Fans say the new, mega Hollywood production of the Star Wars prequel has been accompanied by a hard-ass attitude by the Lucasfilm regime.
Lucasfilm has announced a worldwide crackdown on unauthorized commercial uses of copyrights and trademarks, and they've begun yanking licenses back from some of the artists and writers who've faithfully stoked the Star Wars flame for many years.
Among them is Dave Dorman, one of three or four truly collectible creators of Star Wars art in the world.
Dorman painted the lushly colored, richly detailed cover art from the Dark Empire comic-book series, which is based on the Star Wars story and endorsed by Lucasfilm. George Lucas himself is a fan who owns 14 of the 16 pieces Dorman produced for the series.
So it was a surprise and a shock when Lucasfilm told Dorman that it wasn't renewing his license to paint Star Wars images in 1999.
"I was told that my work did not fit into their new marketing plan," said Dorman, from Rolling Thunder Graphics, his artist's studio in Shalimar, Florida. "I can sort of understand it from a business point of view -- my work is associated with the so-called Star Wars classics."
But Dorman's fans are not so gentle in their opinions. "Lucasfilm has lost touch with the very thing that made them: their fan base," said Keith Jakubowski, who has posted a petition on his extensively archived Star Wars site to restore Dorman's license.
"They should listen to the fans instead of big business," said 28-year-old Jakubowski, a computer programmer in Aurora, Illinois, whose collection of Star Wars paraphernalia, including some of Dorman's limited-edition art, is worth approximately US$45,000.
Other Dorman fans have similar laments, but see the controversy in Jedi terms -- the ceaseless battle between Good and Evil. "There's one thing I'm certain of, and that's that George Lucas himself doesn't know a thing about this," said Alex MacPhee, a 25-year-old Dorman disciple from Plantation, Florida. "Because if he did, he would do something about it."
Indeed, fans are passing around dark rumors about a new, barbarous licensing team at Lucasfilm.
"Somebody at Lucasfilm just doesn't care," said Paul Kester, whose art collection includes, in addition to Dorman's work, the original painting produced for the first poster made for the Star Wars movie.
"This fan network has sprung up around sharing this kind of stuff," said Kester, 46, who plans to take his 2- and 9-year-old sons to the New York prequel premiere. "Now there is one less thing to share."
"I don't hold a grudge at all," said Dorman, who is still doing other contract work with Lucasfilm. "It's a business. But there has to be a point where you look beyond and decide what's a detriment to the business and what's good for it. I don't think I was a detriment. I helped contribute to the mythology."
As one fan put it anonymously, "There's a machine that Lucas has hired that is like a hydra standing behind him, and he doesn't see it. It remains to be seen if Lucas will be dragged to the Dark Side, after all."
