Welcome to the Judge John Hodgman podcast. I'm Baylor Jesse Thorn, where in Chambers

this week clearing the docket. And with me is the King of the Cats, Judge John Hodgman.

Oh, I haven't been King of the Cats for some time. I'm barely an Earl of cats.

A vice Roy perhaps. Yeah, yeah. Like on Naboo, my royal title is actually ceremonial and

elected. I've given up my term of office as King of Cats. And now I'm Chamberlain of Cats.

Is Naboo is that Star Wars? Yeah, that's a Star War. Which who's on Naboo? Princess Amidala

was the Queen of Naboo. And then she wasn't. She became the Senator of Naboo. Is that one

of the prequel characters? That's from the Phantom Menace. 20 years ago. We were disappointed

by that film. The great trauma was visited. Now 20 years ago, we saw what happens when

someone is able to make their vision with unlimited resources and no one willing to tell them.

That's not a good idea. And I think that the Phantom Menace, it gave us Darth Maul.

It gave us a double-bladed lightsaber. It gave us some cool stuff. I remember thinking

there was a lot of cool-looking stuff in that movie. Yeah. And Princess Amidala's costuming

was tremendous. Incredible. Also gave us some extremely bad alien ethnic stereotypes

that should not have flown. Never mind at light speed, even on impulse drive. Should

not have flown. But did, weirdly. Had he not made a movie for like 20 years before that?

I think the last movie that he had a hand in was the radio-land murders. But I don't

know that he was credited as a director on anything since Star Wars. And he had a producer

on Star Wars, a new hope, and Star Wars, the Empire Strikes Back. I'm Gary Kertzmann,

I want to say. We'll get letters. Who was kind of like a counterforce to George Lucas's

vision. Not his vision, but a counterforce to George's impulses, right? And then he left

after Return of the Jedi, or before Return of the Jedi. And then George Lucas stood in

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