![\"MCQUARRIE2\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/MCQUARRIE2.jpg?resize=680%2C448\")
\n<\/p>\n
Got my tickets for tonight\u2019s 7:30pm screening of The Force Awakens<\/em>. If there\u2019s ever been a film with more hype and buildup than this one, I can\u2019t recall it.<\/p>\n I\u2019ve been a Star Wars<\/em> fan since \u201977 and every once in a while, something sparks that full sense of wonder I first experienced\u00a0for these films when I was a kid.<\/p>\n Found these at my parents\u2019 house several months ago. One of my prized possessions as a kid was The\u00a0Empire Strikes Back<\/em>\u00a0Ralph McQuarrie portfolio. I studied every inch of these concept paintings. They\u2019re still amazing today. The newsletters you see in that photo? Those are copies of Bantha Tracks<\/em>, the official newsletter for Star Wars<\/em> fan club members. I remember pulling those out of the mailbox and immediately analyzing them like they were holy documents. I knew more about the behind-the-scenes crew\u00a0that worked on those films than I knew of\u00a0some of my own family members.<\/p>\n So yeah \u2014 Episodes IV, V,<\/em> and VI<\/em> had a profound effect on me, to say the least. I\u2019m grateful I was a kid during that era.<\/p>\n I hope my own daughter gets to experience some of the same.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s hoping this film\u00a0has some of that impossible magic.<\/p>\n<\/body>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Got my tickets for tonight\u2019s 7:30pm screening of The Force Awakens. If there\u2019s ever been a film with more hype and buildup than this one, I can\u2019t recall it. I\u2019ve been a Star Wars fan since \u201977 and every once in a while, something sparks that full sense of wonder I first experienced\u00a0for these films […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1934,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Today's The Day","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[182],"tags":[183,63,184,172],"class_list":["post-1931","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-art-life","tag-bantha-tracks","tag-john-picacio","tag-ralph-mcquarrie","tag-star-wars"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/MCQUARRIE2.jpg?fit=2000%2C1316","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5te7x-v9","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1931","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1931"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1931\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1937,"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1931\/revisions\/1937"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1934"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1931"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1931"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1931"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}