If there is one thing George Lucas has mastered over the past few decades, it’s reminding us that the first three Star Wars films were a fluke. Between pre-teen Darth Vader, Jar Jar, and a ridiculous dance sequence in Jedi, we have all come to the realization that the phenomena of Episodes 4-6 should be untouched and never tainted by the hands of its creator.

With that in mind, Lucas is (kind of) backpedaling from a drastic change to A New Hope that had fans up in arms when the Remastered version was released. In it, the famous scene where Han Solo kills Greedo was brought into question. The original had Han shoot first, killing Greedo before he gets a chance to fire. In the new version, Lucas changed history (Long Time Ago, etc etc) by having Greedo shoot first and miss, allowing Solo to shoot to kill.

Turns out, Lucas never changed anything, he just pulled the camera out a bit. Yeah.

The controversy over who shot first, Greedo or Han Solo, in Episode IV, what I did was try to clean up the confusion, but obviously it upset people because they wanted Solo [who seemed to be the one who shot first in the original] to be a cold-blooded killer, but he actually isn’t.

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Ever since the beginning of the motion gaming movement we have been waiting for a game that lets us slice and dice with a lightsaber. Finally that dream is becoming a reality with the brand new game Star Wars Kinect, a motion based game that puts you in the Jedi army during the thick of the clone wars.

This game was originally meant to be released last year, but a release date has finally been confirmed for the long awaited project, April 3rd. And to celebrate the release a special edition Kinect bundle pack is being released with a 320GB R2-D2 themed 360, a C3-PO gold controller, a white Kinect and of course the game as well.

Additionally more details about what we can expect in the game have been released, including the new Duels of the Fate mode which pits you one-on-one against Sith baddies, cool. Also a Galactic Dance-Off where you can take on Darth Vader Dance Central style, much less cool.

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This past weekend we saw the release of Beauty and the Beast in 3D, the most recent in a string of classic films getting a 3D face lift.  The next big re-release is only a few weeks away with the first of the Star Wars 3D updates. Lucas is starting with Episode One, and is moving on through the franchise with a new re-release every year.

Even though the prequel trilogy lives in infamy among most film fans, the impending arrival of a Star Wars film on the big screen still holds some weight. In advance of the February launch a new set of five posters has hit the web, each with a wildy different design and most of them actually pretty cool.

It is gratifying that the posters excise the existence of Jar Jar Binks completely, although it would have been nice had Jake Lloyd received the same treatment. The upcoming 3D versions of these films represents the greatest perk of the 3D post conversion era we live in.

To have an opportunity to watch classic films on the big screen again in new and exciting ways is an exciting proposition. Hopefully lesser films like the prequel trilogy don’t ruin it before we get back to the original trilogy.

You can see the whole set of new posters after the jump.

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There are 50 scripts out there somewhere, 50 episodes of a TV series that most fan boys can’t wait to see. The Star Wars live action show has been discussed for years, Lucas has the scripts ready but is waiting for technology to be cost effective enough to make a show that looks like the prequel trilogy every single week.

That is a daunting goal, and requires a bit of a waiting period while the world of digital effects catches up. In the mean time small tidbits about the show keep getting dropped like bread crumbs leading us through the forest. In a recent sit down with IGN, Rick McCallum let slip that the working title of the show is Star Wars: Underworld.

What we know so far about the show, is that it takes place in the twenty year gap between Episode III and Episode IV and will revolve around bounty hunters. This is a very intriguing concept for a show, showing the rise of the Galactic Empire from the perspective of the criminals who thrive under it’s rule. It is also very encouraging to hear McCallum discuss the darker nature of the scripts.

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One thing we’ve learned is there are too many games and too little time to play them all. This also means there isn’t even enough time to give all of them awards, but we try our best. Today we take a look at both the most time consuming efforts of the past year as well as give some awards for games that deserve some notable mentions as well.

Game Most Likely to Consume Your Life: The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Two Hundred and Fifty Hours. By most estimates, this is how long it’ll take an average player to explore MOST of the content of Skyrim. To give some perspective, if the average person works a 40 hour a week job, Skyrim would take six and a quarter full work weeks to complete. Now, we realize that most gamers work jobs outside of the gaming industry and cannot devote a full forty hours a week to a single game.

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There is only one thing that George Lucas doesn’t want to make a dime off of, only one thing he wants to see disappear and never brought up again. That would be the horrible, no good, very bad Star Wars Holiday Special which details Chewbacca’s attempt to get home to his family on life day. While we wont get a chance to see the special officially released anytime soon, Chewie is getting back into the holiday spirit.

The cast of Glee welcomed the wookie on set to film his appearance on next week’s Christmas themed episode. One of the series’ stars Matthew Morrison, who is also directing the episode, recently revealed on the Jimmy Kimmel show that the episode will be paying homage to the previously mentioned Star Wars Holiday Special and the Judy Garland Christmas Specials too.

“We called up George Lucas and he gave us Chewbacca. There is only one guy who can officially be Chewbaccca, and he lives in Northern California and they flew him in,” Morrison said. “We had Chewbacca for the day, and it was just great, and we were all taking pictures with him. This is a guy who has been doing it for 12 years.”

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As always, one of our favorite parts of any convention is the sights and NYCC was full of them this year so we had to share them with the Flickcast audience. The level of dedication by the men and women who attend the con every year is staggering.

