Eric Welcomes Super Star Wars fan Andrew from the Rare Cuts Media Society to talk all about George Lucas and Disney…but not necessarily Star Wars. George Lucas has been a force in filmmaking technology in the movies he made and the Companies he started, Like Industrial Light and Magic (ILM). But he also did a lot for the Disney Company and that was all before he sold his LucasFilm to Disney. In this episode, the conversation focuses more on Indiana Jones Disney Parks Attractions, Pixar Animation technology, Michael Jackson using the Force as Captain EO, and a strange little movie called Strange Magic! Oh, yeah….we do talk about Star Wars too.
Andrew appeared once before on the first episode of Synergy Loves Company: Aerosmith and Disney! Listen here: https://synergylovescompany.com/episode/aerosmith-and-disney
You can find more andrew on Rare Cuts Media Society: https://rarecutsmediasociety.com
Thanks for listening to Synergy Loves Company: How Disney Connects to Everything.
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00:04 --> 00:32 Synergy loves company. We have this coterie of rich franchises. The company now that people want to engage with. I came here to try and continue what Walt Disney and his associates set in motion 50 years ago, which is to experiment with every new and innovative.
00:32 --> 00:34 Kind of entertainment possible.
00:40 --> 00:53 It's what we hope to do here to really develop something that just, more than an entertainment enterprise, it's something that contributes many other ways.
01:00 --> 01:27 Hey, this is Synergy loves company, where we explore how Disney connects to everything. I'm Eric and I'm super excited to be talking about our topic today. I do love Star Wars. I would say I love Star wars as much as the next guy. That is, of course, unless the next guy is this next guy who's keeping me company. And that's Andrew Jagoda from the Rare Cuts Media society. Andrew, welcome to the show.
01:27 --> 01:33 Thanks for having me on, Eric. It's fun to be here and talk about this topic, I'll tell you that.
01:34 --> 02:04 That's right. And I do want to bring up real quick that you are the first, 2nd time guest ever on the first. You were on my very first aired episode when we did Aerosmith and Disney. And now we're here to talk about George Lucas and Disney. But I know I talked about Star wars at the beginning, and I got to break it to you, we're not necessarily talking about Star wars.
02:05 --> 02:08 Yeah, I got that from the title up.
02:10 --> 02:47 Want to. We could go into Star wars. And now that Disney owns Star wars, which I'm sure we'll talk about a little bit here and like, sure, the whole thing know all of Star wars connects to Disney. And that's like a whole other, like, I think there's podcasters out there who do those Star wars podcasts and what Disney's doing with Star wars. And we're not going to take all that time today to talk about all of that stuff. So we're going to just focus on that. George Lucas and Disney mostly before Disney bought Lucasfilm. So you ready for this?
02:48 --> 02:49 Oh yeah, I'm pumped.
02:49 --> 04:43 So the first piece I want to talk about is I want to talk about Pixar. Because if it wasn't for George Lucas, we wouldn't even have Pixar. Because while making Star wars in the late 70s, Lucas wanted to get into that computer animation special effects, kind of bring the special effects to the next level. And there were some companies out there doing this already. Like there is one called CGL or computer graphics lab, and that's where Ed Catmull came from. So George Lucas pretty much stole Catmull and some of those other guys from CGL and brought them to Lucasfilm to work on 3d animated effects. And that's where they kind of started developing new ways to do those animated kind of cartoons. They actually bought this machine from the guy who created Atari and Chuck E. Cheese, Nolan Bushnell, and it was called a cadabra scope. And they used that combined with some of their other technology to create the Pixar machine that eventually became what made Toy story and all that kind of stuff. Now, at the time, George Lucas wasn't into making those cartoons, those animated films, and he kind of sold them off to Steve Jobs. And then Pixar was born in the way that we know it. So Pixar is one of those things that George Lucas ilm, too. We'll bring them up. Industrial light and magic. They wouldn't exist without George Lucas and what he wanted to do to further filmmaking and special effects. So I got to ask you, does Pixar hold a special place in your heart that movies.
04:43 --> 04:57 Yeah, it does. I have two kids, so of course, I see all the new Pixar movies, too. But it's funny because I'm going to bring up Star wars.
04:57 --> 05:00 Of course you got to do it. I'm not. So you will.
05:00 --> 05:26 When Toy Story, the first toy story came to theaters, I went and saw it, and that was the first time I got to see a trailer when they were working on the special editions of the original trilogy. And that just blew my mind. And then know was kind of like overjoyed throughout watching Toy Story without even really thinking about Toy Story.
05:26 --> 05:26 Yeah.
05:26 --> 05:39 And of course, Toy Story took off after all of that. But to me, walking out of the theater, I was going, did you see that trailer? Did you see that trailer? They're coming with special edition. Oh, my.
05:40 --> 06:01 Now I see you turned our Pixar conversation into a Star wars one. Because now, of course, I got to ask you a Star wars question. Is that kind of when? Because that's from before we knew each other. We go way back, but that's from before that time. Is that like when you started getting into Star wars, or were you into Star wars before that?
06:01 --> 07:51 I was already in over my head. Gotcha. But also, to me, it's funny to think about Pixar now that I know that history with George Lucas and how he basically had no idea what these guys were doing. Then they showed him what they had been working on, and he said, that's not what I told you to do. What are you doing? And he basically was Po'd that they were doing this and he didn't get it at all. So it's funny that something George Lucas didn't understand became so huge after he let know, whereas almost everything else he touched, he knew what he was doing. There are some exceptions, Howard the duck, but all of his big franchises, they're still around today. They're huge. Disney's doing all sorts of stuff with them. But that Pixar, I mean, he didn't understand. And look at it. I mean, it's its own thing in Disney, so it's fun for me to see that. And as far as movies go, for know, I love the incredibles. I think that was a really great way of Pixar showing that it wasn't just for kids. I mean, it had already proved the point, but a lot of know, early in those Pixar days were going toy Story and finding Nemo and this and that, and they just were thinking, oh, well, it's for the kids, whatever, but incredibles, really, if you watch it, it's an adult geared movie, but safe for kids. So I really love that one.
07:51 --> 08:04 No, the Incredibles. And I even thought the Incredibles two was a good sequel. I felt like they handled sequels well in that case, where both of those kind of were great together.
