The ForceCast

The Weekly Force-Cast is the official podcast of TheForce.net and Rebelscum.com. Season One began on April 6, 2005, and the current season began on September 1, 2006. Regular episodes, which run anywhere from fifty minutes to two hours long, are released every Friday. The Force-Cast features the latest news, interviews, events and opinions from the Star Wars fan community. The show is hosted by Jason Swank and Peter Nadel, with occasional guest spots from collecting guru Dan Curto, Jimmy Mac a.k.a. "The Man", Rebelscum's Jovial Jay Shepard, and Former Fan Club President Dustin Roberts.



History
Originally, the Force-Cast was done by Erik Blythe, but he had to stop production of the episodes due to external conflicts. After a contest done by TheForce.Net's Dustin Roberts, Jason and Pete were selected to continue the show. As revealed in the audition tape, the two co-hosts originally called each other by nicknames, with Jason as "Jedi Swank" and Pete as "Master Nadel."

Show rundown
The main sections of the show consist of:


 * Intro: Jason and Pete open the show, and sometimes correct themselves as pointed out by listeners.
 * Billy Dee Clip of the Week: Jason and Pete play a clip of Lando Calrissian actor Billy Dee Williams playing the part of Toussaint Dubois on General Hospital: Night Shift.
 * Fantasy Football Update: Jason and Pete review the current standings and notable moments from the Force-Cast's own Fantasy Football League, created by Mick Celli.
 * Headlines: the two hosts will run through the events of the past week that related to Star Wars.
 * Indy Coverage: Jason and Pete update the audience on any news pertaining to Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.
 * Collecting: the Force-Cast gang, which sometimes includes collector Dan Curto, goes over collecting and merchandise announcements.
 * The Outrageously Unthinkable Story of the Week: Inspired by Sio Bibble's quote, "It's outrageous! It's unthinkable!" and accompanied by a musical introduction of its own, this section features a story that is deemed too hilarious or unfathomable to put in the general news section.
 * Listener calls/mail: Jason and Pete play voicemails and read emails from listeners, and respond to them.
 * Live call-ins: occurring throughout each episode, and only when the Force-Cast is recording via TalkShoe.

Running gags
Throughout the course of their show, Jason and Pete have created and ran with several gags, many of them perpetuated by fans of the show in the chat room.


 * Shirtless Palpatine: Jason maintains that this is not a "desire," but simply an casual, offhanded comment.
 * Blackhole Stormtrooper: Sparked by the hosts' great dislike for the action figure cop-out that was the Blackhole Stormtrooper, this gag has been further explored in a video Force-Cast for the September 28 episode.
 * "It's outrageous! It's unthinkable!": Although the joke now has its own show segment, it started out with Jason and Pete congratulating Sio Bibble actor Oliver Ford Davies on his birthday, and soon transformed into a exclamation thrown out whenever something shocked a Force-Cast fan.
 * The George Lucas Impression: Though many a chat participant has been fooled during the live recording into thinking that the Maker himself is on the show, it is in fact Jason doing an impression.
 * "I want my nickel!": Spawned from the unmatchable Jimmy Mac's interview with Admiral Conan Antonio Motti actor Richard LeParmentier; the actor complained about not getting paid for his famous line regarding the Death Star being the "ultimate power in the universe," and eventually the complaint evolved into a famous Force-Cast gripe.



Force-Cast Video
Though not produced by Jason and Pete, the weekly video episodes available on the Youtube Channel are officially "licensed" parodies of, and supplements to, each regular audio show. Produced by Force-Cast video icons Kay and Mark, each video segment includes special video content on top of audio from the latest episode of the show, with the Force-Cast crew making appearances as still images whose features are manipulated in sync with their dialog. Each video also ends with the Force-Cast's disclaimer being read by Jason, but with different video content accompanying it each time.

CafePress store
Around the time of Celebration IV, the Force-Cast introduced an online store where fans could buy t-shirts, mugs, aprons, mousepads, clocks, hats, stickers, magnets, and calendars printed with the Force-Cast logo. Fans sporting the logo at Celebration IV were rewarded with exclusive Force-Cast swag.

