"Genuine" Star Wars prop
There it was on ebay, ... a "Genuine" Star Wars prop. Sitting at the initial asking price of £9.99 with no bids and a few minutes left to go. No pictures and a really vague one line description, oh and it mentioned a dread two words ... "Phantom Menace"

This was early 2002 and I had had a great pre-Christmas clearout on the bay, with a lot of DVDs and things going for far more than I hoped, so with a bursting PayPal account I thought, fuck it. I bid for it and won.

A few days later the 'prop' arrived. It was a wooden panel around the size and shape of a decent laptop, painted white, with some non-descript wires hanging from it. There were a few bits of coloured transparent paper affixed to little raised bits, and overall it looked a bit shoddy.

The seller had mentioned something about Queen Amidala's ship, so I studied the DVD, going almost frame by frame through the interior shots of the ship (mainly whilst they are stranded on Tatooine). And guess what , I FOUND THE BUGGER!

Above Liam Neeson and Ewan McGregor's head as they study some readout, is a panel that has the exact shape, size, look and decoration as the bit of wood I had in my hand. It looks a bit more hi-tec on screen, but it was perfect apart from one weird detail ... it was a complete mirror image.

Don't know why ... don't know if the film was flipped or if my prop is from the other side (although I can't see them building both sides of the ship)... but I know, thanks to a daft impulse, I got a bit of screen used Star Wars memorabillia. OK The Phantom Menace sucks balls, but it's Star Wars nonetheless.
( Cheeses of Nazareth Where's Captain Kirk? www.whereiskirk.com, Wed 27 May 2009, 15:54, 1 reply)

Phantom Menace
I must be one of the few people who really enjoyed it.
( SpikeyPickle wishes he was mabazaritchie, Wed 27 May 2009, 16:07, closed)