Swedish Fans Share The Experience Of Ticket Lines
So, what’s it
like to be among the last to see The Phantom Menace?
Swedish writer Michael Johansson invites us along for his Episode I adventure
Submitted by Michael Johansson
Published 9/9/99
(Please click on images to view full size photographs)
If there's a bright center to the universe, you're on the planet that it's farthest from. That's how it feels to be a Star Wars fan and live in the little country called Sweden. After exactly 3 months, the doors finally opened for the first installment of the Star Wars saga in this small country.
Over the summer there hasn't been too much noise around the new Star Wars film here, just some gossip that comes from America. I know lots of people that have been shielded off from the world because they don't want to read any spoilers about Episode 1 (some even avoid knowing how the characters looks, which can be quite hard to miss). But as a true weak-minded fool I have swallowed all the spoilers that I have had the pleasure to come across. I have read the book, the comics, listened to the soundtrack and I have even watched the much-hated bootleg. If the premiere over here had been sooner I might not have watched the bootleg or read the book. The reason, according to those who run the film business around here, they wanted to show it in August when the schools were starting because no one goes to the cinema in the summer. Well, I don't really care now when the release is around the corner but I can tell you that it sucked to live here in May.
At last the big day was here, the day when the tickets were going to
be released to the public (to be exact it was the day before because the tickets were
released at 00:01). I took my bag, loaded it with my copy of the Han Solo adventures that
I haven't finished (and I doubt that I ever will) and headed over to Stockholm. As I sat
in the train waiting to arrive I had the fear that I would line up alone, that there
really wasn't so many Star Wars fans in Sweden as I thought. When I arrived in Stockholm I
went down the subway and the first thing I see is a poster with Darth Maul, the most evil
man in a cinema this year. I wasn't thinking more about Star Wars; instead I was lost in a
city I seldom visited. But to my luck I found Biopalatset, which lies next door to the
cinema that had the golden tickets. When I arrived there my heart jumped. A LINE! Curse my
metal body I was late. So I bought some Cola and joined them. The problem to begin with
was that the line was surrounded with pubs so there were lots of drunk, and for the most
time entertaining, people around. After one hour I started talking with the other fellows
in line. We played some cards and then were abruptly cut off by a heavy rain. I of course
had nothing to protect me with. So we found a shelter under some sort of modern art
sculpture. The rain disappeared as quickly as it had come and we had to grab our place in
line back because the lined had started to move.
The line wasn't organized by professionals I can tell you that. The
line went past us, around the statue and back into the line again, before our places. The
good thing was that I found a fellow fan that was as great fan of Star Wars as I was last
in line. We talked about how bad the expanded universe books were and I spoiled Vector
Prime a bit for him. After that nice chat I walked to the front of the line to get some
photos. The next time I found the fan that was last in line was 10 meters from where the
line started. Of course did we have a trivia and I met his friend who didn't believe that
there were fans like us. After a little hunt for Star Wars Pepsi there were less then 1
hour left until the release. Then suddenly the line collapsed and we were 20 meters ahead
in the line. We talked a little about how stupid people were to come at 23:30 and think
that they would be first in line.
After another collapse in the line we started to count down the last
minutes until 00:01. We tried to start a political party that supported the Empire but no
one cared to join, we even sang the Imperial March but no reaction. And when finally the
clock was 00:01 there was this roar that must have woken up half the town, the tickets
were released. But it still took awhile for us to get into the cinema. 10 meters from the
opening a little burned-out alcoholic came with two beers close to his chest, he said
something about a rock concert and wondered why we stood there, then played some air
guitar and disappeared. We were pretty certain that we had seen Yoda in real life. We got
even closer to the door and people came out shouting that they had gotten the tickets to
Notting Hill (don't ask, some sort of line joke). And when the cinema guard, a small
person, eventually let us into the cinema, we jumped down the steep stairs almost getting
us killed. I put up the money and got my beloved tickets, I went out with a big smile on
my face and continued through the line (a little afraid to get killed for the tickets).
The point is that this is only my story, from the line that I attended. There was probably a line outside every cinema in this country that day. I never thought that Star Wars was so huge here in Sweden, I saw old people, people that looked like Indians, small boys, even their parents in line. I will never doubt that this country is obsessed with Star Wars again. I hope that those who decide when Episode 2 is to arrive here also know that the Force is strong in this country.
(Michael Johansson is a huge Swedish Star Wars fan and starter of the Swedish fan site Kraften (translated to "The Force").)