John Adams shares his amazing story of how Star Wars as a constant through the highs and lows.
By John Adams //
Everyone has a Star Wars story, so we typically don’t run a bunch of them here on RetroZap. However, when John came to me with this, it moved me so much that I had to run it. The story here is at once completely unique but also relatable to just about every first-generation Star Wars fan. No matter your age or interest in Star Wars, I encourage you to read every word and learn about the good and the bad, the highs and the lows, and how Star Wars stayed a consistently positive impact in one person’s life. It’s real. All of it.-JT
I was in the store aisles the other day hunting for Star Wars toys and saw a bunch of kids running around all excited and yelling for their dad, “Star Wars! Dad, I want a Star Wars toy! Look, they have Rebels on DVD! Can we get it, dad?”
Seeing the excitement of those kids and the spark in their eyes when they saw what little was left in the toy aisles brought a smile to my face and warmed my heart. The next generation is just as enthralled with this magical world George Lucas created as I was when I was a kid, and it got me thinking about what Star Wars means to us all. Why does this resonate so much with children of the 70s, 80s and 90s as well as the kids of today? What is it about Star Wars that holds a special place in my heart–something no other movie or film series has ever done?
Why does Star Wars mean so much to me?
This may sound strange to some, but I know a lot of you out there will get where I am coming from when I say that Star Wars is more than just a movie to me. It’s more than just an adventure through a galaxy far, far away, more than just a good space opera, more than a bunch of strange characters trying to save the universe from even stranger characters. For me, it hits on a more personal level. Star Wars has meaning.
I was born in 1973, which means I was four years old when Star Wars hit the big screen. My godfather had seen this awesome film when he was on a trip and told my father that he should take me to see this amazing picture. It was my mother who finally took me, as most moms in that day did. She tells me that it was the first movie she took me to where I didn’t try to get up and run around, want to go home or just plain fall asleep in the theatre. She says that I tried to get up a few times before the film started and was fidgety, as usual, but then that music started and I looked up during the main crawl. When that Star Destroyer flew over the top of all our heads, I was hooked! She said I sat there at the edge of my seat the whole time with my jaw to the floor in awe. I was quiet the whole movie. When it ended and she asked how I liked it, I said just one thing, “Can we go again!?” She took me twenty-three times.
All of my first memories as a child are of Star Wars. As I said above, it was the first movie that really grabbed a hold of me. To this day, I am an artist, and the first drawings I ever made as a kid were of TIE-Fighters and X-Wings battling it out. The first time I connected with my new baby brother Joey was through Star Wars, and my first best friend was made while playing with the Star Wars toys.
I can remember coming downstairs and seeing Joey there with his glass jar full of Star Wars figures waiting to play out scenes from the movie on our living-room floor. Joey and I would spend hours inside in the winter and outside in the summer playing Star Wars and playing with our action figures. We also just loved it when we were invited to the neighbors’ house. Eric was a bit older than us and he had ALL the toys, playsets and vehicles set up on shelves in his room. Joey and I would just walk around his place with our eyes popped out of their sockets just looking at everything and dreaming of the day when we would have all these toys. Of course we were never allowed to touch.
But Star Wars was more than just a few good memories; it was also a place where I could go that was safe and comfortable. When I look back with the understanding and awareness of an adult, I now realize that I had some trauma in my childhood life, and Star Wars was always there for me when I needed a place to escape. My mother had always wanted to live in the country and work a farm so, when I was six going on seven, we moved away from the suburban life and into the country we went. I had to leave behind my best friend.
I was not aware of it at the time, but now as an adult, I can see that I felt lost and alone without my best friend there beside me. It was as if Han Solo had lost Chewie. The team was broken up. I remember sitting in the front porch with the shag-yellow carpet that was popular in the 70s and playing with all the cantina aliens. I could escape with these toys and they could be my friends. Friends that would never have to leave my life and would always be there with me. Incidentally, it was this yellow-shag carpet that ate my blaster pistol for Walrusman. I remember looking around the carpet for ages trying to find it after I had lost it. My mom most likely vacuumed it up, but I remember every time I was in that front porch playing, I would spend some time looking for that missing weapon.
