Happy Anniversary, Star Wars!

On this day in 1977, a little film called Star Wars made it's debut.

Fox had such little confidence in this curious movie, which placed classic storytelling from epic Westerns and Japanese samurai pics in the previously ghetto-ized genre of science fiction, that they let George Lucas retain merchandising rights.

Yeah, they'd live to regret that one.

Turns out, they had a hit on their hands. More than 30 years later, Star Wars is a dominant cultural force in a way nobody, even Lucas, could have foreseen.

Lomography.com has a terrific piece on the momentous historical day, it's a great read and I highly recommend you check it out. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to open up my Millennium Falcon case and play with my 3.75" old-school figures.

NO, you can't touch them!

Star Wars Crayons [Pic]

From art instrument, to work of art. The force is strong in these Crayolas! That is some fine Star Wars wax-whittling right there.

Brand Logos Get the Star Wars Treatment

Because let's be honest- everything's better when you add Star Wars. Even corporate logos take on a certain badassery when given a Jedi-vs-Sith spin.

Pimp Yoda [Pic]

"Have my money, hoes better."

Star Tours: Now with Junk-Touching!

Because tragically, nothing grounds a tour of imagination and wonder in the real world like an INVASIVE PAT-DOWN.

Oh, brave new world. From the description of the revamped Star Tours Disney World attraction:

The second room of the queue is now a security check area, similar to a TSA checkpoint. The two G-series droids are still there, G2-9T scanning luggage and G2-4T scanning passengers. For those attraction junkies, you'll remember that the G-series droids are so named because in the original Disneyland Park version of the ride, they were created by removing the "skins" from two of the goose animatronics from the soon-to-close America Sings attraction (Goose = "G" series). While we won't tell you why, you'll enjoy paying a lot of attention to what the scans of the luggage show is inside. When it's your turn to go through the passenger scan (a thermal body scan), you may be verbally accosted by a security droid. Also, keep an eye out in the queue for an earlier version of RX-24 ("Captain Rex") from the original Star Tours; he's labeled "defective" and has some familiar dialogue.

Sexy Darth Vader Girls [Super-NSFW]

If you get aroused - you won't get raptured. You have been warned.

Smokey the Ewok on Endor Fire Safety [Pic]

It's all well and good to sing 'Yub-Nub,' but forest fires are NOT COOL. Bury corpses instead of burning 'em, and let's keep Endor green!

Car Wars: Jedi Nissan

You just KNOW that the sole purpose for buying a Rogue was to pimp it out, Star Wars-style. Well played!

Skottie Young's Awesome Star Wars Art

Skottie Young is so talented it's ridiculous. He posted these gorgeous Star Wars pieces and more on his blog, under the heading 'Daily Warm-Ups':

Most of these are about an hour worth of work.

That's time well spent. He ranges from grim and gritty to fun and goofy with pics of Yoda, Boba Fett, Han Solo and even that cute little Darth Vader kid from the Super Bowl commercial.