredible job at incorporating the Nintendo universe into Star Wars and if this entry is anything to go by, the final entry should be even better. I might even have to go out on a limb here and say I wouldn't mind seeing James Farr tackle the most recent Star Wars films (as much as we like to pretend they don't exist).

Super Smash Wars: A Link To The Hope Is a Beautiful Star Wars Treat

Animator James Farr knows his way to my cross-over fueled heart. While Disney may have purchased Star Wars for their evil bidding it's still nice to remember the golden days of Star Wars games on the SNES and the N64. 

In a 9-minute long mash-up of Star Wars and Nintendo, James Farr showcases just how awesome a Star Wars x Nintendo cross-over world could actually be. You can't argue that the Master Sword / Lightsaber combo isn't the coolest thing you've seen all day, admit it. The cast chosen by James Farr is absolutely perfect for their Star Wars counterparts, especially Birdo (You'll know it when you see it).

James Farr has a short history of mixing Nintendo with unlikely pieces of pop-culture and they seem to keep getting better. With his focus on on 80's and 90's films, it's not long until we see the Super Mario x Breakfast Club combo you've always dreamed about.

Star Wars Uncut 2: The Empire Strikes Back Trailer

Star Wars Uncut was an awesome project inspired by the entire 'sweding' movement, which spawned from Michel Gondry's cult 2008 flick Be Kind Rewind, featuring recreated pop-culture flicks using little to no budget. The movement has spawned countless swedings of famous movies, until Star Wars Uncut took the concept to the next level by setting out to recreate the entire feature length trilogy, done by breaking each movie up into hundreds of 15 second sequences to be completed by the community.

We posted the finished version of the first film in the series back in early 2012, and the same team and community is now at work wrapping up The Empire Strikes Back, due this May. There are still some scenes available, so gather up your friends and head on over to the official Star Wars Uncut website for a chance to be immortalized in this fan tribute.

Luke's Change : An Inside Job

Luke's Change is a tongue in cheek reference to Loose Change, the somewhat conspiracy theory lead documentary series relating to the 9/11 attacks being an inside job, but set in the Star Wars universe. Using an investigative journalist approach, this fun little spinoff offers a take on the events leading to the Death Star's explosion being rather..Unlikely.

'An examination of some questionable events and circumstances leading up to the destruction of the Death Star, through the eyes of an amateur investigative journalist within the Star Wars galaxy. The focus is mainly on the connections between the people who created and operated the Death Star and those responsible for destroying it.'

The 8 Best Things To Potentially Happen To Star Wars

Yesterday, the news broke that Disney had purchased Lucasfilms for over $4 Billion, a massive purchase that seemingly came out of the blue. As with any type of Star Wars news, Star Wars fans freaked out, although it seemed relatively split on whether they were upset or happy. It's understandable for such a big purchase to be a little bit worrisome, but let me ease your troubled minds and help you assess the good news that could potentially come of this.

Hit the break for the 8 best things that could potentially happen in Star Wars' future.

Fanmade Star Wars Tribute Is Looking Positively Kickass

This WIP video of a Star Wars tribute was supposedly created by Youtube user Otaking7707. Despite it being soundless at this point, this proof of concept video is nothing short of insane, especially if it was created by an army of one. Using a mishmash of cel shaded 3D, a little rotoscoping and a lot of inspiration from the classic adapted Star Wars mangas (Published by Tokyopop)  from back in the day, this is shaping up to be one hell of an epic tribute short to the golden days of Star Wars. Stay tuned for more updates.

Star Wars Uncut - The Empire Strikes Back

Star Wars Uncut: The Empire Strikes Back Trailer from Star Wars Uncut on Vimeo.

Remember the 'Star Wars Uncut' project? A huge group of fans came together to recreate 'A New Hope,' by assigning people 15 second scenes to recreate. The end result was bizarre, hilarious and somewhat of a heartwarming fan endeavor, winning the people behind the project an Emmy, probably to George Lucas' chagrin.

Well if you were upset about missing out on the chance to contribute to such an amazing fan project, mope no longer as the Star Wars Uncut folk just announced their new project: the scene by scene remake of The Empire Strikes Back. You can head over to their website and claim a scene (Which we already have, btw), get a crew together and become immortalized in the next uncut project! Do it!