Eventually Star Wars would bring me to another best friend–someone who remains a good friend to this day–Marty. I had a hard time making new friends in this new neighborhood as a seven year old just wandering the country streets and hoping to meet new kids to play with. Most all of the neighbor kids already had an established group and as we all know, kids can be a bit harsh, so I got chased out of more than one yard with the kids going “Get out of here, new kid!” But, then there was Marty.
Marty was a few years older than me, but not by much. He was also new to the neighborhood and to my surprise, he let me in his yard and there in his hand was a Darth Vader carrying case! Star Wars was back! Marty and I would play Star Wars in his front yard or mine and we could build elaborate secret bases for the Rebels out of the stones in his yard or the snow piles in mine. All year long, we would play Star Wars outside in the many, many acres of land surrounding each of our farms recreating scenes from Tatooine or Hoth.
My parents eventually divorced when I was 10. I think my brother and I went inward around this time and one of the few things that was there and stable in our lives was Star Wars. Return of the Jedi came out while this was going on and the movies once again sparked our imagination and gave us a place to escape during all the drama and turmoil in our lives. Nothing seemed solid or steady, nothing except Star Wars. Here was another movie to keep the imagination going. And, through Star Wars, we had each other.
My brother had an X-Wing and I had my Tie-Fighter. We would chase each other around the farm-house blasting at each other’s ships, taking turns who was chasing who. We would literally throw our ships when they got shot down. Mine usually went into the bushes for a softer landing, but my brother made his shoot up into the air and crash solidly onto the ground–eventually breaking off all the wings. Those are some of the fondest memories I have; my brother, Marty and I playing Star Wars. I think Star Wars was the first place where my brother and I bonded.
As we all do, we eventually got older and things started to change. Marty and I reached the age of 16 and I got a car. The NES (Nintendo Entertainment System) and other video games came out and took hold of me and my friends almost as strong as Star Wars. The ‘wars were no longer around and it looked as if there would never be another movie, so it took a back seat to other interests, such as the NES, girls and partying late into the night. There we some nights where I swear we never slept. We would drive around meeting new people in new towns and places closer to the city and spend all night roaming the streets with new friends and interesting people. My brother often tagged along and eventually all our friends kind of melded together. Our only rule when growing up in our teenage years, was to be home before our father woke up for work. Sometimes we would be scrambling in the door and running up the stairs to skirt into our rooms just in time for him to check before he went off to work.
I never really connected with my father until I was around 18 or 19 years old. He told me later in life that he just did not understand us boys. He never got why we loved these movies, comic-books and toys so much, so he just could not relate to us. His business- and money-oriented mind just didn’t get the geek culture that was sprouting up all around him. But it was my father that eventually brought Star Wars back into my life.
Growing up, we were not poor, but we also were not rich, by any means. We had every single action figure and some of the ships like the aforementioned Tie-Fighter and X-Wing, but we never got the big stuff like the AT-AT. I still remember my grandmother giving me Han Solo for Christmas of 1978 and that year each and every aunt, uncle and grandparent coordinated the gifts and got me one figure each, until I had all 12. Through the years, we kept getting all the figures and small vehicles, but I always wanted that AT-AT. It stuck in my mind like glue. Something I just HAD to have.
One morning on either my 18th or 19th birthday, I came downstairs to find a package on the table all wrapped up with a note on it. My father had run off to work or something and left it there for me to find. I don’t remember exactly, but the note said something to the effect of, “I know you had always wanted this, so here, you finally do”. I un-wrapped it and there, before my eyes, was an AT-AT. He apparently had found it on clearance for something like $5 at a Kay-Bee Toys and thought it would make a good gag gift. He intended to give me my “real gift” later that evening after he was home from work. To this day, I don’t even remember what my “real gift” was; all I cared about was that I finally had an AT-AT.
