Happy New Year, my friends!

I’m continuing my reread of The Rising Storm, by Cavan Scott, and I find I’m enjoying it much more this second time around. I’m not sure why, but it happens to me a lot–I’ll reread something, or rewatch a film, and like it a lot more than the first time. I guess I just need time to absorb and think about the story and see it from a new perspective. Or maybe the timing just needs to be right. I’m so ready to continue the story of The High Republic, and can’t wait for The Fallen Star next week!

So of course the first episode of The Book of Boba Fett premiered this past week, and like many others, I’m cautiously optimistic about the series. As I’ve mentioned before, I was never a huge fan of the guy, but his appearance in The Mandalorian piqued my interest. The first show answered some of our questions, like how he got out of the Sarlaac, and what happened just after. I thought it a clever device to show the flashbacks while he was in the bacta tank. As for ruling in Jabba’s (and Bib Fortuna’s) wake, I don’t think he entirely knows what he’s doing, lol, but he’s figuring it out as he goes along, with Fennec’s help. We have to shift our view of him from being a villain to being the protagonist of his own show, which means he can’t be a villain, not entirely. As the main character, we need to root for him, so he needs some redeeming qualities. I think his experiences with his near-death in the Sarlaac and the trials with the Tuskens changed him, at least a little. And I’m okay with that; it makes him more interesting, at least to me. I’m looking forward to the upcoming episodes and to see where this leads.

After my rewatch of The Clone Wars, I wasn’t intending on continuing with the animated series, but it just naturally segued into The Bad Batch, transitioning from the Republic to the Empire after Order 66. The first episode, Aftermath, is fantastic, but I found, again, that I enjoyed watching the series more this second time around than the first. Maybe it’s because I can binge-watch it rather than wait a week between episodes. I don’t know, but I just love it. I didn’t love Clone Force 99 right off the bat when they first showed up in The Clone Wars, but I love them now, every single one. Even Crosshair, that bastard, lol. There are a lot of things I’d love to see in Season 2, and I’ll probably do a little post about it as its premier gets closer (I don’t think we have a specific date yet).

Seems I’m doing a lot of rewatching/rereading of familiar territory, as I rewatched The Force Awakens on New Year’s Eve. I don’t care what anyone says, it’s such a great movie. I’ll never forget how I felt when I watched it for the first time in the theater in 2016: I was so incredibly excited to be watching a new Star Wars movie. To see Han, Chewie, Leia, Threepio and Artoo, as well as a batch of interesting new characters, was amazing, and it reignited my love for the franchise. I never thought I’d see these characters on film again, and here they were, so many years later, dealing with new bad guys, and incredibly painful personal stuff. No Star Wars movie is perfect (except perhaps Empire), but they’re all enjoyable, this one included. I’ll probably watch the rest of the sequel trilogy this weekend.

So with the new year comes new goals and resolutions, and one of mine (besides cutting down on the dark chocolate consumption, lol) is getting back to writing, specifically the Star Wars fan fiction I began a couple of months ago, and predictably, set aside. I really like the story idea and the characters I’ve created, so I’m not sure why I put it down (I suspect it’s simply laziness, lol), but I intend to get back to it and stay in it. If I accomplish one thing in the coming year, I’d like it to be a finished story that I can be proud of and that I enjoyed writing.

So that’s it for this week (and this year!) What’s been entertaining you lately? Any New Year’s resolutions? Let me know in the comments and we’ll talk about it!