Star Wars fans, your feast for the eyes continues.
Image via StarWars.com. Star Wars is TM & © Lucasfilm Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
See if you’re willing to go along with this Jedi mind trick. Imagine, if you will (and you will), a darkened room, illuminated by Force ghosts: blue Jedi spirits, like that of Obi-Wan Kenobi when he came walking out of the mist on the swamp planet of Dagobah.
You are in the room now; the ghosts are materializing. Now, imagine you can expand on their size and color palette and further open up the blue assembly of spirits to non-Jedi characters, even droids or Sith lords.
Can you see the scene unfolding in your mind’s eye?
Pretend it’s happening, all around you. Suddenly, you witness an array of vibrant hues, cornucopias of color, spiraling into existence at various points in the room.
Soon, you can see the green of Yoda’s ears, and the gold of C-3PO’s body, and the red of Darth Maul’s face taking shape in the dark. As they solidify, each character appears larger than life and strangely Japanized, as if these manifestations of modern myth have gotten mixed up in the swirling haze of Japanese folklore.
That’s the impression, at least, that a visitor prone to creative flights of fancy might have formed when stepping inside the Nebuta Room, the sanctum sanctorum, or holy of holies, at Nippon Television’s “World of Star Wars” exhibition in Shiodome, Tokyo, last December.
This is where a group of Star Wars parade floats, stylized like Japanese nebuta, made their majestic homecoming after debuting over the summer in conjunction with the 2015 Aomori Nebuta Festival. They also appeared, unilluminated, during the daytime at the 2015 Kawasaki Halloween Parade.
The room where the Star Wars Nebuta went on display wasn’t officially called “The Nebuta Room.” That’s simply the nickname that The Gaijin Ghost has given it in memory. And since the Ghost acts as curator here, this collection of 20 photos will live on under that name.
From now until an electromagnetic bomb destroys the Internet, this is the space where Aomori’s Star Wars parade floats will perpetually shine in all their glory. Though the actual floats have become one with the Force now, geeks around the world will be able to check in here anytime and see American pop culture, fused with traditional Japanese culture in the coolest of ways.
If this is your first glimpse of what Star Wars looks like through the prism of Japan, then as Obi-Wan would say, “You’ve taken your first step into a larger world.”
In the sidebar, under the “Star Wars in Japan” heading, this blog holds a growing list of features. The pics in this post are also preserved in a gallery on our home page, where the full “World of Star Wars” exhibition and its sequel (dubbed Mo Hitosu no Star Wars Ten in Japanese) both receive ample documentation in terms of photos.
Enjoy these pictures, and may the Force be with you.
