Last month, I finally concluded my perennial Star Wars tour of Japan, though it really just meant taking long-overdue trips to Aomori and Tottori, two places I first gained awareness of through their local Star Wars promotions back in 2015. With the country reopening its borders to individual foreign tourists in three weeks, here’s a quick look at five potential travel destinations for you across Japan that I’ve visited since 2015. As you’ll see, each of these places has a history of mingling Star Wars with Japanese culture.
Unless otherwise noted, all photos here are by Joshua Meyer. Star Wars is ™ & © Lucasfilm Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Sapporo
I visited the Sapporo Snow Festival in 2014, only to wind up kicking myself the very next year for missing out on its 2015 Star Wars snow sculpture. Luckily, the 2017 festival did have the droids I was looking for. They and Kylo Ren took the place of the previous Darth Vader and Stormtroopers snow sculpture in Odori Park.
The “Snow Star Wars” sculpture at the 2015 Sapporo Snow Festival. Image via facebook.com/StarWars.jp.
The “White Star Wars” sculpture at the 2017 Sapporo Snow Festival.
Odori Park, seen from the Sapporo TV Tower observatory during the 2014 Sapporo Snow Festival.
Aomori
My first exposure to Aomori’s traditional Nebuta — paper parade floats of warriors, illuminated from within by lightbulbs — came when I saw some on display in Tokyo at the “World of Star Wars” exhibition in December 2015. In January of both 2017 and 2018, I had a chance to see some real (non-Star Wars) Nebuta floats at Furusato Matsuri, the “Hometown Festival,” in Tokyo Dome. The Aomori Nebuta Festival itself was canceled in 2020 and 2021 due to the pandemic, but in 2022, I finally made it there and got to see the floats on parade after all this time.
The Jedi Nebuta float at the “World of Star Wars” exhibition in 2015.
A Nebuta float from the city of Aomori at Tokyo Dome’s Hometown Festival in 2018.
A float on the street during the August 3rd night parade at the 2022 Aomori Nebuta Festival.
Tokyo
I had never been inside Tokyo Dome until the Hometown Festival, so in a roundabout way, we have Star Wars to thank for that. Another place I discovered in Japan’s capital because of Star Wars is Nittele Tower in Shiodome. This is where, from 2015 to 2017, the aforementioned “World of Star Wars” exhibition and two follow-up exhibitions were held. It’s also where you can find the Ghibli Clock, designed by Hayao Miyazaki himself.
A Japanese folding screen at Nittele Tower’s 2017 Star Wars exhibition.
Rogue One costumes on display at the 2016 exhibition.
The Ghibil Clock at Nittele Tower in Shiodome, Tokyo, 2015.
Tokyo Dome City, seen from an upper floor of the Tokyo Dome Hotel in 2017.
Tottori
Regrettably, I never got to see the Tottori Sand Museum’s Star Wars sand sculpture in person back in 2015. According to the official website, it was designed by the Walt Disney Co. and made by the museum’s producer, Katsuhiko Chaen. In 2022, however, I did see a sand sculpture of pharaohs that Chaen made for the current Egypt-themed exhibition at the museum. The Tottori Sand Dunes, moreover, were a whole Tatooine experience unto themselves. Sand got everywhere in my shoes, just as Anakin Skywalker (Hayden Christensen) said it would.
Katsuhiko Chaen’s Star Wars sand sculpture in 2015. Image via facebook.com/StarWars.jp.
Chaen’s pharaoh sculpture tented outside at the Tottori Sand Museum’s ongoing Egypt-themed exhibition.
The Tottori Sand Dunes after a light rainfall in August 2022.
Fukuoka
One my earliest /Film articles and the first news article I ever wrote for the site concerned yet another type of Japanese Star Wars float. The summer floats at the Hakata Gion Yamakasa festival in Fukuoka are much taller than the ones in Aomori. They don’t glow in the dark, but the Star Wars one I saw did retract to avoid hitting power lines on the street. You can read more about that here.
A 42-foot Kazariyama-style Star Wars float on display in a Fukuoka shopping arcade in 2017.
A regular Kazariyama float in Fukuoka’s Canal City Hakata mall.
Jump to Hyperspace
By way of a bonus, while I was in Shibuya last weekend, I happened to pop into Toy Sapiens, the flagship store of Hot Toys, where they have a “Star Wars: Jump to Hyperspace” event going on right now. You can see the eponymous bounty hunter (or #NotABountyHunter) from The Book of Boba Fett on his throne right when you walk in. They also have the Child, a.k.a. Grogu or Baby Yoda, on display, while Darth Vader towers over the store’s Star Wars section, as you can see below.
Other than that, 2022 has been a quiet year for updates to my Star Wars portfolio, mostly because I’m getting older and slightly more prone to jaded Dark Side thoughts, and I’ve reached a point where I’ve stopped caring as much about the franchises of my youth (and by youth, I mean mid-30s). This hasn’t been an overnight thing; it started back in 2018 when Solo was out and I first said I was closing the book on Star Wars. It could also be an occupational hazard of writing about movies and TV for a living while streamers are pumping out more and more content to diminishing returns.
Obi-Wan Kenobi
I might be in the minority, but I wasn’t a big fan of Moon Knight or Obi-Wan Kenobi, and I’ve sort of mentally checked out of Disney+ since those two shows hit earlier this year (though I hear good things about Ms. Marvel). The finale of the former and premiere of the latter both arrived in May 2022, when Star Wars marked the occasion of its 45th anniversary.
Ewan McGregor brings plenty of gravitas, and the lightsaber night fights made for some cool imagery, but seeing another prequel with a child actor playing a Muppet Baby version of a legacy character didn’t do much more for me than The Phantom Menace did once upon a time. In Obi-Wan Kenobi, even the titular Jedi is haunted by nightmares of the prequels. Like the new, precocious young Leia (Vivien Lyra Blair), I’d frankly “rather be digested by a jakobeast” than go down that road again.
Andor
The trailer for Andor — a prequel to a prequel, no less — makes it look good and epic, but that’s what trailers are designed to do, irrespective of the quality of the entertainment product they’re marketing. So far, based on the first three episodes today, Andor is off to a slow start, with a few too many vanilla white guys and a few too many filler scenes of Cassian Andor (Diego Luna) walking the streets of Ferrix. (Not going to lie. I had to google the name.)
Things pick up as the first act wraps up in episode 3, and I appreciate what showrunner Tony Gilroy is trying to do by breaking from the usual “faster and more intense” pacing and having a series geared more toward the audience for adult dramas. On the whole, I find the aesthetic of Andor more in line with my personal taste than that of Obi-Wan Kenobi, so I’m on board with it until at least the end of this 12-episode first season. Yet with all the other live-action Star Wars shows Disney+ has in the pipeline, I think we’re fast approaching a saturation point where I’m going to disconnect from the franchise even more — as I have already with the Marvel Cinematic Universe — and not be watching every single show they put out after this.
Maybe I’ll change my tune in 2027 when Star Wars is celebrating its 50th anniversary. Until then, may the Force be with you.