Some are picture perfect renditions that rival movie quality costumes like the Anakin Skywalker we saw wandering the floor. Others come from careful collection of legitimate television costumes and props like the classic Power Rangers Green Ranger. Still others take their own imagination and run wild with custom Mandalorian battle armor for both human and giant chicken alike to life sized Castle Crashers.

One of the things this gallery sadly doesn’t do justice is give an idea on just how huge NYCC was this year. Though it is yet to overtake the surrounding neighborhood like SDCC does, the New York Comic Con feels every bit as big and as important as its west coast counterpart.

The entire Javitts Center was filled with every major comic company to movie studios and video game publishers in every corner. This year the Flickcast was only able to spend a day on the Con floor but if things keep looking up for NYCC, we may have to tackle this show the same way we do San Diego Comic Con or E3.

Take a look below to get just a glimpse of the many sights at this year’s convention. See you next year New York!

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As a fan of the Star Tours attractions on both coasts, I was excited to go to the D23 panel on the making of Star Tours: The Adventures Continue… I crowded into the 1,000+ seat ballroom, not knowing what Imagineer insights awaited me.

In true Disney fashion, the panel was a professionally crafted presentation, with no room for questions..errr, I mean error. In this panel, lead Imagineer, Tom Fitzgerald, spoke with the aid of Powerpoint and took us on the journey to bring this attraction into the future.

Tom Fitzgerald, began his Star Tours story in 1998 when George Lucas summoned the Imagineer team to his ranch to watch the pod race, and only the pod race. After seeing the infamous scene, the Imagineers decided to wait to see the rest of the film, hoping against hope that it would the pod race would be scrapped for something way cooler.

Ok, so Tom said, “In fact, we did think it was a great idea”, but I can read between the lines. Interestingly back in 1998, way before the 3D onslaught, the Imagineers knew the ride was going to be in 3D.

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Whatever your feelings about Star Wars, and in particular the second trilogy, Cartoon Network is doing a pretty good job with their animated series The Clone Wars. The show has already been on the air for three seasons and is very popular with fans new and old.

With season four about to get underway, Cartoon Network has revealed today the premiere date for that season and also sent us a cool trailer to help get you ready for it. And this new season promises to deliver even more thrills and excitement for fans.

Here’s the scoop for season four directly from the network:

As the heroic Jedi Knights and their clone army fight to preserve order, their efforts continue to be met with strong resistance from the massive Separatist droid army. Escalating and expanding into uncharted corners of the galaxy, the scope and scale of Star Wars: The Clone Wars continue to grow – with exotic adventures and enhanced animation strengthening ties to the Star Wars saga.

Within the galactic battle, fearsome foes from the past return to settle the score. As unexpected alliances are formed on both sides of the battle, the action explodes and the course of the war takes an unforeseen turn!

Star Wars: The Clone Wars premieres on Cartoon Network, Friday, September 16 at 8PM (E/P). Click through to check out the trailer for the new season.

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As much as we love Star Wars here at The Flickcast it isn’t such a sacred series of films that it can’t be parodied. In fact, it’s got a long history of people making a bit of fun out of it, and there’s nothing wrong with that.

Just like there’s nothing wrong with a good porn parody. In fact, that’s just what filmmkaer Axel Braun has done with his latest film. He’s combined these two things and made a porn parody of Star Wars. To help illustrate just how these two things can go together, we’ve got a teaser for his latest opus for you today.

Although it doesn’t show any sex, it does still manages to be pretty amusing. In fact, some of the visual effects and sets are not even that bad. It’s obvious Braun is a fan and took the time to do things right (or as right as needed), even if he’s actually making an adult film.

Check it out after the break. No, it isn’t NSFW — at least not yet. The next trailer? Who knows.

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One of the very first booths I hit on the show floor this year was Bioware’s SWTOR – or Star Wars: The Old Republic – the company’s massively multi-player game set in the Star Wars universe. In development for the last five years, I was excited to learn there would finally be hands-on demos of the game both at the Con as well as off-site at the Hilton Gaslamp across the street.

To coincide with Comic-Con this year, Bioware announced pre-orders for the game on Thursday, which would allow players early access to the game as well as spiffy in-game bonuses. Given that the game’s release window is set for Holidays 2011, it made sense for the SWTOR team to leverage Comic-Con to start showing off their shiny new MMORPG.

After a roughly 45-minute wait, myself and a dozen other eager players were ushered into the booth and each seated at one of the high-end Alienware gaming rigs running SWTOR. We slipped on our headphones and were given 15-minutes on the clock to put the game through its paces. I decided to play a Sith Warrior, went through a brief intro and my character was jumped into a desert-like world ripe for the exploring.

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With the Blu-Ray release of the Star Wars saga coming this September, 20th Century Fox is titillating fans with a sneak peek at some of the extras, including this trailer of some footage cut from the original trilogy.

The clip shows a handful of glimpses at some deleted scenes, including the “wampas in the Hoth base” sequence. These aren’t from the digitally remastered/Greedo-shoots-first editions released in the late ‘90s; these are from the original original films, right down to the ‘70s film grain—and that’s not to say they look fuzzy. They’re as crisp and good-looking as you could want.

Fox plans to release Blu-Ray editions of both the original trilogy as well as the prequels and, for the fans who need every damn thing, a whopping nine-disc Complete Saga edition that will include over 30 hours of special features from deleted and alternative scenes like these to, well, pretty much anything else George has lying around in the archives.

You can view the trailer after the jump.

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