08:05 --> 08:05 And.
08:05 --> 08:17 No, that's true. When I'm thinking about the incredibles, you get a lot of James Bond from the Incredibles. You get a lot of superhero, but you get that other kind of action and spy thriller stuff going on in those movies.
08:18 --> 08:37 It really showcased mean people that watched the movies already knew, and that's Pixar movies aren't just for kids. No, but that was, to me, the one that really showed its guts for going after the adult audience.
08:38 --> 09:18 Yeah, no, I love it. Yeah. Like you said, there's so many good ones out there. And as you're talking about the incredibles, I was trying to go like, what is my favorite Pixar movie? And I was like, I'm popping through my head. I'm like, I do love the Incredibles. I love Wally. I love my daughter, Maddie. She was obsessed with Monsters, Inc. For a time when she was younger. So it's like, I've seen that one probably the most out of all of them, but all these ones popping up, and I'm like, there's always that element of something for the whole family, which I think is that Disney thing, too. Disney always kind of was striving for.
09:20 --> 09:21 That balance.
09:22 --> 09:49 And we could even say, like I said, I wasn't going to bring it up, but Star Wars. Star wars has got something for the whole family to bring it back to George Lucas's bread and butter. And that's kind of one of those things where, like Pixar and Star wars and Disney, they all have a similar dna that I think is one of those things that people can gravitate towards and can appreciate, which is really cool.
09:50 --> 09:50 Yeah.
09:53 --> 12:10 So we talked about Pixar being that thing that George Lucas didn't understand, and I'm glad you brought that up because I'm going to put a pin in that for now. And later, we're going to talk about whether or not George Lucas ever did understand the animated movie. We'll get into that later, but let's move into something that I know Parks fans, at least, are going to be really excited about. And that's, of course, the first ever George Lucas themed attraction. Well, kind of first ever. We'll get into that in a second. But the first one in a big way, which is Star tours. So I guess we do get to talk about Star wars here. So in Star tours, which in California, in Florida, both of them, imagineering, really wanted to make a big splash with its first of its kind flight simulator ride. They got this technology that could make flight simulators be controlled as a form of entertainment instead of just like, simulating flight for practice, for military and things like that. So they played around with using a lot of Sci-Fi movies like Disney's Black Hole, which I know we both have seen black hole. I think we watched it together, and it is not Star wars, I'll put it that way. I love it for what it is, but it's not Star wars. And so when they got into trying other Sci-Fi movies, Star wars was one, of course, that came up. But they would have to get George Lucas on board if they wanted to use Star wars. So they got George Lucas to come in. They got him to agree with it, of course, and he got ILM, industrial light and magic to come on board and help out to create the flight sequences for what we know now as Star tours and then what it's kind of evolved into. So as a Star wars fan and a Disney fan, I didn't mention that at the top of my friends, you might be among the disneyest of my close friends, so I do have to shout that out to you, too. But what's your experience with Star tours?
12:10 --> 13:17 So I have been on Star tours six or seven times. I always lose count. My first time was 2015. They'd already come out with episode seven. So, of course, that first time I went and it was all sequel trilogy planets. And I said, well, that makes sense. They're promoting the movie. It's just been out a couple of months now. Makes sense. Whatever. I've been on it six or seven times. I have not once gone to a planet that was not sequel trilogy. I have been on every planet in the sequel trilogy, and I have been to most of them several times. I cannot get one of the original or prequel trilogy ones. I can't. So if anybody that works for Disney ever listens to this, please boost the frequency on Darth Vader and all of the non sequel trilogy.
13:17 --> 13:23 The last time I went on it, we did get Darth Vader, like, in the Hangar.
13:24 --> 13:35 My wife and my older son went on it once without me, and they got Vader, and was. I was agitated.
13:35 --> 13:44 They see you in line and they say, no, andrew's here. We're going to only play only the new stuff. Only the new stuff.
13:44 --> 14:13 So that's my gripe about it. I love the ride. It's one of my favorite rides because it's Star wars and it's really well done. But, yeah, I know Disney's got their stuff to promote, so I'm sure that the percentage might be boosted a little on certain planets, right? I wish it was the other way, for sure.
14:13 --> 15:05 No, that's crazy, because I haven't ridden it that much personally. I know a lot of. Well, my son recently got into Star Wars. Ben recently got into Star wars. But Maddie and Carrie, I just use all their names. They've all been on the show now. At this point, they get motion sick really easily. So we tended to stay away from it until Ben really wanted to go on. Like, it had been years and years since I had. And then it's like, just this last one was, like, the first time in a long, long time. So that's where it was like, because I had someone who wanted to go on it. But no, we got Darth Vader, so, like, once in recent history have I written it, and we've gotten Darth Vader. So I don't know. It's you.
15:05 --> 15:06 Just my luck.
15:06 --> 15:42 Yeah, it's totally you. So I got to ask this question, too, about Star tours, because Star tours was the Star wars ride. But then, of course, galaxy's edge in both parks opened, and I wanted to say it opened just around the corner in Florida. It was around the corner in California, across the park. But did that change your feelings about Star tours, or did that give you a new appreciation or make you like it less, because we got millennium Falcon smugglers run and, of course, rise of the resistance.
15:42 --> 17:06 So I have mixed feelings on that because I love galaxy's edge. I think it's fantastic to have that. But at the same time, I hope they never get rid of Star tours because it's like having two versions of Star wars to visit at Disney. You get the one where you're trying to be a part of it, and then you also get the one where it feels like a ride. Because to me, it's just a slight variation to be whether it's star tours or rise of the resistance or smuggler's run, because those two in Batu, you get on it, in Batu, the story revolves around you getting back off on star tours, though, again with my sequels. It always lands me on Batu at the end, really. Instead of saying like, oh, you've landed on the rebel ship. You brought the spy home, or whatever, it always puts me on Batu. It always says, oh, and now we're crash landing on Batu. And then I'm like, but I'm not on Batu. I'm in Hollywood studios.
17:06 --> 17:08 I'm next door. No.
17:08 --> 17:18 So it's like that kind of gives me mixed feelings because I love Star wars, but at the same time, it keeps telling me, oh, you're on Batuu, and I walk out, I'm on tatooine traders.