This gag gift sent me running up to my room and to the toy chest. I had this huge wooden and very solid crate with a huge wood lid on it where I had put all the toys we had as children. I dug through all the Transformers, G.I. Joe, He-man, Blackstar, M.A.S.K., Dino-Riders, Centurions, Sectaurs, Air Raiders, M.U.S.C.L.E. Men, and finally, there before me, at the bottom, were all the Star Wars toys. I eagerly pulled out the action figures, which were all in sandwich baggies with their weapons (something I had learned to do, since losing Walrusman’s blaster) and the ships and play-sets. Well, what was left of those anyways, and I started putting them together and setting them up all on the bedroom floor. I was just like that kid again, playing Star Wars at 19 years old.
I looked around my room and thought of those shelves that Eric, the neighbor-kid, had in his room and immediately got up and drove myself to the hardware store where my brother was now working.
By the end of the day, I had shelves everywhere and my room was all set up with all our old Star Wars toys. As I was setting all this up, I found a few with price stickers on them. Apparently, I had once thought about having a garage sale and getting rid of all this “old childhood junk,” and I was so thankful I never went ahead with that sale. I felt as though I was rescuing my treasured friends when I took those stickers off and placed each item carefully on a shelf.
That gag gift had rekindled my interest in comic-books and action figures and sparked the collector in me once again. The only problem was that I didn’t have much money to go back and buy the toys from my childhood to complete the collection. Sure, I worked at McDonalds and Wonderland Comics at the time, but that paid for my car, gas for the car, food, rock concerts and hanging out with my friends; things that I did not want to give up to a hobby. So Star Wars once again came to my aid. Our love of Star Wars sparked my friend Onofrio and me to open our own business. We would sell off other toys from lines we did not collect and use that money to get Star Wars and other things that interested us. We formed a company together and got a vendor license and would sell at local shows such as R.A.T.S.–the Rochester Antique Toy Show. Together we would hunt garage sales, thrift stores and clearance sales to find toys to sell through our business so we could then use the money to buy things we wanted for our own collections (something I still do to this day with my eBay store, Kingdom Of The Geeks).
We also joined a Star Wars club, called The Greater Rochester Area Star Wars Fan Club. I quickly became a super-involved member and would host meetings and other events. Randy, one of the guys who started the club, and I even got local radio and TV stations involved when the time was right for Star Wars to return to the theaters. As the prequels began, we organized the 5th line-up to start in the entire United States. We were featured and listed on places such as CountingDown and other websites who were tracking the lines forming around the country. My job even let me have two weeks’ vacation for this event and we started our line a full 10 days before the tickets even went on sale.
Randy and I planned on buying a ticket for each showing and we would sit there together watching Star Wars all day long, eating movie-theatre food in-between shows for lunch and dinner.
We were in all the newspapers and on TV and this got the club a lot of press and a ton of new members joined. I even met another very good friend who delivered pizza to all of us in line dressed as Boba-Fett. From the moment Brian walked up in that home-made outfit, we were friends for life. He made it from cardboard and plastic and an old jump-suit he found at an army surplus store. To this day, Brian and I are good friends, even though he now lives and teaches in Japan. But more importantly, Star Wars was back in my life once again and in full force!
However, after a personally difficult time, I decided to take a step in a new direction and closed down the toy business, packed up all my Star Wars stuff and moved across the country to Seattle, WA. It took an entire U-Haul to hold just my Star Wars and toy collection. (That was such a fun move, but again – a story for another time.)
I reached Seattle with my brother and started work at Nintendo of America, testing games for them. I enjoyed Star Wars still, but it was not a main focus for a while after moving here. I didn’t have a place to put my collection, so it stayed in an attic locked away in boxes. I went to see Revenge of the Sith with at the Cinerama in Seattle, but Star Wars just wasn’t the main focus of my life at the time. I felt as though it was time that I had to just “grow up”.
