Well, given that we're all just a little bit ticked off at Darth George this week over yet another DVD reissue, this item is well-timed: now you can own your own little GL to drag behind your car/landspeeder, toss into the snowblower/Sarlaac pit, melt down into a skate tightener/ restraining bolt, whatever gets yer bacta flowing..
Hasbro is offering a limited-edition action figure of Georgie in full Stormtrooper regalia, albeit on with his 70s-era hair and waistline (this isn't the first time Lucas' likeness has inspired a toy--Hasbro confirmed his visage was previously used in an action figure called "George Sacul"). Now for that "bad feeling" you've all had about this: The Lucas figure is only available to participants in something called "Hasbro's Ultimate Galactic Hunt", in which fans must show proof-of-purchase of five vintage "Star Wars" action figures in order to score the Lucas trooper.
Lucas isn't the first director to have his own action figure: there's Peter Jackson as a hobbit from the "Lord Of The Rings" line, Quentin Tarantino as a "Crazy 88" from "Kill Bill, Vol. 1", Kevin Smith of course, Andy Warhol, Warren Beatty ("Dick Tracy"), Steve Buscemi, Terry Jones as "Mandy" from "Life Of Brian" (which he also directed), and even Steven Seagal (he did helm, unfortunately, "On Deadly Ground").
I waited for a Dickie Attenborough from "Jurassic Park", but it didn't happen. Nor did a Francois Truffaut from "Close Encounters Of The Third Kind". Wouldn't an official line of plastic, poseable auteurs be just the thing for obsessive film junkies who've got it all? Just think, your very own Alfred Hitchcock playset, with Tippi Hendren sold separately, whom you could torture with marathon bird attacks. Or a Werner Herzog/Klaus Kinski limited edition "Fitzcarraldo" kit where you disassemble the ship, pull it up a mountain, and rebuild it on the other side. And what Criterion completist could resist a talking Jean-Luc Godard doll that spews Marxist rants?