17:19 --> 17:21 Yeah, right.
17:21 --> 17:22 This is not Batu.
17:24 --> 19:10 But, hey, all right, enough of that Star wars stuff. Let's talk about Michael Jackson. No, but at the same time, yes, let's talk about Michael Jackson, because we have to talk about what actually ended up being George Lucas's first Disney attraction, even though he started work on it after Star Tours. So I kind of toyed with where I would put these. But he was working at Disney on Star tours, and he was all with imagineering, trying to work this project out, bring an ILM in. And Michael Eisner started pursuing Michael Jackson about being in an attraction. See, like, Michael Eisner heard that Michael Jackson was, like, a Disney super fan and was like, I like celebrities, so let's bring Michael Jackson in. And so Michael Jackson was like, I want Spielberg to be involved with the film that I'm going to make. But Spielberg wasn't available. And they put together this team of, they're like, if he can't get the one he wanted, let's put together a team of Hollywood superstars. And they got George Lucas to write and help with a lot of the production and Francis Ford Coppola to direct and Angelica Houston, of course, to play opposite of Michael Jackson. Now, this one has a fond place in my heart where Star wars has that nostalgia for you. Like I said, I like Star wars, but I have been a big Michael Jackson fan throughout my life. So I got to ask you, before I rant about my history with Captain Eo, what your feelings about Captain Eo, or maybe how you've experienced.
19:14 --> 19:43 Mean, it's interesting to hear about. It's pretty cool that they were able to get together like a superstar team to work on, but it really feels like they just did a really expensive music video and then said, we're going to fill a theater with people to watch this music video. Oh, but we need to add 3d because otherwise they won't want to come.
19:44 --> 19:45 Right.
19:47 --> 20:01 Looking at it from the perspective now, it's fun to kind of watch and see that eighty s, ninety s, three D where it's covered for you.
20:01 --> 20:05 There are total moments of that, like 3d for 3d sake.
20:05 --> 20:12 Like that one character with the wings that just flies at the screen for no reason, like four different times or whatever.
20:12 --> 20:48 And the whole film starts with that rock, that asteroid just kind of spinning with the narrator so that you get the idea that that's floating above the people in front of you and all that. But no, it was in a 3d theater that existed before magic journeys was there. So then they were like, well, we can't do a non 3d film. It's got to be 3d or 4d in that sense with all the moving, the 3d beyond that. But had you ever gotten a chance to see Captain Eo before just watching the YouTube videos and stuff like that?
20:48 --> 20:53 No, I never did. So I can't say I had the full Captain Eo experience.
20:53 --> 22:00 You did not get the full cap. I remember watching it as the first young, first Disney memories, like back in 1990 watching Captain Eo. By the time we went back a few years later, it was gone. So then later in my life, when I said I have been a Michael Jackson fan, when I got into Michael Jackson's music, I was always kind of chasing Captain Eom. And I remember tracking it down then on a dvd years later, like when I was in middle school, high school, kind of around then, and being like, this is amazing. I got it. It's not in 3d, but that's okay because I can see it again because I remembered it from as a kid, because as a kid in 1990, this was amazing. Watching it on a little YouTube video is not the same exact thing. And also, being a grown up, watching it on a YouTube video does change the magic of it. But when you watched it on the YouTube video, was there anything that screamed George Lucas to you?
22:02 --> 22:32 How do I want to put it? The garbage like base was very George Lucas like, with the Death Star and all that. I get the feeling that some of his ideas that he used for Willow kind of had a connection to that supreme leader, which, might I add, this is not very related, but it's Angelica Houston.
22:33 --> 22:33 Yeah.
22:33 --> 22:42 Her performance as the supreme leader was straight, the same as her performance in the witches.
22:43 --> 22:44 I could buy that.
22:45 --> 22:50 She came on and I didn't know it was her.
22:50 --> 22:50 Right.
22:51 --> 22:58 And I heard the voice and I said, that's Angelica Houston. And, of course, then I didn't know all the stuff, and I said, yep, that's her.
22:58 --> 22:59 Yes, it is.
22:59 --> 23:11 The whole, like, with the fingers and everything, it was exactly the same. But going back to George Lucas, honestly, the rock spinning.
23:11 --> 23:12 Yeah.
23:13 --> 23:30 It reminded me of how he had the asteroid field in then, of course. And then, of course, the one alien hooter, he was Max Rebo from turn of the Jedi.
23:30 --> 23:31 Totally.
23:31 --> 23:34 Which I love Max Rebo. So thumbs up to that.
23:34 --> 23:39 Yeah. He even played a synthesizer thing, which is the same.
23:40 --> 23:47 Yeah, exactly. I feel bad for the guy. They give him a job where his job is to push a button that's too high up.
23:48 --> 23:51 He's the least qualified for that job.
23:51 --> 23:58 Who was the jerk that gave him, like, you see that button up? Oh, yeah. Hit that button. Okay.
23:58 --> 24:11 Michael Jackson was the jerk who gave him. Or Captain Eo, actually. But Michael Jackson. But, yes, he was the captain. Right. Maybe that's why they had so much trouble. He misassigned roles.
24:11 --> 24:19 Yeah. But then, too, in terms of George Lucas, the whole, like, Captain Eo just being able to change people into dancers.
24:20 --> 24:20 Yes.
24:20 --> 24:36 With no explanation. That, to me, was very. But I should say George Lucas before episode one, when he tried to explain the force, it was like, just don't explain it. Just have it happen.
24:37 --> 24:42 Michael Jackson used the force, didn't he? In some weird way.
24:42 --> 24:46 In a very weird chorus line, kind of, yeah.
24:46 --> 25:26 Yes. Well, and that's bringing up, like, the backup dancers and him bringing them in. I had heard that originally they pitched to Michael Jackson that he would be in the movie, would be that he would be in the magic kingdom at night and the animatronics from the pirates specifically. But some of the other animatronics would come alive and battle dance with him. And then he was like, isn't that just thriller, but with animatronics instead of zombies. We did that already, and then they were like, okay, fine, we got to come up with something new, and then got the crew in.
25:26 --> 25:51 I think they could have made the animatronic thing work. Looking at it from today's perspective, I think Disney would like that kind of video better because they could incorporate it more on special occasions with characters roaming through the park. Like you said, it's at night. So if they were open late someday.