My father began trading stocks in his later years, and introduced me to the world of day trading. We started discussing stocks to purchase and what to hold onto and what to sell, when. I remember some of the very first stocks we bought together for long term investment were Hasbro and Lucasfilm for their ties to Star Wars. I knew Star Wars was a goldmine and anything attached to them would just skyrocket. We had found something in common and something we could share a bond over and it gave us a reason to talk to each other almost every other day. I am very fond of my father and was glad that again, through Star Wars, I had made a connection with another cherished family member, and now we talk regularly to “just talk,” like old friends.
Years went by, and I as I started getting older a few friends and family members passed away. All those deaths started to take a toll on me. I felt as though I was too young to be losing this many people in my life already. It made me start to look at my life and I was not quite sure I was who I wanted to be. Anxiety and depression were starting to take a hold on me. I took some good advice and started looking for what may be missing.
Then, it hit me. Star Wars. I started thinking of what made me happy my whole life and Star Wars was it–the one solid thing that had always been there. I got back into my art and photography and let Star Wars influence my creativity. I started showing my art at local galleries around the Seattle/Bellevue area and to my surprise, I was not alone in my nostalgia. Patrons of the galleries were coming in specifically to see my pieces and they spent time reminiscing about their own childhood and playing with the toys we all know and love. It brought joy to my heart knowing that I was not alone in my nostalgia and love of this wonderful universe.
Together with some friends, we started a podcast called “The Super Awesome Geek Show” to give an outlet for my fandom of Star Wars, comic-books and all things geeky. I AM a geek and always have been, so why not embrace who I really am? So, each week, my friends and I would geek out about a different topic in geek-culture. It was through podcasting that I found out about a few local Star Wars podcasts and discovered that Star Wars was alive and well in the geek community around Seattle.
I reached out and found a few local Star Wars clubs. They were a perfect fit for me and my love of Star Wars. But, while this was all coming together, it could not conquer the anxiety and depression I was living with. It was still there and getting worse, until I suffered a breakdown of sorts. My body just shut down and my digestive system just went on the fritz. I could not eat anything other than bananas and apple sauce for two whole weeks. I started missing work and my life was taking a downward spiral towards a slow or sudden death. My good friend, Jason, who started The Super Awesome Geek Show podcast with me, took me to the ER and finally a clinic, where I spent four and a half days. Jason brought me some Star Wars comics so I had things to read and do while working back to health. The wonderful people there helped me get to the root of my issues, and together with my love of Star Wars, really changed my life.
I am back and feeling better than ever. The new comics from Marvel Entertainment and now the new movies from Disney have brought new life to this magical world and really did help me through my stay at the clinic. You can hear my story on episode 67 of Super Awesome Geek Show.
So now Star Wars is back! There are new movies on the way, new Star Wars toys to collect and new people to meet and get involved with through our joint love of Star Wars. I am so thankful to George Lucas for creating this wonderfully imaginative universe of crazy, whacked-out characters and now grateful that Disney has taken up the helm with Dave Filoni, J.J. Abrams and Kathleen Kennedy making wonderful and fantastic new adventures and new characters to fall in love with.
Star Wars is more than just a movie to me. Star Wars was responsible for meeting some of my best friends in life. It encouraged me to open my own business. It helped me bond with my brother and in our later years, my father as well. Star Wars gave focus to my art and photography and through that, it helped me connect to the world in a way no other film has. Like an old friend, Star Wars has been there as something I always went back to, through the good times and the bad. It’s true when I say that Star Wars may very well have helped saved my life. It is the one solid thing that has always been there and now, with all this new material, I am sure it will be there for the rest of my life and bring that same joy and excitement to many, many generations to come. Thank You, George, Dave, J.J., Kathleen and so many others that have worked on Star Wars through the years for all the magic and for bringing that magic to so many of us fans. I am that kid again–running through the isle with the children of today shouting with excitement at all the new Star Wars toys and merchandise. Thank you.
This is what Star Wars means to me.