Well since we do consider ourselves mainly a sci-fi, fantasy and superhero movie site, I guess we ought to post up the new full trailer for Star Wars: Clone Wars. If you haven’t heard, this will be a new ongoing CGI animated TV series, but Lucasfilm decided to launch it as a feature length animated film in theaters this summer.

You can check out the trailer for yourself below…

So tell me, seriously - does the image above make you excited to see a new Star Wars series about the Clone Wars?

In case you don’t know, there’s a new completely CGI animated series coming out in the Fall that picks up where Episode 3 left off. So what actually should have happened in Episodes 2 & 3 will take place in this animated TV show.

The twist is that Lucasfilm will kick off the series with a theatrical movie which will be released on August 15th.

The new Star Wars: Clone Wars animated feature film will premiere theatrically August 15, 2008, then it will air on Cartoon Network and TNT. This one is from Lucasfilm Animation, not from Genndy Tartakovsky, who oversaw the original Clone Wars series in 2004/05. He’s attached to the new Dark Crystal movie.

This is cool, because I was just thinking that it’s been three years since the last Star Wars movie, and we’re not getting one this year. There were new Star Wars movies in 1999, 2002 and 2005.

Find out more at starwars.com.

Anyone recognize this little fella? It’s Salacious Crumb, the creepy little guy that sat at the foot of Jabba the Hut in Return of the Jedi. If you’re a big Star Wars collector this is a pretty cool piece since it’s a 1:1 reproduction of the character from the film.

As unbelievable as it sounds, it’s true: According to several reports, George Lucas can’t find a network willing to air his new, self-financed Star Wars: Clone Wars animated series. Lucas says this is a PG-13 style show that doesn’t follow the model of the first animated Clone Wars series.

I first heard these rumors from my sci fi fan friends, and when I checked out IMDb, there it was. Lucas is financing 100 episodes of this new series (with animation, this could be at least two to four years worth of episodes). So what will Lucas do to get the animated series on the air?

You’ll notice I don’t post a lot of Star Wars related news here at Screen Rant. The reason is basically that George Lucas murdered the saga for me with his three prequel movies. That’s it, plain and simple. I think the man became:

A. Too full of himself (understandable I suppose considering the money and power he wields).

B. Too enamored of the VFX/CGI at the expense of the story and characters.

Having said that, I did enjoy the mini-episode animated Clone Wars saga that was broadcast on Cartoon Network. Lucas was pretty much hands-off on these and they were created by Genndy Tartakovsky, creator of Dexter’s Laboratory and Samurai Jack.

By Brian Rentschler

The short version: There aren’t a ton of extras here, and purists will be annoyed by George Lucas’ changes, but picture and audio is excellent and you’ll finally have these on DVD.

Well, after all my bellyaching about how Lucas went and ruined a good thing by fixing what wasn’t broke, I decided to make the plunge and buy the Star Wars Trilogy DVD set. Overall, I am very happy with the movies (hey, it’s Star Wars after all!), but I have quite a few “nitpicky” things I want to point out here. This review is not so much of the movies themselves, since the movies have been reviewed to death elsewhere. This is more of a commentary on what’s there and what’s not there. Since I never saw the “Special Editions” of the movies that were released in 1997, I may be giving commentary on content that has existed for years without realizing it, so bear with me.

The first thing that surprised me about this DVD set was the lack of extras. Compare this to the collector’s edition DVD’s of Pulp Fiction or Jackie Brown, or the Extreme DVD version of Terminator 2, and you’ll see what I mean. There is commentary on each movie disc, but that’s it. There is a fourth “extras” DVD that has a fairly lengthy behind-the-scenes documentary and some old trailers, but nearly everything else appears to be a plug for an upcoming movie or video game. Nearly every featurette on the “extras” DVD shows either a bunch of losers dressed up as Star Wars characters or a bunch of directors talking about how George Lucas is bigger than God. Ultimately, the extras were a bit of a letdown.

Now for the movies themselves…