Last Christmas there was a Lego Star Wars special on Disney Plus, which I felt was "reasonable but not quite clever enough to live long in the memory". Fortunately, whilst still not a must-see event, this Halloween special is a lot more inventive and fun for it.
Whilst mopping up the remains of the First Order, Poe Dameron's (Jake Green) X-Wing is damaged and crash lands on Mustafar. There he discovers that Graballa The Hutt (Dana Snyder) is converting Darth Vader's (Matt Sloan) castle into a new Empire inspired hotel. Whilst Dameron is negotiating for assistance, Vanee (Tony Hale) a cloaked figure who came with the castle begins to recount several stories with the aim of encouraging progress deeper and deeper into the secret chambers and to the Sith treasures hidden inside.
Essentially the story is a Portmanteau film, with Vanee's stories making up the bulk of the run time. The stories are loose movie parodies. The middle one, is the least easy to pinpoint what film they're after, but something like the Dracula Meets Frankenstein Universal films is probably the clearest touchpoint. This sees a resurrected Darth Maul battle a restored General Grievous to recover a lightsabre for the Emperor. The third section is an adaptation of the classic Twilight Zone story, "The Monkey's Paw" with "The Wookies Paw" in which young Luke Skywalker wishes his way off Tatooine, but each wish takes him further and further into the dark side.
You may have noticed I've missed off the first one, that's because it's by far the best. A full parody of "The Lost Boys" detailing Kylo Ren's decision to join up with the Knights of Ren. I'm not sure how many people planning to watch this film will also be intimately familiar with an Vampire film from 34 years ago - but I was in that bracket and enjoyed that section quite a lot. There was a myriad of other little moments cribbed from classic horror in there too.
Overall, a lot funnier and more inventive than the Christmas special, if perhaps still a way short of the cinematic Lego films.
