Dreaming Disney - Smuggler's Gambit

When I was a teenager I volunteered at a library during the summer. This gave me unrestricted access to pretty much all the contents of the library. Did I mention that it was a library for the blind? So the Braille books were inaccessible to me since I did not read Braille. Of course, that also meant that a teenager could shelve Braille copies of Playboy with no fear, sorry kids there were not tactile representations of the pictures! And the books on record were honestly not very portable when working an 8 hour shift moving all day! But the books on tape were a joy. I could grab a book and throw it into the specialized tape player which we had plenty of laying around. And headphones were everywhere, which I really did not need since I often worked alone on deserted stacks. One day I realized that everything on tape was not a book, they also had radio plays!

What’s a radio play kids? Well before television you had to imagine the action in your mind! Radio dramas were the most popular from the 1930s to 1960s before television became a standard in most homes. The actors, played out the story dramatically with the assistance of in studio sound effects to help the listener imagine the action. When I made my discovery in the library stacks, I threw myself into the world of The Shadow and The Green Hornet. After a few summers I really came to appreciate how fun a radio show can be, especially when you need to pass some time.

Let me speed you up to 2012. In 2012 at Star Wars Celebration V, director Kyle Newman gathered together a group of Star Wars: The Clone Wars actors and Jimmy Mac from RebelForce Radio and put together a live Star Wars radio drama for the fans in attendance. StarWars.com has this radio drama, Smuggler’s Gambit: A Han Solo Adventure, available for free download.

There is also a Facebook page to keep you updated on future Radio productions from this group.   

You really should check it out if you are a Star Wars fan, or becoming one as you become familiar with this new Disney property. The voice acting is top notch and the production value is not what you would expect for a free presentation. It is fun adventure focusing around Han Solo, that almost everyone could enjoy on a slow day in Betweenland even if you are not an over the top fan.  And it will take you back to a time when there was not a promise of a future full of Star Wars and you had to rely on your imagination to create new images of Star Wars.