The Star Wars That I Used To Know

This is nothing short of a cathartic piece for anyone who's ever been frustrated by the untimely fate that the Star Wars franchise has met. Portrayed by a fine Jedi covering Gotye's fantastic 'Somebody That I Used To Know,' this Jedi breaks down every stupid decision that sent our favorite scifi series into the gutter. The best part is the faux George Lucas that comes in around the chorus, delivering his stubborn vengeance onto betrayed fans. The green screen painted ending takes this into absolute brilliant territory, the one technique that represented everything that had gone wrong with the series.

Art Of Avanaut

Tattooine Sunset (Via)

Finding Avanaut's Flickr archive was like stumbling onto a trove of visual treasure, as it contained doezens of excellently staged photos featuring Star Wars and Indiana Jones characters in classic situations. The catch is, he uses toys that he lights and color grades them in a way that on first glance, could be confused for stills from actual movies.  The atmosphere and colors he captured in his photos are so good that if you're an artist, these would probably be worth using for doing lighting studies. Check out 9 more images from his geektastic collection after the break!

The Phantom Menace's Fights Totally Made Sense

We've been pretty harsh on George Lucas in the past, but let's face it, he deserves every bit of flack he's gotten within the past 15 years. Being the blind optimist that I am, I've always remained adamant at admitting that I enjoyed the fight sequences from the most recent Star Wars films. YouTube user FirstManOnTheSpoon has smashed all my hopes and dreams in this single 3 minute video, proving once and for all that there isn't one f*cking redeeming quality in these films. I'm going to go rewatch the movies and hope I can find something to put me back on track.

6 Star Wars Identities : What Forces Shape You?

Stormtroopers: Quantity, not quality (Via)

As part of a new exhibit taking place in Canada, specifically Montreal and Edmonton starting April 19th, 'Star Wars Identities' will explore the forces that made us all into what we are today. The posters explore that theme, using objects and settings that defined the most iconic Star Wars characters to create these portraits (With my personal exception of Queen Amidala, who had as much personality as a toaster). Check out the promo video below, and 5 more posters after the break!

Returning to Jedi

Several days ago, we posted two documentaries by Jamie Benning about the making of Star Wars and The Empire Strikes back.  He recently came out with his third Star Wars making-of fan documentary, about The Return of the Jedi.  Similar to his other documentaries, this one includes trivia, deleted scenes, and commentary from cast and crew in the same awesome feature length, 'enhanced' format. Enjoy!

Cool Star Wars Posters by Christopher Lee

(Via)

We haven't been shy about our disapproval of the decision to re-release the Star Wars prequels to theaters (now in 3D). That said, if the prequels do well, and the originals end up being released somewhere down the road, that would be kinda sweet. The originals are certainly classics, and while there is definitely no shortage of fan tributes out there, we thought these movie posters by Christopher Lee pretty awesome.

Check out the other 2 after the jump!

Biopics Recast With Jar-Jar Binks

 BINK! (Via)

In honor of today's re-release of Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menace to theaters (ugh...), we bring you the most beloved grating cinematic character of all-time: Jar Jar Binks. Now, you see, since Jar Jar was so fantastic in The Phantom Menace, someone out there decided to recast several biopics with him instead. To the die-hard Star Wars fan who likes to lovingly leave essays in our comments section (yeah, you know who you are), we lovingly dedicate this to you. COME AT ME.

See 4 more posters after the break!

Star Wars Begins: The End All Star Wars Documentary

This incredible series of documentaries by Jamie Benning are an ode to everything from the original Star Wars trilogy, an unofficial look at the creation of the original movies with the addition of deleted scenes, takes, bloopers, trivia and commentary from the original cast and crew. All these elements are spliced into the feature length movie, creating an incredibly insightful look at the thought process that created the universe we all fell in love with (Until the Phantom Menace came out).

We wish Lucas would have released something this in depth, but we'll gladly take this labor of love instead. Jamie has created one of these for each of the three movies in the original trilogy, but only Episode IV and V are currently on Vimeo. We'll post VI when he gets it up on there. Check out his awesome Empire Strikes Back doc after the break!