T'Bone at T'Bone's SW Universe noted in his review that if he had any criticism at all of the book, it was that Bowen injects too much of his opinion. Don't worry, he is generally favorable to the PT, but at times even I felt from a writer's perspective the editorializing was distracting. The facts in the book speak for themselves.

T'Bone can kiss my butt. After he looks in the mirror to see what "someone who injects his own opinion" into allegedly neutral SW matters looks like.

Sorry...I don't much care for T'Bone.

It does sound like Mr. Bowen could've done with a good editor. But oh well. As far as I'm concerned, the SW bashers all over the message boards, and their representatives in Darth Media, could do with a good editor, and fact-checker, and B.S.-detector, and a sharp right hook in the kisser...

SW is a guy thing? Well, it was created by a guy and most of its characters are male, but despite the occasional accusations of sexism I've seen leveled against Lucas, by feminists as well as pholks who weren't feminists at all but just wanted to jump on the "bash SW and cloak it as moral outrage" bandwagon (similar example: the pholks who, out of nowhere, became champions of racial equality and bashed TPM's alleged "racist caricatures"), Lucas has, fairly consistently, created interesting and strong female characters in his storylines. Leia, Marion, Sorsha, Padmé -- they are not idealized pillars of PC virtue, they're no better or worse than their male counterparts. Even the much-maligned Willie from "Temple of Doom" does, in her own way, prove her mettle.

Which is why Mara Jade never was and never will be a genuine SW character, not just because Lucas didn't create her, but because she's a generic pseudo-feminist uberkewl kick-butt girl whose smart mouth and "dark past" are mere substitutes for any kind of depth, but who is rendered untouchable simply because she's female, and therefore, you must be a knuckle-dragging Neanderthal if you dislike her.

Lucas grew up with three sisters, and I doubt even the most delusional fervent Lucas-hater could say he was ever anything approaching macho. He raised two daughters, and from what I can tell, raised them no differently than he raised his son.

I personally used to know someone who visited "Skywalker Ranch" to do some voice-over work, and happened to run into a short, hirsute man in the hallway, who promptly turned and all but ran in the other direction -- the no-doubt bemused security escort informed her, "That was George." So I can see why people might call him "cold" and "unfriendly." But sexist? That's a stretch.

But back to SW being "a guy thing." Fneh. There are plenty of we womenfolk who like SW! I've always liked TV shows and movies that were thought of as being aimed at boys, and despite being a chick and happy to be one, I usually dislike "chick flicks" and am happier watching an action movie.

Lucas has admitted aiming SW at 12-year-olds (and he's done so since 1977, despite what bedwetters like to say about him pulling that out of his butt to "defend" the "kiddieness" of TPM), and it's pretty obvious that he aimed it at not just 12-year-olds but 12-year-old boys. But so what? Like all timeless tales, SW's appeal crosses all boundaries, and I'll always take a "boy's story" with interesting female characters over an excruciatingly PC movie/TV show/whatver with a perfect uber-heroine and a guy who is a loveable, but emasculated, goofball who never fails to recognize the woman's superiority kind of like EU Luke after he married Mara.