On Saturday, June 21st, Ed was kind enough to treat Nick, Carin, and me to comps at the Star Wars exhibit at the Science Museum. Thanks, Ed!

The exhibit’s premise is shaky, I’ve gotta say, in that Star Wars has no scientific basis, nor does it ever attempt to adhere to scientific principles, strictly speaking. It’s fantasy. Consequently, the exhibit just shows us some droids and then shows us some real-life robotics, comparing the two. Same thing goes for transportation technology (look at the landspeeder!; we have maglev trains!) and medical prosthetics. I’m not knocking that, but there’s not much material on which to hang a whole exhibit. Star Trek would be a more appropriate franchise to mine for scientific discussion, but there’d be way fewer visitors. The real value of Star Wars: Where Science Meets Imagination is to gawk at props, models, and costumes. Which, of course, was awesome.

I was giddy. Looking at this stuff in person made me nine years old again. I’ve grown up with these characters and items, and to see them up close was pure joy. But, because it’s Star Wars, the exhibit included some disappointment as well.

I recommend avoiding the cheesy and boring robot show, wherein a scientist who is terribly uncomfortable on-camera educates C-3PO about real-world robots, and chides him for not appreciating R2-D2 and his highly advanced robotic splendor. I’m all for authenticity, but man, they should’ve hired an actor to play that woman in the video.

We waited in line for an hour in order to “jump to lightspeed” on a mock-up Millennium Falcon, which sits in the Science Live Theater where we performed The Value of Life. I thought it would be a simulator ride, and I was not alone in this misconception. Sadly, it was just a theatre for four, where you sit in the Falcon’s cockpit and watch a boring video about the vastness of space on a simulated starfield which wraps around the cockpit. The feeling of being on the Falcon was pretty exciting, though. I mean, look at it! I’m on the Falcon! Ed and I spent most of the video playing with the cockpit instruments, pretending to be Han and Chewie.

Ed also got us tickets to the IMAX film Special Effects, which I suspected was the same IMAX Special Effects that I had seen with my parents at the Aquarium of the Americas in 1996. Ed said, “No, I think it’s new!” As it began, and I heard John Lithgow’s narration, I immediately knew it was the same movie after all.

We learned about the upcoming Special Edition of Star Wars, learned about motion control, miniatures, and found out that movies were beginning to turn more and more to digital effects. We saw behind the scenes of Independence Day, Jumanji, and Kazaam! I’m really excited for the future of effects technology, and how it may be used to ruin future episodes of Star Wars.