A Twin Cities Geek Goes to Star Wars Celebration 2019
Star Wars Celebration Episode IX Panel.
It’s April 10, 2019, and I’m cursing the Minnesota winter. As the Cities get around eight inches of snow, I know that my odds of making it to Chicago have gotten worse for an event I’ve been looking forward to for a year: Star Wars Celebration. The convention, dedicated to Star Wars fans, ran from April 11 through April 15 this year. It might be a little unknown to some, but for die hard Star Wars fans it’s mecca, and a time to celebrate everything we love about the Star Wars franchise. Luckily for this nerd, we were able to brave the snow, freezing rain, and thunderstorms and make it to Chicago in time to celebrate our passion for Star Wars!
I had been planning for weeks leading up to the event, buying autograph sessions and planning the weekend out—especially with the help of this wonderful Star Wars Celebration Fan Group that was jam-packed with helpful tips to prepare for the show. A portion of the event that was polarizing for fans was a lottery system that ReedPOP, the events company who put the con together, decided to install for most of the show’s exclusive panels and merchandise. I was lucky enough to win three of the five that I entered—winning tickets to the Episode IX panel, the Hasbro Action figure exclusive, and tickets to The Mandalorian panel on Sunday. This event would be my second Star Wars Celebration and my second major convention. Last time I went completely unprepared in Orlando, and to my chagrin, ended up spending the entire convention waiting for autographs from Hayden Christensen, Ian McDiarmid, and Jeremy Bulloch. This year I prepurchased all my autograph tickets and spent a couple days putting together an itinerary curating the events that I most wanted to go to while at the event.
Episode IX: The Rise of Skywalker.
My friend Mike and I got up early Friday morning and both made our way directly to the Episode IX panel. I didn’t really know what to expect, and I think the fandom was overly nervous due to the polarizing reaction to The Last Jedi. The event started off with a bang as Stephen Colbert made his way to the stage to moderate the panel. As the main cast and crew started to filter onto the stage and the excitement started to build, I remembered why I love the franchise so much. The panel itself didn’t bring forth too many details on the new film, The Rise of Skywalker, except for when Colbert probed into the heritage of Naomi Ackie‘s new character Jannah—likely somehow related or connected to Billy Dee‘s Lando Calrissian in the film. I was proud of my fellow Star Wars fans as Kelly Marie Tran came back onto stage and was immediately received by the audience with a standing ovation and fans shouting “Kelly! Kelly!”—something that she specifically deserved after all of the hate-filled online abuse she took from the anti–Last Jedi trolls.We got a couple new stills from the film—a few that reminded me very much of Indiana Jones, especially Oscar Isaac‘s new Poe Dameron outfit. As the panel wrapped up, we got our first glimpse at the new teaser for the film. I was absolutely blown away by it, but my skin crawled as the teaser came to a close and we heard a familiar sinister cackle that could only come from one character in the franchise: Ian McDiarmid’s Emperor Palpatine. I couldn’t process for very long, as the actor himself briefly appeared on stage, and, in his most sinister Emperor voice, he commanded the A/V team to “roll it again.”
My Friend Mike and I donning our best Lando capes with R2-D2.
The panel started my weekend on an incredible high—a high that was very hard to top for the rest of the weekend. As with most major conventions, though, it was not without its problems. ReedPOP was attempting to bring the convention scene into the 21st century with app-based technology. Unfortunately, the app crashed frequently, and the “light speed lane,” where you could get rapid access to the celebration store with exclusive merchandise and enter panels the morning of, didn’t really work until Sunday of the convention. My buddy and I were able to make it into the store after being in line for nearly three hours on Saturday, which was significantly better than the five hours I heard about on the first day, when the store’s point of sale servers kept crashing. Overall though, the event was significantly better than Orlando. From what I experienced and what I heard from fans, the Orlando event was a logistical nightmare with lines consistently being over five hours long.
I had an incredible con, as I got autographs from Billy Dee Williams (Lando), Sam Witwer (voice of Darth Maul and Starkiller from the Force Unleashed series), Ray Park (Darth Maul), and Warwick Davis (Wicket from Return of the Jedi). My personal favorite was meeting Ray Park. He ran about two hours late due to the infamous Chicago traffic, but he still took his time with each person in line, personally thanking them for being patient and talking to every fan for a good five minutes. He also took the time to personalize his autograph and add quotes to the picture, which was amazing knowing that most of these autograph sessions tend to be transactional 10-second interactions with your celebrity of choice.
Life-sized X-Wing Starfighter.
I met some amazing people in line, and what always has struck me about Star Wars Celebration is the friendliness of the people that attend. It seems that most people in the Facebook group make friendships or even meet a significant other at these events and forge relationships that last a lifetime. It’s fun being at an event where everyone is as passionate (and usually more passionate) about the same fandom. We constantly struck up conversations while we were waiting in line for the store, for autographs, or for any of the exclusives in which waiting was mandatory. We even met some great guys from Minnesota who were behind us in line for the store.
There’s so much to do at the event that I felt like two full days wasn’t quite enough; I could have spent an entire day just doing panels, or an entire day just getting autographs. My favorite part of the event though, besides the Episode IX panel, was just wandering the floor with my buddy Mike. At about 2:00 p.m. each afternoon, we would proceed to the beer stand to get a couple of beers, then wander the floor just checking out people’s amazing cosplays and taking in the various stands. This practice, of course, led to a few impulse purchases between the two of us.
The Entire Star Wars Saga by Jason Palmer.
The event was phenomenal and definitely worth the investment in the con, but likely something I won’t do every year now that I’m home and broke. Next year’s Star Wars Celebration will be back in its home town of Anaheim, California. The dates are to be announced at this point, but my guess is that they will do something in April with tickets going on sale at some point this summer. If you are interested, I recommend staying up-to-date on announcements on the official website and buying tickets the day they go on sale; this year’s event in Chicago was sold out within days.
My Star Wars Celebration haul.
If you’re interested in any of the panels from the convention or a recap, visit the Star Wars YouTube channel, which livestreamed most of the panels. Also feel free to take a look at this author’s haul from the event above. It was most impressive.
Follow @TwinCitiesGeeks on Twitter or Like Twin Cities Geek on Facebook for more great stuff from Minnesota geeks in your feed!
