Tag Archives: Race

Searching for Lando

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Lando-FlamewindCoverChatter in the geek-o-sphere for the past few months says that nearly every major character in the Star Wars universe is going to return to the new JJ Abrams flicks, starting with Episode VII. Mark Hamill is to reprise his role as an older Luke Skywalker, Harrison Ford is coming back as a grizzled Han Solo and Carrie Fisher will be a more mature Princess Leia. Even the Wookie and the droids gonna be in it. Yet the one character that doesn’t seem to be making it back is the one with the baddest name–Lando Calrissian. So far, despite fan requests, it doesn’t seem that actor Billy Dee Williams has been invited to reprise his role as the daring rogue. But how can this be, when Lando Calrissian saved my young geek life?

Art from book cover of Lando Calrissian and the Flamewind of Oseon, by L. Neil Smith

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My Own Personal Judas: Revisiting Jesus Christ Superstar

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Carl Anderson JudasSometime in the mid 1990s, around Easter, I stumbled upon a VH-1 showing of the film adaptation of Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice’s rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar. I caught it in the middle, but I sat mesmerized, watching what appeared to be a rag-tag bunch of 1970s hippies and yippies singing and dancing a passion play. In the desert (!?) Before I knew it, the film had ended. But, being VH-1, it naturally started up again. So I watched it a second time. A few hours later I couldn’t deny it. I was hooked. And most shocking of all, the character who affected me the most wasn’t the guy playing the requisite Lord and Savior. It was Judas.

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An Ode to the Anti-hero

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staggerlee_mIn 1900 a black laborer named Robert Charles set off a massive manhunt after an altercation with New Orleans police. Before all was done, Charles would shoot well over 20 whites sent to apprehend him, killing several. Altogether, 28 people (the exact number is truly unknown) would die in riots, including Charles, who made a last stand in a burning building. The violence that surrounded him continued to swirl and claim others even after his death. The last turbulent days of Charles life would make him a monster to many and a folk hero to others. For black musicians, he became one of the legendary “bad men”–those near mythic black anti-heroes of superhuman capabilities, whose acts of defiance were both celebratory, captivating and frightening.

painting: Cruel Old Stagger Lee, by Van Orno

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Slavery and Sleepy Hollow: A Revisionist Revolution

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sleepyhollow11“…many Negroes and Mulattoes the property of Citizens of these States have concealed themselves on board the Ships in the harbor … and to make their escapes in that manner … All Officers of the Allied Army … are directed not to suffer any such negroes or mulattoes to be retained in their Service but on the contrary to cause them to be delivered to the Guards which will be establish’d for their reception …Any Negroes or mulattoes who are free upon proving the same will be left to their own disposal.”–General George Washington, October 25, 1781.

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