Four-Word Story
A big hit on the Force-Cast forums has been a thread called the Four-Word Story. Started on October 22, 2007, by Chris Pence, the idea is for each post to continue the story so far using only four words. Several plot twists and scene transitions have occurred seemingly out of nowhere, but the story always maintains a sense of cohesion. In addition to the thread on the forums, Force-Cast fan Eric also produces a Four-Word Micro-Cast, wherein he reads the story for listeners who don't browse the forums. Each episode runs no more than five minutes and features audio clips from the films accompanying the reading.

Micro-casts
The Force-Cast frequently releases Micro-Casts spanning a plethora of topics.


 * What's New In the EU? (This series was retired on March 7, 2007, when the final era of the EU was covered)
 * A Galaxy of Music
 * Interviews
 * Convention coverage (Celebrations, Comic-Cons, etc.)
 * Announced on the October 4th Force-Cast: A new collecting micro-cast hosted by Dan Curto

Listener interaction
At the end of every regular Friday episode, The Force-Cast crew plays voicemails and reads emails from Star Wars fans. Their voicemail number is (330) 871-4TFN (4836), their Skype username is forcecast, and their email address is podcast@theforce.net.

Host costuming
On the October 12 episode, Jason and Pete announced that they would try to put together a costume for the as-yet-unannounced Celebration 5. Jason had said that, being short in stature, he had always wanted to be Yoda for Halloween. In addition, because Pete was tall enough to be Luke, the pair decided to attempt a "Luke in training on Dagobah" setup, with Jason on Pete's back. The idea was met with much interest and enthusiasm from the fans, and one fan named Joel Cramer put together an artistic rendition of the costume. The sketch was in reference to Jason's statement on the episode saying, "I have conceptual sketches."

Live tapings
Jason and Pete stream their regular shows live through a website called TalkShoe. Fans of the show can download the TalkShoe client, chat with fellow fans, and take part in the recording by waiting in a queue to speak. Non-TalkShoe members may also choose to listen-in, although they may not chat. Occasionally, technical errors will pop up, although only the live listeners will hear them.

ThotMarket property
The Force-Cast is now represented by a stock property on a website called ThotMarket. On this website, users can buy and sell fake stock in properties that are created to represent blogs, websites, services, movie franchises, and commercial entities. As of August 29, 2007, at 9:32 PM EST, the stock value for the Force-Cast was at a shocking high of $136.53. This was the result of Jason and Pete mentioning the website on their August 24 episode. Unfortunately, the share price dropped abruptly, leaving it at $0.40 as of September 4, 2007, at 7:53 PM EST.

RebelScum forums
The official forums of Rebelscum.com have a section for the Force-Cast, where listeners post threads about topics from the show, general Star Wars news, and all things related to the podcast. Fans of the show also post in-jokes from previous episodes, questions for the hosts, messages for fellow listeners, and any input they have for the show. In the past, there have been several trivia contests, some of them with prizes and some of them just for fun.

