You know your day is going well when you and your fellow FTN’ers get stuck in a lift within five minutes of arriving at their beautiful German hotel in 30 degrees heat.
Thankfully we got out alive and proceeded to unpack and head for Messe Essen for a special day involving the media, exhibitors and crew ahead of Friday’s official first day for the paying public.
While we didn’t get to see the full exhibition in place we were able to watch its construction with the mixture of German and American crew fitting the toy stands, tattoo pavilion and LEGO section, amongst others. Tomorrow should be something else with Star Wars fans from across the world descending on this small German city for everything in a galaxy far, far away.
Oh, by the way, did I tell you we sat just five feet from Mark Hamill and Carrie Fisher during a special press event? Well, we did, and to be fair it was one of those surreal moments you have in life. Here sat two icons of my life (never mind youth) within touching distance. They talked briefly about their memories of Return of the Jedi and previous Celebration events but to be fair I was too mesmorised to really listen. Unbelievable and we’ll have some video of this event to follow.
Shortly before their departure from the stage we were also introduced to many of the cast from Jedi all those years ago. Ian McDiarmud, Warwick Davis, Jeremy Bulloch, Peter Mayhew and Anthony Daniels chatted to host David Collins about their Star Wars thoughts and memories and again the whole thing was surreal. These were my heroes in front of me. Bloody cool and again we’ll have this chat online in the coming days.
Anyway, following this hugggeeee moment in my life, me and my fellow FTN team had a further look around the main exhibition hall. Ofcourse, chief nerd Marc was like a dog with a bone. Grabbing quick chats with Steve Sansweet, Mr Bulloch and Ashley Eckstein to ensure interviews over the next few days for all you fans out there. Fingers crossed all goes to plan.
In the meantime, I’m having a few drinks in the overwhelming German heat looking forward to the main opening day of Celebration Europe II which will include Attack of the Clones in 3D and a screening of Return of the Jedi outside on a very big screen under the stars. We all cannot wait!
Until tomorrow…. May The Force Be With You!
Marc
Marc is a self-confessed nerd. Ever since seeing Star Wars for the first time around 1979 he’s been an unapologetic fan of the Wars and still believes, with Clone Wars and now Underworld, we are yet to see the best Star Wars. He’s a dad of two who now doesn’t have the time (or money) to collect the amount of toys, comics, movies and books he once did, much to the relief of his long-suffering wife. In the real world he’s a graphic designer. He started Following the Nerd because he was tired of searching a million sites every day for all the best news that he loves and decided to create one place where you can go to get the whole lot. Secretly he longs to be sitting in the cockpit of his YT-1300 Corellian Transport ship with his co-pilot Chewie, roaming the universe, waiting for his next big adventure, but feels just at home watching cartoons with his kids….
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