Exciting Star Track Rumors!

by Mr. Bad

2000-02-07 11:21:58

Mr. Bad's List

Ever since the digitally-remastered Millenium PLATINUM KERDITIONS of the Star Track movies came out in 1997, the World Wide Web has been awash with RUMORS and FASCINATING STORIES about the "prequel" series. I don't care much, but I wish to capitalize on the fury by releasing some fabulous tidbits of my own!

I dipped my toe into the prediction-making waters last year, with my prognostication that Jake Busey would be tapped for the role of Analkin Skywalker, the Dark Vader who wants to kill Spock. The studios have been playing their cards close to the vest, but I believe that there is further news for STAR TRACK fans in the upcoming months, which you will hear first on PIGDOG JOURNAL!

• HAL LINDEN of "Barney Miller" fame has been approached by LucasFilm to play the part of veteran Jedi BOBA FETT, who will lead the Dai'Jhee faction in the divisive internecine Clone Wars in Star Track Episode 2.
  There may be a side-line plot added at Linden's request, in which Boba Fett seeks treatment for his blind half-daughter FEENA. Because of the Clone War embargoes he cannot get her the bio-mechanical prosthetics she needs, but through her strength, courage, and peculiar outlook on life, Boba Fett learns to love again and to treasure every one of life's little miracles.
• The veteran thespian team of PAUL WILLIAMS and CHARO will be reprising roles they developed on "The Love Boat: TOS" in the early eighties as a mismatched married couple -- Charo, or "Conchita," a party girl who just wants to have fun, and Paul Williams as a poor but earnest pianist struggling to make it into the big time.
  In "Star Track: Episode Two," their characters will come back five years older and wiser: this time, Williams's character will have achieved the critical and financial success he once craved, but at the cost of losing his passion for his craft. Conchita, who has settled down as a wife and mother, tries to revive her formerly crazy ways, with hilarious results. Then they are blown up by a gravity bomb.
• The biggest buzz in Hollywood has been the on-again-off-again casting of "Ally McBeal"'s CALLISTA FLOCKHART as blowsy, scatterbrained Imnay P'tang, a spaceport prostitute with a heart of gold. Her character has a dark secret: she is an exiled warlord from the lesbian Amazon planet Snizz, banished from her homeland for dark crimes of passion.
  Negotiations and script edits are still underway, with Flockhart complaining that P'tang lacks "positive message." Rumor has it that that P'tang will be required to return to her homeland to raise an Amazon army that will change the balance in the bloody Clone Wars. Watch for a hot zero-grav GIRL-ON-GIRL sex scene with the muscle-bound captain of her personal bodyguard, played by veteran adult film star JANINE LINDEMULLER.
• RHEA PERLMAN will play a mysterious alien being of pure SEXUAL ENERGY who tries to woo Analkin away from his lusty Naboo mistress.
• ANTHONY MICHAEL HALL will feature prominently as a young and ambitious Grand Moff Tarkin (although he's only a Minor Moff in Episode Two) who hitches his wagon to charismatic Analkin's rising star.
  Hall's character will provide much of the non-alien comic relief in Episode Two, as Minor Moff Tarkin is a riddle enthusiast (Example riddle: "Q: When is a loading bay cover not a loading bay cover?" "A: When it is ajar (a jar).")
  He will also reflect much of the pathos of the Clone Wars as his youthful enthusiasm is squelched by the horrors of the battlefield. He loses his sense of humor, transforming before our eyes into the terse, stony Grand Moff of later films, when he watches his home planet destroyed by a firebomb attack. "Why does sentient being kill sentient being?" he openly weeps in a heart-rending scene. "That is the true riddle."
• "There are always two." Yoda's chilling words from Episode One will be followed up in Episode Two with a star turn of epic proportions. You heard it here first, folks: Darth Sidious will replace his sidekick Darth Maul, the tattoo-faced Sith Lord killed by Ewan MacGregor in Episode One with none other than CAPTAIN CHRISTOPHER PIKE, the tragically maimed captain of the Star Track Enterprise from the television pilot.
  But who to play Captain Pike, in his all-body wheelchair shaped like the hood of an AMC Pacer? None other than CHRISTOPHER WALKEN! Keep this one under your hats, folks -- it's going to blow Hollywood WIDE OPEN.
• JOHN WILLIAMS's classic scores have seen their last Star Track films. Episode Two will feature a STAR-STUDDED soundtrack featuring Phil Collins, Donna Summers, Elton John and Mel C (Scary Spice) of the supergroup the Spice Girls.
  Elton John will score a major hit with the first single off the soundtrack, a plaintive ballad called "There is No Space (Like the Space Between Our Hearts)" which is featured in the film during a montage sequence as Analkin, on his way to the Clone Wars, muses on his relationship with the lovely Queen of Naboo, whom he must leave behind.
  Also, PUFF DADDY will have a big hit from the album "II Good II Be IV-gotten: Songs Inspired By Star Track Episode II." The track, called "Cold Jedi Mack," will top the charts in England and the US.
• Pepsico has been promised a horizontal co-marketing tie-in for Episode II. A nationwide contest, "Where's Waldo in Star Track Episode II?" will offer hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash and other fabulous prizes to viewers who can identify the stripe-capped character in the computer-generated battle scenes, replete with warbots and Elephant Cannon Brigades. Consumers will also be able to find instant prize packages under the caps of selected Pepsi and Sprite cans.
• The biggest surprise of Episode II will be that NATALIE PORTMAN will -not- reprise her role as the youthful Queen of Planet Naboo. Instead, JENNIFER LOVE HEWITT will step in as the older and somewhat wiser Queen of a restored planet whose rule is threatened by the spread among her people of a fanatical cult called "The Circle."
  Many explanations have been floated to justify in the plot the change of actor for the role, including that Queen Amidala had her mind transfered into a clone body after a disastrous speeder accident (apparently a common medical practice before the Wars). After long deliberation, producers have decided not to provide -any- such explanation. "Mystery and the viewer's imagination have always been part of the Star Track experience," says one source.

burton@pigdog.org