25:51 --> 25:53 Like they do, like the after hours.
25:53 --> 26:12 Parties, if it was about the animatronics, and that was like, they totally would like that kind of thing now more probably than they did back then when it would have been harder to organize and everything. But Michael Jackson's not here.
26:13 --> 26:24 That's what we got. They did bring it back right after he passed away for a short while, Captain Neo. I don't know that they'll ever bring him back fully, probably never again. But you never know, right?
26:24 --> 26:25 Never know.
26:26 --> 27:39 So I want to stay in the nostalgia area because another nostalgic piece of 80s pop culture that, of course, is very George Lucas. And he was sticking around working with Disney for a while. He did the star tours. He did Captain Eo, and then, of course, Michael Eisner wouldn't let go of him and asked him to do some Indiana Jones for first the studios park, and then later, which we'll talk about in a little bit, some stuff at Disneyland. So when Raiders of the Lost Ark came out, Michael Eisner was part of Paramount in getting some of those connections made as an executive over there before moving over to Disney just a few years later. So he already had that kind of relationship with Indiana Jones. So he brings the Indiana Jones stunt spectacular to Hollywood studios. And this is when MGM Studios, because back in the late 80s, early 90s, when it opened, it was MGM, and I still call it that a lot. The stunt spectacular opened, and it was supposed to be showing what a working movie studio would have happening in it. So it was very, we're making a production that is a movie of.
27:42 --> 27:42 It'S.
27:42 --> 27:50 Framed like that, and it's still kind of like that today. Let's talk about this attraction. Indiana Jones stunt spectacular.
27:50 --> 28:34 I saw it the first time I went to Disney. It was extremely hot that day. And so getting to sit in the shade know, pretty smart move. Yeah, I liked the show. But I will say when you're in Florida and then giant gouts of flame come shooting out and you're already feeling like you're going to die from the heat, maybe not the best idea, but yeah, for me it works. I think it feels a little bit dated now because there's movie studios don't work like they did back during that time.
28:36 --> 28:44 Not at all. That's a good point that I didn't even think of. They're still hanging on to that and it's not really how they do it anymore.
28:44 --> 29:01 I think it needs an update. But if you're in, especially in the Florida heat and you need to sit down in the shade, I recommend it. Just sit well back from the stage or you blistered.
29:03 --> 29:51 So then I know too. So I haven't gone to Disneyland. You went to Disneyland. You got to ride what they built for because they just kept going with Indiana Jones. They built the temple of the forbidden Eye in Disneyland and in Tokyo Disney Sea. And that's the kind of dinosaur like, well, dinosaur came second, but that's the one I'm more familiar with. But the dinosaur like kind of rover ride through the temple of the forbidden eye in Disneyland. So I want to hear what you think about that. But then I also want to hear, what do you think? Does Indiana Jones serve better as a stunt show or a ride like the one at Disneyland?
29:51 --> 30:31 So if you are a fan of Indiana Jones and you want the experience, you would want to go with Disneyland ride. If you just kind of want to see something Indiana Jones, I'd say go just do the sunshine. But I will also say if you are going to the Disneyland ride, be careful. Take your pain medication ahead of time. Because like Eric was saying, it's dinosaur. Like the dinosaur ride in Indiana Jones, I find to be two of the most painful experiences one can have at a Disney park.
30:31 --> 30:33 It's the Jocelyn.
30:33 --> 31:01 Jocelyn around jostles you so much that your bones will ache. And I'm not exaggerating. My wife and I, we both went on it and we needed motrin right after. It was not something I would do again. It's a great painkiller, great design ride. They did a wonderful job on it. It's really cool looking in there.
31:01 --> 31:21 Is it a case of Indiana Jones stunt spectacular is know old man's game. Like you get to sit in a bench and watch a show and the Indiana Jones temple of the forbidden eye is a young man's game. But as we're getting older and feeling the pain. But then you said too, maybe it's just too jostly.
31:23 --> 31:30 If the track was just smooth, a smooth ride, which technically the track is smooth.
31:30 --> 31:36 Well, I'm going to get into the weird design everything. Yes.
31:36 --> 31:57 But if it didn't jostle you around, I would highly recommend it. I would warn, don't go when the ride time is high, because the line is it winds and winds and winds. I don't know how long we were in there, but it felt like two days trying to go through.
31:57 --> 32:29 Well, there's so many. From what I've seen, there's so many different. This is one, honestly, I'm looking forward to. And I'm not going to tell my family that it's going to jostle them too much because I don't want to scare them away from it. So I hope they don't listen to this. But this will be like, well, Andrew said. And we'll be like, no, we're going on it at least once. So the same thing with the Matterhorn. I want everyone to go on the matter. I'm like, we got to go on the Matterhorn. We're going to be in Disneyland for all of our first times. It's the Matterhorn. But I know that one also is a jostler.
32:29 --> 32:47 It is, because that was part of our stupidity, I guess, since we didn't know Indiana Jones was going to be that painful, we went on the Matterhorn right after not thinking it would be painful, and so we had compounded our interest on that pain.
32:49 --> 33:00 Those are two. I'm looking forward to that. Will, from what I hear from you, jostle me. But I'll always go into it knowing that and have the Tylenol, the motrin, whatever.
33:00 --> 33:12 Take your pain meds with you. Have them ready. Take pregame and take a motor afterward. Take a tylenol, split the difference.
33:13 --> 35:04 Yes, and maybe not both in a row or anything like that on the same day, or we'll spread them out a little bit. But, yeah, I do have to shout out two other Disney Indiana Jones attractions. There's another ride that was in Paris at the studios park. And then, of course, there was a little scene in the great movie ride, the Indiana Jones scene, snakes. There was the idol up on the kind of pyramid thing, and then that would be one of those interactive hosts of the ride would come out. So that was always a cool moment. And that was part of that deal with George Lucas that pretty much starts here in Disney. That deal of, we're going to work together. And it kind of even started to feel, in my opinion, like Disney, Star Wars, Lucas, Lucasfilm, Indiana Jones, all of it were kind of like one in the same and together and at least in cahoots with each other. And then this next thing that we're going to talk about even solidifies that more before Disney buys Star wars. And that's the Star wars weekends at the Hollywood studios, which were in 1997 and then ran in the early 2000s for a spell, all the way up into 2015. And it would go all weekend, like, from a Friday to a Sunday, and they were usually in May and June. And it seemed kind of like, I know Star wars celebration is kind of that big convention that happens now. And to me, someone who never got to go to either Star wars celebration or Star wars weekends, they kind of seem to have some similarities and whatnot. But you are someone who has been to both of those things.
