Star Wars: Revenge of the Nerds.

 It's Friday, September 11th, and as such it's a good time to reflect on the worst atrocity in living memory.

 That's right - it's been exactly one week since some nerds couldn't get the toys they wanted.

 Like most people who aren't lugging their virginity around like an over-filled steamer trunk, I was unaware of "Force Friday" - the day that the toys for the new Star Wars movies were released. All that changed when some stunningly petulant material started showing up online, written by grown men who had waited up until midnight only to find that their local Toys R Us had run out of action figures.

 It was an awkward mix of embarrassing and hilarious, and an example can be found here if you want to subject yourself to it. As the Islamic State bulldozes real-life sacred temples, and the people fleeing that destruction are so desperate that they drown in their hundreds, people were throwing their toys out of the pram about Lego. Or would have been, if they'd got there early enough to buy any toys in the first place.*

 Whilst it should be pretty clear that I don't care about Star Wars toys, I was nonetheless struck by the language people were using. Or, more accurately, the names. From the butthurt author's admission that he got a "cool Kylo Ren poster" to the wailing lament that the Funko Pops had been "decimated", I dont have the first idea what this person is talking about.

 On the one hand, sure, I'm getting older and as such can't be expected to know everything about pop culture aimed at children.* On the other hand, I try not to become completely ignorant of my surroundings. Why don't I know what a Funko Pop is?!

 The answer is that it's ridiculous to expect me to know the names of characters in a film that hasn't been released yet. Somehow, however, movie marketing juggernauts have managed to create a status quo in which I feel slightly left behind for not knowing what's going on in a film that doesn't exist yet. Effectively, I feel dumb for not being a time traveller.

 Aside from this being a depressing comment on consumerism and the movie industry, it also leaves the door wide open for shoddy writing. Think about "Raiders of the Lost Ark." The sequels all had titles involving "Indiana Jones and the...", but the first film in that series didn't because nobody knew what an Indiana Jones was. That movie had to create Indy from the ground up.

 Now, through the internet, tie-in comics and early toy releases, a lot of people apparently already know what I've had to infer from context - that the guy in the trailer with the cross-shaped lightsabre is called Kylo Ren and, judging by the poster given to nerds, he's a bad guy.

 This is a real time saver for script writers - instead of establishing a character as being the bad guy through words or actions, just release a small plastic facsimilie of him three months in advance with a little tag attached saying "antagonist."

 The same could be done with the heroes, except it already has. By bringing back the characters from the original trilogy, we don't need to worry about backstory or motivation on their side of the fence, either.

 Go far enough down this road, and we won't even need the film - just an extended toy commercial to set things up and then a general release of Lego sets so people can make up a plot themselves based on the information they've already been spoon-fed. At which point films shouldn't be released in cinemas or even Toys R Us. They'll just be flat packed in IKEA.

 I hope I'm wrong about this, and that the new Star Wars films are creatively interesting as well as financially successful, but those of us who are long in the tooth and memory can recall how promising "Episode I: The Phantom Menace" looked.

 The new films are bringing in fresh creative talent and new characters, and this is encouraging. But let's hope that the story of these new characters isn't being told on the back of figurine packaging, instead of on screen where it belongs. After all, a complete mythology can be created in the space of one movie.

 It happened a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away...






*Yeah. I went there. Come at me, Star Wars geeks.