No midi-chlorians necessary.
So I was poking through a copy of Star Warp magazine, dated Summer 1979, and within was the article “The Force Can Be With You” — in which the author first outlines what we know about The Force as revealed in the first Star Wars movie, and then suggests methods by which you, the reader, can develop your very own Force abilities.
For example, the articles suggests practicing on moving peas with your mind, or trying to guess cards held by another person, and
“…have your friend hide something, say a button. Again, you let the Force guide you until you find it. […] If you’ve succeeded with the peas and the cards, it should only take you five minutes to find the button the first time. Eventually, you should be able to work up to finding the button before your friend has even hidden it.”
Emphasis mine, by the way, because that’s awesome.
Anyway, after you’ve done that, get a load of this:
This article is, like, five pages long, and I’m assuming this was written with tongue firmly placed in cheek, particularly since it’s credited to one “Steven Shlocmeister.” Well, this was the 1970s, when belief in ESP and other imagined magical powers was quite the fad, so you can’t be too sure.
This next article, however, is absolutely 100% serious: “DARTH VADER VS. MUFFEY!” Yes, Muffey, the robot Daggit from the original Battlestar Galactica:
“Muffey springs at Darth’s throat. His metal jaws can find no grasp on Darth’s armor. Darth swings his lightsaber playfully at Muffey, lopping off one of the daggit’s ears. Muffey goes for Darth’s ankles, snapping ferociously. Darth simply snickers and lops off the daggit’s tail.”
And so it goes, with a gratuitous but probably deserved backhanding of Boxey, Muffey’s owner. But Muffey gets his second wind, takes out Darth’s “life support panel” on his chest, and Darth totally bails, zipping back to his home universe via a convenient space/time warp.
Yeah, yeah, I know…but count your blessings, it could have been Darth/Muffey slash fiction.
Can we trust fanfic that can’t even get the character’s name right? The daggit was named Muffit, not “Muffy”…
“it could have been Darth/Muffit slash fiction”
But in the big wide world of the internets, I’m sure that exists somewhere.
Mike,
I read that Star Warp magazine article way back in ’79 and have been honing my mind control skills ever since. In fact, I came up with the exact wording for this post a week ago and commanded you to write it today. Wait ’til you see what I have planned for next week.
Uh, Mike? I think I EDITED that magazine you wrote about today! Between my undergrad and grad school years I worked for this fleapit of a publisher, and it was up to us to write all the stories. We had a lot of freedom since they only cared about what taglines they could put on the cover (with variations on these semi-libelous names: Star Warp, Space Wars, etc), and tried to have some fun with it, but… we didn’t last long.
So if it’s edited by Scott Bukatman (Rocket Scott – yikes!), that’s me! And now I’m a respected academic!!
I didn’t write either article, though — that was my colleague Michael Moore (not that one). I shoulda caught that Muffy/Muffit thing though — some editor I am!
Next question – I have NO copies of those magazines… is that one for sale?
Scott – That was indeed your name in the masthead, my friend. (Look to your email for further communiques!)
For a second I thought you wrote “Muttley,” the snickering dog in Hanna-Barbera sixties cartoons. Who was such a sneaky bastard, he might actually have a chance.
And now I’m thinking of Vader entering an X-wing fighter in the Wacky Races.