These Are The Droids You're Looking For OR Klaatu Barada Nikto

Since this is the second post about the Star Wars exhibit (the first post is here), I seriously thought about giving this one a name like "The Exhibit Strikes Back." But in the end, I went with a robot-centric title. Why? Because this time we're looking at puppets, droids, robots, and various other gadgets.

Side note: If you read "Klaatu barada nikto" and thought "What does the Army of Darkness have to do with robots?", then you need to go see The Day the Earth Stood Still. And not the one with Keanu Reeves.

Moving on, let's scan around the exhibit and see if we find something roboty...

Perhaps while scanning the ice planet of Hoth...?

Star Wars just wouldn't be Star Wars without its robots and androids, or, to use the trademarked word: Droids. This word is actually trademarked by Lucasfilm, and if you look at the bottom of any cell phone ad for a "Droid" phone, you'll see a tiny copyright Lucasfilm.

Which is why there were so many droids in the movies, and at the exhibit.

I don't know about you,
but I feel safe trusting the fate of the rebellion to those mechanoids...

These included the actual props and puppets they used in the first three movies...

Being a tall doctor doesn't mean the same thing
to single ladies in the Star Wars universe.

Still not sure why the interrogation droid is so effective.

...And the models they used for close-ups that were largely CG in other sequences for the later movies.

The pit droid was clearly inspired
by the turtles from Super Mario.

Gonna be honest: I mostly remember being
annoyed by these guys in the Lego Star Wars game...

But it was really neat to see the detail put into these models.

Also to picture the days and days
spend soldering all of those wires together.

The exhibit didn't disappoint with the education, either, featuring a bevy of exhibits about robots in the real world.

The last of a three-station robot-programming/building exhibit.

That big green on isn't a toy, but a model of an actual tree-cutting machine.
...Soon to be the focus of a SyFy movie.

The creepy robot can see you...

All of these were of course accompanied by my favorite tool: The informative plaque.

Informative! Also: Random Mark Hamill.

A particular favorite was the exhibit where you get to figure out the mechanics of making a robot walk. Yes, you heard me.

You can tell by the way it uses its walk,
It's a women's robot, to time to talk.

I ostensibly didn't try this because I wanted to let the children learn and discover more myself. But the truth is, I probably would have failed just as much as they did, if not more.

This was the most successful robot operator.
She succeeded it making the robot moonwalk.

Walking is a great segue to the next subject, and not because the Segway is a ridiculous replacement of walking...

...No, it's because pronouncing these next vehicles makes it sound like you're hacking up a hairball.

Go ahead and try it:
AT-AT, AT-ST, AT-TE

As a kid, these walkers were exceptionally cool, and I was always more than a little jealous of the family friend who had an AT-AT toy and (very wisely) wouldn't let me play with it.

So I was overjoyed to see the models up close.

Strengths: Big walking weapon.
Weaknesses: Clumsy as all get out.

Strengths: Side-mounted missiles
and gatling gun that nobody uses.
Weaknesses: Logs of all types.

Like with the rest of the exhibit, I kept having fond treks down memory lane to when I was a child who sang along with the Ewok song at the end of Return of the Jedi. (Like most people, I made up nonsense syllables that sounded vaguely like what they sang. Pretty sure that's what they did when originally recording it.)

And without admitting anything, there may have been some geeky quoting upon seeing certain tiny, round props.

I always wondered just how much those training blasts stung...

Go ahead. Just try to tell me you didn't hear,
"He's holding a thermal detonator!" when you saw this.

Overall, it was a great exhibit which I thoroughly enjoyed and found thoroughly fascinating. And I'll leave you with an extremely cool technology not from Star Wars at all:

Augmented Reality.

Looks like just a normal video game, right...?

A video game made by placing picture tiles on a blank white surface.
How awesome is that?!?

We now return you to your regularly scheduled (slightly) less geeky programming.