35:04 --> 35:04 Yes.
35:04 --> 35:09 So I wanted to kind of hear about all of that from your perspective.
35:09 --> 37:15 Yes. So I got to go to the very last Star wars weekend, 2015 on that trip, and it was wonderful. I mean, to me, that solidified my acceptance of Disney buying. So if you go to. It's a. It's an experience. Star wars weekends was like the whole park was a party. A nice, you know, you think of when they do the Christmas stuff, or they do not so scary Halloween, and they do all these events. Star wars weekends was. That's what it was. It was. You're walking, and then suddenly stormtroopers are walking with you. Turn another corner, Darth Vader is coming at you. And you don't get that. With get, you get, you know, Mando, some of those characters show up. Rey, Chewbacca, Kylo Ren, but you didn't get them where they were just, like, acting like it was no big deal, because when they come out at Batu, it's like they're out. They're trying to perform for whoever gets to spot them, and then they leave, and people swarm. Yeah. And with Star wars weekends, it was more like, to be honest, more like celebration. Because celebration, it's all these people in costume, but they're just all around you, and it's just like you get to stand back and enjoy it, be a part of it, whereas it feels more distanced with the characters in Batu. But I have a special surprise for you and for your audience. I want a little something that I did during that final Star wars weekend. You had to have a special appointment for this, and it was very expensive, but I got to do the detect me. Oh, nice. There we go. Personalized figure.
37:16 --> 37:16 That's awesome.
37:16 --> 37:22 And I got to have myself made into an X wing pilot. Zoom in. Oh, that's.
37:22 --> 37:23 That is awesome.
37:24 --> 38:13 That's you, an X wing pilot. I look younger it was eight years ago. Give me a break. But that was just so much fun to get to do that. I mean, obviously I didn't get the figure for six to eight weeks after for sure. But again, that really felt like celebration because it was this long merch tent, basically, where you could buy Star wars weekend shirts and keychains and all that. But then they had a booth where if you had an appointment, you could go and get scanned for these figures. And so it was by where the stunt car ride or whatever that they.
38:13 --> 38:19 Used to, which now is in Galaxy's edge. The light motors action, it was called.
38:20 --> 38:21 Yeah, it was by there.
38:21 --> 38:22 No, that's so cool.
38:22 --> 38:41 So, I mean, it was a lot of fun because there was Star wars everywhere in the park. It felt like celebration, which I've been to three. I went in 2002, 2005, and then 2019, Indianapolis. Indianapolis and Chicago.
38:42 --> 38:43 Keeping it midwest.
38:43 --> 38:46 Midwest. I would go every time if I could.
38:47 --> 38:51 Right. It's expensive for sure.
38:51 --> 39:22 But, yeah, it was that kind of experience, like celebration where you didn't feel like you were just a tourist, which is kind of how Batu is. You feel like you're a tourist walking through one of the parks. It was more like you were part of the party. So I wish it would come back. But with Batu, I highly doubt they'll do that. Maybe as some special, maybe for like the 50th anniversary of a new Hope or something.
39:22 --> 40:05 That would be cool. I find it interesting because this is one of those kind of old Disney fans online. It's like a common narrative that Disney fans are always kind of talking about the good old days. Remember back in the good old days when this happened or that happened or whatever, but it sounds like you're describing it. Kind of like those after hours ticketed events, like those not so scary the Merry Christmas party, like all those Disneyland after dark kind of things. And it wasn't one of those. It wasn't like an extra ticket or it was just like if you were in the park that day, you could be part of this.
40:05 --> 41:22 Yeah, they had so much stuff that you could just be walking and not even know, like a rope drop. They had like a cherry picker kind of thing. But Star wars looking with stormtroopers standing up in it, telling jokes to the crowd over the speakers while we're all waiting for the rope to drop and open up. The rest of the mean, you still get the stormtroopers walking through Batu and kind of joking with people, but you don't get it where it's like a show and then you got past that and you went in front of the what's now runaway railway. Can't talk. You went to there and they had a giant stage with things that just happened throughout the day. Random characters would show up and get on the stage. They'd do trivia questions. It was just all day long there and it was for everybody. You didn't have to wait in a line for it. You could just be walking by on your way to some other ride and just get Star wars, which again, is like celebration. Like, you just could walk through there. You don't have to do anything. You could just walk through there and have a great time.
41:22 --> 42:05 Yeah. And that's like having not gone to celebration. I've been to Comic con type like c two, e two in Chicago. And it's like I could kind of get the sense of what that is. But when you're at just like a general comic con, there's so many fandoms there. But like a celebration is just that one fandom. You just got the Star wars fandom. And sure, there's facets within there. Or like, if you go to D 23, which I hope to one day go to, it's that Disney fandom. And they're sure there's different facets in there, but it's still a more specialized one. And, yeah, it's kind of too bad that we can't have those special weekends, those special days like they used to.
42:06 --> 42:18 I do want to say, when Disney took over Star Wars, I was afraid celebration was going to go the way of the dinosaur, not the ride.
42:20 --> 42:21 Indiana Jones did that.
42:21 --> 42:24 No, it was going to go the way of Captain Eo.
42:25 --> 42:26 There you go.
42:26 --> 43:29 Yeah, I was afraid that they were going to knock it out. They were going to say, no, come to Disney World. So I'm very happy that they did not do that. And they kept it going. They made it even more frequent than it had been because it had been that it was just, well, promoting episode one, promoting episode two, promoting episode three, and then it stayed. But I do wish that they would make sure not to just bring it nearer Disneyland and Disney world. They've gone other places, but there's always that fear that one day they're just going to say, why are we doing this? Let's just always have it by Disneyland, Disney World. And so a lot of us Star wars fans are worried that Disney will do that someday because that's not really fair to everybody. But so far, they're being good. They're traveling around, they're going to other countries.