List of all celebrity guests

 * September 1, 2006 - Composer Steve Parsons
 * September 8 and 15, 2006 - SW Fan Club President Dustin Roberts
 * September 22, 29, and October 6, 2006 - Artist Joe Corroney
 * October 13, 20, 27, and November 3, 2006 - Fanboys Director Kyle Newman
 * November 10 and 17, 2006 - Author Drew Karpyshyn
 * November 22, 2006 - Boba Fett Actor Jeremy Bulloch
 * January 17, 2007 - 501st Legion members Albin Johnson, Mark Fordham, Darren Blum, and Dean Plantamura
 * January 26, 2007 and February 2, 2007- You Can Draw Star Wars! Artists Bonnie Burton, Tom Hodges, and Matt Busch
 * February 14, 2007 - Mara Jade model Shannon McRandle
 * February 21, 2007 - Author Timothy Zahn
 * February 23, 2007 - One Man Star Wars performer Charlie Ross
 * March 5, 2007 - Comic book artists John Ostrander and Jan Duursema
 * March 12, 2007 - Red 5 Comics artists Paul Ens and Scott Chitwood
 * March 14, 2007 - Musician Suckadelic
 * March 21, 2007 - Evasive Action webstrip artists Paul Ens and Scott Chitwood
 * April 23, 2007 - Atom Films representative Chris Albrecht
 * April 27, 2007 - Lucasfilm Director of Fan Relations Steve Sansweet
 * May 16, 2007 - Celebration IV Artists Allison Sohn, Cat Staggs, William O'Neill, Tom Hodges, Russell Walks, Dave Dorman, Mark Brooks, Joe Corroney, Adam Hughes, and Grant Gould
 * May 21, 2007 - Celebration IV-related personalities Stan Stice, John Scoleri, Shane Turgeon, Gus Lopez, Cris and Courtney Macht, Kyle Newman, Kevin Burns, and Beth Segarra
 * May 28, 2007 - Celebration IV-related personalities Cris and Courtney Macht, Dan Madsen, and Don Bies
 * June 1, 2007 - Lando Calrissian actor Billy Dee Williams
 * June 27, 2007 - Artist Randy Martinez
 * June 29, 2007 - Artist Tom Hodges
 * September 27, 2007 - Artist Tom Hodges
 * October 2, 2007 - Star Wars Battlefront: Renegade Squadron Producer Jeff Penna and Assistance Producer K.C. Coleman
 * October 4, 2007 - C-3PO Actor Anthony Daniels
 * October 8, 2007 - Lando Calrissian Actor Billy Dee Williams
 * October 10, 2007 - Lucasfilm/ILM veteran C. Andrew Nelson
 * October 15 and 17, 2007 - Former Fan Club President and Insider magazine co-founder Dan Madsen
 * October 22, 2007 - Reference guide author Daniel Wallace
 * November 16,2 007 - Star Wars Vault authors Steve Sansweet and Pete Vilmur

Contests
The Force-Cast frequently receives Star Wars goodies from groups and individuals affiliated with Star Wars merchandise or media. Some of these items are made into prizes for Force-Cast contests. Some notable contests follow:


 * Pledge of Allegiance: Upon receiving two signed copies of Timothy Zahn's book Allegiance, Jason and Pete created the Pledge of Allegiance contest. Listeners were invited to pledge their allegiance to the Force-Cast in a voicemail; the two best pledges would receive first place and those people would get the signed copies of Allegiance. After extending the deadline for submissions by an extra week, Jason and Pete finally picked two winners from Maryland, Mike and Eric.
 * Legacy Revealed Contest (forums): When Jason and Pete got several promotional items from the History Channel for their upcoming documentary, The Legacy Revealed, they put together a contest to win the promo goods. T-Shirts, posters, and trading card packs were included, with listeners vying for the first response post to several trivia questions from the show hosts.
 * Number One Longing, Number Two Regret: This contest was run by RebelScum forum-goer and TheForce.Net staffer Mike Barrick. He had acquired four copies of Jeremy Bulloch's movie Number One Longing, Number Two Regret.  Barrick held a miniature trivia contest, wherein four forum users won the DVDs.  The first copy, which was unsigned, went to Eric, a Marylander who was also Mike Barrick's co-winner from the Force-Cast's Pledge of Allegiance contest.  The three signed copies went to Pedro Jorba, a listener from Mexico City; John Fagan, from Connecticut; and Nick, a student at Purdue University.
 * Battlefront: Renegade Squadron Giveaway: The first giveaway conducted in a live Talkshoe chat. After doing a Micro-Cast interview with two LucasArts developers, Jason and Pete got four copies of their new game, Star Wars Battlefront: Renegade Squadron.  Shortly thereafter, in the next live episode of the show, the duo announced that they would be giving away the four copies they had received.  Each of the next four episodes featured a quick section at the end, where Jason and Pete took the first live caller with the answer to the trivia question.
 * October 5: Joshua. The question was, "What were the names of the two LucasArts developers interviewed on a recent micro-cast?"
 * October 12: Eric. The question was, "In which movie did Billy Dee play football player Gale Sayers?"
 * October 19: Nate. The question was, "Name the Star Wars film in which Dan Madsen had a cameo role, and name his role."
 * October 26: Robbie. The question was, "What was Daniel Wallace's first officially licensed reference guide?"