A Certain Point of View: Writing, Film and Stuff

On Quora, many Star Wars fan can't stop themselves from asking "Is Han Solo really dead?" and variations thereof. As a matter of fact, this is my second (and hopefully final) answer on this issue: Is there any possibility Han Solo is still alive? In Act III of  Star Wars - Episode VII: The Force Awakens,  the following events take place in the First Order’s  Starkiller Base,  a weaponized planet: Kylo Ren, aka Ben Solo, stabs Han in the heart with a very unstable lightsaber - fatally Han then falls from the catwalk into a deep chasm after suffering a fatal lightsaber stab to the heart A short time after  this,  the sabotage to the Starkiller Base’s shields allows Resistance X-wings to deliver a fatal attack on the base’s equivalent of a thermal exhaust port. The resulting explosion not only destroys the First Order’s facilities on the weaponized planet but the planet itself So, considering all these events, and taking into account that Han i...

Photo Credit: Michael Stewart/Getty Pictures On Quora, Trump supporter extraordinaire Paulie Duguay asks: Why can't people support President Trump the way U.S. Presidents in the 1940's, 50's, and 60's were supported? My reply: I wasn’t going to answer this; I have a comedy screenplay to finish and turn in, but since right now I’m stuck trying to add an extra scene the director/producer wants me to add for “dramatic tension,” I will use this rather bizarre and patently insincere question to loosen up my writing muscles and do some mental gymnastics. I’m sorry to tell you this, dear staunch Trump supporter, but this question is based on a flawed premise: that before the Sixties, Americans of all social strata and political stances supported American Presidents almost universally. This, my sweet summer child, has never been true in any era of American history. Since 1789, perhaps the only U.S. Chief Executive who enjoyed this kind of support  may have been ...

On Quora, Cory Dun asks: How realistic is the miniseries Band of Brothers as far as the airborne divisions are concerned? Was Easy Company a real parachute infantry company? I replied: Cover of the 2001 "miniseries tie-in" edition. © 2001 Home Box Office and Simon & Schuster Band of Brothers  is a 10-part adaptation of Stephen E. Ambrose’s 1992 non-fiction book  Band of Brothers: E Company, 506th Regiment, 101st Airborne from Normandy to Hitler’s Nest,  which itself was a companion book to his 1988 book  Pegasus Bridge: June 6, 1944.  Based primarily on interviews with surviving E (or Easy) Company veterans, correspondence, unit histories, diaries, and other resources,  Band of Brothers  was a look at a light infantry unit (albeit an elite one) that fought in many of the major campaigns in Northwest Europe from D-Day all the way to V-E Day (May 8, 1945) and through the summer of 1945. Because it is a dramatization of a non-fiction b...

1977 poster promoting Star Wars. © 1977 20th Century Fox Film Corporation On Quora, Marielle Jenna asks: What is the name of the first Star Wars movie of the Original Trilogy? My reply: Officially,   the name of the first  Star Wars  movie of the Original Trilogy is  Star Wars - Episode IV: A New Hope. Originally, though, 20th Century Fox released writer-director George Lucas’s now-iconic space fantasy adventure on May 25, 1977 as  Star Wars. The studio, which financed, marketed, and released the film (indeed, owning the rights in perpetuity, although that’s now a moot point since The Walt Disney Company now owns Fox  and  Lucasfilm) allegedly refused to allow Lucas to include the  Episode IV: A New Hope  subtitle in the main titles sequence. Per Lucas’s account in the director’s commentary, Fox executives feared that audiences would be put off by seeing an “Episode IV” subtitle at a time when no other  Star Wars  ...

On May 19, 1980, fans saw the first use of the numbered episode/subtitle format in a Star Wars Saga film. By then, Lucasfilm had already decided to rename the original 1977  Star Wars film as Star Wars - Episode IV: A New Hope, but the new title would not be seen on screen until 1981. © 1980 Lucasfilm Ltd.  On Quora, Henry Hunter recently asked: When did the Original Trilogy of Star Wars movies adopt the Episode IV, V and VI subtitles? Was this met with confusion at the time? My reply: In November 1979, Ballantine Books published the original edition of The Art of Star Wars. In Part One: The Script, readers discovered the new Episode number and subtitle scheme for the first time. I remember buying this book a few weeks after seeing The Empire Strikes Back. Oddly enough, even though I went to bookstores as often as I could as a teenager, I did not see any copies of Titelman's book in stores until the Summer of 1980.  © 1979 Ballantine Books and Lucasfilm Ltd...

Originally asked on Quora as: Sarah Sanders was under a great level of scrutiny professionally by some in the mainstream media or personally (Red Hen refused to serve her). Do you think she did a good job? Do you sympathize with her now that she's leaving? My reply: Sarah Huckabee Sanders did not, in my opinion, do a good job as Donald Trump’s second, longest-serving Press Secretary. Yes, she served the President faithfully and to the best of her ability, but did nothing to either (a) reconcile the wide gap between real journalists (Fox News, Breitbart, and BlazeTV, being basically propaganda outlets for the right wing) and the Trump Administration, or (b) give the American people at least a modicum of honesty and decency. On the contrary, not since Ron Ziegler, President Richard M. Nixon’s press secretary throughout his two terms (1969–1974) have we had such an adversarial Assistant to the President charged with being a liaison between a Chief Executive and the press...

© 2017 Dolby Labs and Lucasfilm Ltd. (LFL) Was The Last Jedi too far, far away from being like a Star Wars movie? Despite what many of its vocal “Disney ruined  Star Wars ” detractors claim,  Star Wars - Episode VIII: The Last Jedi  was not much different from any of the other Skywalker Saga films. It follows the basic format of the previous seven Saga films and has the same basic visual and aural  Star Wars-y  features, including: The Lucasfilm logo (yes, I miss the 20th Century Fox logo and fanfare that preceded the movies made before 2008, but let’s get over that) The Main Title, with the receding  Star Wars  titles and crawl, accompanied by John Williams’ score John Williams’ score Transitions accompanied by “wipes” and “dissolves” A basic three-act structure Intertwined plots that converge at the end Lessons about the Force Jedi stuff Dark Side of the Force stuff Lightsaber duels Mix of comedy and drama Space battles Enemy s...