43:29 --> 43:31 Yeah, that's right.
43:31 --> 43:37 Japan in 2025. So I won't be there, but I know people will.
43:37 --> 43:41 Got you. Yeah, some people will travel.
43:41 --> 43:50 Hopefully they keep it up the way that they do. I mean, doesn't have to be every year, but it's nice that it's still living.
43:51 --> 44:33 Yeah. So in 2012, that's when Disney bought Star wars and Lucasfilm. And like you did point out, they continued to do things like Star Wars Weekend and Star wars celebration after that Star wars weekend for a while. But at this point, George Lucas becomes less of connected to Disney and is more part of Disney. So we don't have too much more to talk about. We got a few more things. But I do want to ask you a controversial Star wars fan question. Is it a good thing or a bad thing for the Skywalker saga that Disney bought Star wars and Lucasfilm?
44:33 --> 46:58 Well, for know, like you said, it's controversial in my personal opinion. I think in the short term it was bad. I wish that George Lucas had done something different. And I'll explain in a minute. In the long run, it's very good because who else could keep it going? Like, once George Lucas is gone, which will come at someday, and I'll be very, you know, if it wasn't Disney, I think it would flounder and fall apart. But going back to the short term, the short term, what would have been in a perfect world is that critics had been more understanding about the prequel trilogy. George Lucas wouldn't have gotten ticked off, and he would have continued and finished out seven, eight, nine his way and then sold. So in that sense, the short run, it sucked. But at the same mean with how things went, could you blame George Lucas? I mean, critics just at that time hated the prequel trilogy. Now it's so much love and bring back Hayden Christensen, and there's, it's complete turnaround. And it's not fair, because if you actually enjoyed Star wars, you would look at it and say, wow, look at all the things he's done, not just for Star wars, but for anybody using cg for a movie. Oh, yeah, he did so many things while he was working on those prequels. He created so many things that hadn't ever been done and are constantly used today and being improved on. They're all owed to George Lucas. And did the critics admit that? No, they still don't admit that today. They still look back and say, well, yeah, but Jar Jar Banks, I mean, come now. But then, now we're looking at some of the things in the sequels and going, well, Disney. Come on. So you know that in ten years they'll say, well, back when we had the sequels.
46:58 --> 47:38 That's true. Yeah. It didn't happen the perfect way that it could have happened, for sure. When you brought that up, all the stuff they did for, like, cg and mean. Recently, pretty recently, I watched that ILM documentary on Disney. Plus that kind of few parts in, it's like I didn't even know how much they had to do with. Not just like you think of Lucas Star Wars, ILM. And then it's like, no, there was so many other movies that they touched over the past at this point, 40 years that it's amazing.
47:38 --> 48:06 Yeah. And I mean, all of the. You touched on ILM, the advances, too, with Skywalker sound. You look at any major box office movie now, eight out of ten, Skywalker or sound did the sound for or ILM worked on it in some way, look up their credits. I mean, it's.
48:08 --> 48:08 Yeah.
48:08 --> 48:17 So George Lucas, if you're out there listening to this ever, I salute you. I'm sorry that the critics were terrible and.
48:20 --> 48:26 George Lucas. Yes. If you are listening, please contact us.
48:26 --> 48:32 Yes. Please be happy to discuss anything you want.
48:32 --> 50:33 Right. Yes. And come on this show. All right, so maybe he will, maybe he won't after we talk about this next one, because there's still some more Disney and George Lucas left, even though at this point, in kind of our somewhat chronology, we've kind of been going in chronological order. George Lucas sells Lucas film, the Star wars properties, all that stuff that comes along with it to Disney in 2012. And right around that same time, he starts work on an animated film of his own. It doesn't come out until 2015, but the movie he starts making and makes over that time is called strange magic. And it's his last writing credit that I could see in IMDb, I believe, because he provided the story for strange magic. You could watch it. It's on Disney plus, and it's computer animated by Lucasfilm and ILM. So those guys we were just praising about their technology, it's produced by Touchstone and distributed by Disney through Buena Vista. And so it's this story about goblins whose leader hates love and fairies who make a love potion, and they essentially go to war over love. And it's like this jukebox movie that has, it's like a musical, but the songs are like songs from the radio, the jukebox movie idea. And they range from the. Here's a few ways I pulled out here that it's been described. Lucas, George Lucas himself said he wanted to make Star wars for a young female audience. It is inspired by Midsummer Night's dream, and it's also been called a beauty and the Beast story, where the beast stays that way. So what is your familiarity with strange magic?
50:33 --> 51:42 When you sent me the notes for this podcast and the things to look at, I saw the name strange magic and I didn't place it. And then I started watching it and I said, you know, this does seem familiar. Like, I'd seen trailers back when it was coming out. I hadn't watched it, I know that much. But at the same time, I got to say, and sorry, george Lucas, for saying this, I also, you know, it could have just been a trailer for one of those straight to dvd fairy things that they put out for young. Just, it didn't strike me as sticking out. I kind of said, well, I'm sure that I saw a trailer for it at some point, but I probably thought it was straight to dvd. Having watched it, I will say that a year later, in 2016, Trolls came out.
51:42 --> 51:43 Yeah.
51:43 --> 52:07 And so if any of you are parents out there with a young kid that's obsessed with trolls and you're tired of watching trolls on loop, put strange magic on for a break, if they stick with it, they'll end up really liking it because it basically is trolls without the super fun aesthetics of trolls.
52:08 --> 52:14 You got to laugh at that because you just said it was like trolls without the super fun. And then I thought you were going to stop.
52:17 --> 53:36 Mean Trolls has its own style. Definitely it does. It nailed down the style that it wanted. Lisa Frank meets David the gnome. Or know, if you see something trolls, you go, oh, it's trolls. Whereas strange magic didn't have anything that set it apart visually. I mean, it has amazing cg. Oh, for sure. It's not knockoff like straight to dvd quality, but at the same time, you look at it and you go, well, it doesn't look like its own thing. Even some of the characters look like they're being pulled from different styles. She looks like she's done differently through cg than he is. And then the gnomes look different and the goblins look different, so it's like they don't even cohere to each other. And so if you don't have that cohesion like trolls has, then what are you really going to get away from it? When you watch know, you kind of just think, oh, generic. Somebody put together a movie, right?
