August 10th was my 31st birthday. As usual I bought myself a little gift. I got the 2-disc THX 1138 DVD and the "Drive-In Double Feature" DVD of American Graffiti and More American Graffiti. I wasn't planning to. In fact, it's not even on my wish list. Even though I'm a huge fan of Star Wars, I never necessarily liked other works by Star Wars actors or directors. I kind of liked THX when I saw it years ago, and I thought Graffiti was cool but they are both far from the type of movies that I like which is horror. SO what made me change my mind?

Well, two things. Last Sunday August 7th, I watched the AFI Lifetime Achievement Award: George Lucas show. It just reminded me of how much of a visionary Lucas really is. Also, still trying to catch up on my reading I read an article by my friend and fellow SWFA member Abel Pena in Star Wars Insider #78 promoting the THX DVD. So I just thought, why the hell not?

I did buy the DVDs, but as far as watching them that's a different story...

Also this week I received the Masterpiece Edition books Anakin Skywalker: The Story of Darth Vader and C-3PO: Tales of the Golden Droid, both co-written by another fellow SWFA member Dan Wallace. I won them on eBay for $20 and that completes the series for me since I already had Aurra Sing: Dawn of the Bounty Hunters (which I found for $15 in a toy store last year.) I have been waiting a long time to find a good deal on these books since they were originally over $100 each. Next up, the Star Wars Chronicles.

I also received Vader: The Ultimate Guide. Although it doesn't look like it deserves the title "ultimate" as in the definitive guide to all things Vader, it does have a lot of cool articles by the aforementioned SWFA members. In fact, I fully intend to read the Masterpiece Anakin book before I read Dan's new history of Vader. The mag also inlcudes a post-Revenge of the Sith Vader short story by Karen Traviss, which I will read right after I read "MedStar: Intermezzo" in Star Wars Insider #83.

As usual, lots of reading to do.

Updated Aug.30, 2005: I did end up watching the movies. I thought THX was still boring, even with the new scenes. But the documentary about Amerian Zoetrope was very informative and fun. I did enjoy Graffiti, and I even enjoyed the sequel More American Graffiti which I watched for the first time. This movie was ahead of its time in terms of sequence and editing, and I can see what it failed when it was released. But today it plays just fine.