53:36 --> 55:22 And that's one of those trolls. I'm glad you brought up trolls because even though it's not Disney. We'll talk a couple of Disney movies in a second. But trolls is a definite, like, yes, this. And trolls, they're basically like the same movie. I think when we were talking before, I said, who wore it best, trolls or strange magic? And, like, trolls, I'm not even going to let you answer that, because trolls does the movie better. Now, like you said, the technicality of the animation and the animation itself is amazing. In strange magic. It looks really great. It looks good. But then you hit the nail on the head, and I didn't think about this till you said it. The art styles do clash sometimes, and they're all over the place where when you get something like a Pixar movie, because came from the same thing that was George Lucas saying, I don't understand what you're doing with this animation stuff. And these guys are making know, turning it into Pixar films. They would always pick aesthetic and storyboard that out and make sure that the visual style was consistent. Pixar always does that. And you've got movies like Brave, which look very different than movies like Toy Story or movies like the good Dinosaur or soul. Like, the curvature, the sharp edges. How human do these characters look? How non human do they look? They always pick a style and stick with it. Where strange magic was just like. I feel like they were going for that technology first. Like, look at how well we could render this animation. And then the story was.
55:25 --> 55:28 Again, my name's Miranda.
55:30 --> 55:31 Marianne.
55:31 --> 55:32 Marianne. Marianne.
55:32 --> 55:33 Marianne.
55:34 --> 56:17 Having her look different than the bog king, that makes sense. You don't want them to look similar. They're supposed to be complete opposites. But to then have it where the gnomes look so different than the fairies, you want a little bit of that difference. But they looked like a completely different style. And then the goblins don't look anything like the Bog king. And then they're constantly trotting out these different bugs that don't look anything alike to try and have him marry these different bugs. And even those seemed like they were like they had 15 different people that they told, okay, well, you make a bug. You make a bug, you make a bug. And then they all just got thrown in the movie.
56:17 --> 56:20 And you're like, you can't look at each other's bugs.
56:21 --> 56:36 Yeah, don't look over his shoulder. It's like, it needs to have a little bit of that. Like trolls had. The trolls looked so super cute and colorful as opposed to the.
56:38 --> 56:39 Bergens.
56:39 --> 56:52 Bergens. Thank you. You want that kind of clash. But then you don't want every single troll or every single Bergen to look like a completely different art style.
56:53 --> 57:04 Right. And I felt like the Bergens and the trolls are complementary in their styles, too. They're not that far. It's believable that they're in the same world.
57:05 --> 57:27 Yeah. But then when you go to the bog king and he looks like something completely different than his mom or anybody else in there. That's when you're losing people. And it just makes it like, okay, you didn't really think that through.
57:28 --> 58:28 Now, another thing that I'm going to go with. I'm going to use your. You really didn't think that through. When I first watched this, I didn't realize that it was the jukebox musical style thing. And when they started singing. I think one of the first songs is crazy in love by Beyonce. If I would have had liquid in my mouth, it would have been a spit take, but it was a double take. Like, I was like, wait, I know that song. What is happening? I feel like, let's go back to trolls. I feel like trolls. The music, they use it to pull into. Like, the trolls are singing songs because they love to sing. And in strange magic, they were like, we're making the plot based off the cool songs we can find. And the songs are going to try to move the story. And it felt kind of forced to me. I don't know if you got that, but that was the first moment that I was taken out of it was when I heard the first song.
58:28 --> 59:23 To me, it wasn't the first song, but maybe. Well, I guess it was early, but it was the fact that they kept using fool's rush in. They used it, I don't know, four times throughout the movie. And they just keep going back to the same song like that for different characters. If it was, like, just the two of them and there was some reason he overheard her singing it or something, it would make sense. But to just have it bounce around like this. I'm kind of like, well, where did they all learn this song from? The bog king even sings it and he didn't hear it from her. I'm like, no, they just know it even likes love songs. So why would he have all the words in his head?
59:25 --> 59:27 They're just born with Elvis Presley in their hearts.
59:30 --> 59:44 Plot wise, it just doesn't fit to do that. Whereas with trolls, they're naturally magical and they love songs. Accepted, okay, they're going to sing.
59:45 --> 01:00:45 And I think that's the difference. Because in strange magic, the characters are singing. But it's like that musical thing where we know they're singing because we're watching this musical, but in the world of their world, not necessarily singing, it's just a way to illustrate the action of the scene. Musicals have that at times where it's like in frozen, when they sing love is an open door, in real life, people don't just sing love is an open door, but in a musical, you understand that's to move the action ahead. But in trolls, when they sing a song, the characters are singing a song. So I don't care what the song is. If it's a happy song and it's a happy song, you're singing a song, it's fine. But then in this one, I don't know. That's my gripe. It didn't move the story along the way. It should have, but it clashed in ways.
01:00:46 --> 01:01:23 Yeah. To be blunt about it, having songs in this movie was completely unnecessary. I get that. He wanted it to be geared toward female audiences, young girls, so you say, okay, well, they like singing. They like songs and dances and movies. But if you're looking to make Star wars for girls, which to me is redundant because so many girls love Star Wars. Star wars is for everybody.
01:01:24 --> 01:01:24 Exactly.
01:01:24 --> 01:01:34 But if you were looking to make some kind of epic saga for. Geared toward a female audience, assuming that they need to have songs every five minutes.
01:01:35 --> 01:01:35 Yeah.
01:01:35 --> 01:01:59 Is that sexist? It's not really the smartest move because. No, it's one thing. If you wanted to make that straight to dvd for five year old girls movie, put a bunch of songs in it. If you're looking to make an epic saga, doesn't need to have songs, which.
01:01:59 --> 01:03:12 When you say those directv movies, it reminds me of the Tinkerbell direct to dvd movies that my daughter would watch. And those ones are fairy. It's the same thing. It's fairies. There's actually one where there's, like, a land where there's, like, the snow land and there's the regular spring land and they don't cross. It's the same kind of plot with this not crossing into the other side kind of thing. And then there's this whole secret of the wings. And that's the name of that. One of the secret of the wings. But no, I was like, this feels like one of those. But with these pop songs, it looks like a really good video game, I think is what I would say. Graphics. It's better than a video game. Some of the characters remind me of, like, if they would be a video game, but it just seemed like it was misguided. And it's kind of sad that at this, like, right at the time where George Lucas is working with Lucasfilms bought by Disney and they were going to distribute this project for him, it's like, I wish he would have just been like, hey, Pixar. Hey, Disney, could you help me with this? Could we make it a collaboration together and not just have it distributed and produced by.
01:03:13 --> 01:04:21 Yeah, yeah. It's one of those things. I think if Pixar had done this movie would have been huge. Not a huge necessarily, like their biggest hit or something, but it would have been a big deal. Disney would have been all over it, promoting it like crazy. And instead they took more of the approach they did with going back to Star wars, of course, like solo. Solo. They didn't promote. They just kind of said, we had some trouble with it, so we're going to let it go, brush it under the rug, we're going to let it do whatever it does and say, forget it. Which is not fair. It wasn't fair to strange magic either. But at the same time, they didn't let Pixar work on it. They didn't try to try to take any of those ideas. And of course, you probably couldn't have told George Lucas, like, here, hey, do this if he didn't want it. He probably was just going to do this and that was it.
01:04:22 --> 01:04:23 His thing.
01:04:24 --> 01:04:28 Yeah. I mean, I don't think even Disney wanted to fight with him. Like.
01:04:31 --> 01:04:40 I wouldn't. I don't blame know. It's his thing. He does his thing and he's done it. His track record, he did it well many, many times.
01:04:40 --> 01:04:41 Yes.
01:04:42 --> 01:05:12 So I have one more question about strange magic. We'll keep it on strange magic. What we just did with strange magic is not dissimilar to what we usually do on the other podcast that I introduced you as being from and that I'm also a panelist on rare cuts media society and so on. Rare cuts media society. We kind of do this. We take a movie that's maybe underappreciated and kind of run it through the wringer. Do you think strange magic is a good candidate for the rare Cuts media society?
01:05:12 --> 01:05:12 And maybe.
01:05:12 --> 01:05:14 Why would you say yes or no?
01:05:14 --> 01:05:53 I would say yes because, like I said, it was one that didn't get promoted like the big movie. I mean, it had famous people in it. So it wasn't one of these movies where you go, oh, nobody's in it, who cares? So it's rare in that I don't think there's the big audience for it. I'd say. Yeah, because we couldn't do trolls. No, not a rare cut at all. So we could definitely do it on rare cuts and say, well, this is the trolls you didn't see.
01:05:53 --> 01:06:15 Yes, that's actually a good angle for an episode. I wrote it on my list. I have my notes over here and I'm like, I'm going to write it on my rare cuts list as strange magic to keep it in the back burner. And then one day maybe strange magic will appear as one of my picks because I think it could be worth a look.
01:06:15 --> 01:06:28 And as everyone that watches this podcast knows, Eric is all about the Disney. While on rear cuts, he always tries to make a Disney reference. So it would be easy pickings on that one.
01:06:29 --> 01:06:40 And the funny thing is, if I don't make a Disney reference on rear cuts, you guys usually do it for me or point out the fact that I didn't, thereby giving me the chance to make one.
01:06:40 --> 01:06:44 That's right. We try to keep things nice and fair.
01:06:44 --> 01:07:19 It's like one of the Easter eggs of that show. Like you'll always hear me say something about Disney on every episode, which I even did in a big way on our last episode with rear exports, which was a Christmas movie. Yeah. So definitely check out rear cuts if you like. Kind of our strange magic conversation or you wanted to get into those kind of weird things. There are some Disney episodes because like I said, I've tried to pick some Disney things in the past, and I've tried to mention Disney in every episode.
01:07:19 --> 01:07:24 As you pointed out, go listen to the living desert.
01:07:24 --> 01:07:41 The living desert in the past summer. I was thinking of the North Avenue regulars. I had to get to it. We did that one away back, which that's not on Disney. Plus we had to find that one at the library and all over the very rare.
01:07:41 --> 01:07:45 Yeah, so check that one out. Give us a listen sometime.
01:07:46 --> 01:08:11 Yeah. Well, thank you, Andrew, for talking about George Lucas and Disney. I was glad we got to see that action figure of you. So if you're listening to this in the audio version, go check out the YouTube channel. There will be the little video clips that I do, but maybe I'll also have to grab a screenshot of you and your action figure and popped it on Instagram or something too, if you're cool with that.
01:08:11 --> 01:08:13 Won't shake it. Then I'll just.
01:08:13 --> 01:08:22 There you go. Screen grab. We'll get that and pop that on Instagram so people could see your awesome, one of a kind souvenir.
01:08:23 --> 01:08:23 Yeah.
01:08:24 --> 01:08:28 So thanks so much for coming on to talk about that.
01:08:28 --> 01:08:30 Thanks for having me. It's always a blast.
01:08:30 --> 01:08:34 Yes. We'll have to keep it going on and have you on regularly, of course.
01:08:34 --> 01:08:36 Yeah. We got to do the three peat now, right?
01:08:37 --> 01:10:25 We got to make it a trilogy like George Lucas. So once again, I want to thank Andrew for coming on to Synergy loves company. I truly appreciate you listening and taking some time to listen to us talk about Disney and George Lucas in this episode. I would love to hear back about what you think about George Lucas, about maybe that controversial question about did Disney buying Star wars create something worse or better for lucasfilm in Star wars? And let us know on social media. You can find me on Twitter and blue sky at Eric H. Synergy and you can find me on Instagram and threads at synergylovescompany. So go ahead over there, check out. You'll see that picture of Andrew and his action figure. And you could let me know what you think about this here episode there. And if you feel like you get value from Synergy Loves company and you want to give some back, you can do that on ko fi. If you look in the show description or you go to synergylovescompany.com, you'll find a link to my ko fi page where you can donate, give back and help the show keep going because every little bit helps. And another way that you could support the number one way that you could support the show is to share Synergy Loves company with a friend. I got to share this conversation today with a good friend of mine. Why don't you share our conversation with one of your friends and let them know all about Synergy Loves company? Just send them to synergylovescompany.com. Because sharing the show is the number one way that you can support the show, and your support means the world to me. Thanks for exploring Disney's connections with me. And until next time, keep discovering the magic in everything and may the force be with you and.