I have no special ill-will towards Kevin Smith, and I’ve even liked a couple of his movies. But I noticed every time I wrote about him, commenter “Chareth Cutestory” would erupt in verbose rage, in such a way that was much more entertaining than the news items themselves. At some point, I just decided to let him write the posts himself, sustained only by his incandescent rage and dog-eared thesaurus. Apologies (sort of), Kevin Smith fans, I just find the idea of having an arbitrary nemesis endlessly compelling. -Vince
Kevin Smith, showing tremendous fortitude in foregoing a marijuana joke, recently announced on Twitter that the first draft of Clerks III is complete. Granted, he couldn’t help but toss a Star Wars reference in there, but what’s he supposed to do? NOT treat his audience like slovenly caricatures? Panderers gonna pander. Those limited-edition Silent Bob-a Fett figurines ain’t gonna sell themselves, and sh*t.
“Plays like the EMPIRE STRIKES BACK of the Clerks trilogy,” wrote Smith in the caption of an Instagrammed photo of the script, which is how things are formally announced now because we’re circling the drain as a society and the end is nigh. Now, obviously Smith knows that The Empire Strikes Back is actually the fifth episode in the Star Wars series, and the second film released chronologically, so I assume that he invoked it because Clerks III will feature a scene where Jay eviscerates Silent Bob with a shattered bong shard and slides into his warm, soft entrails to survive a Red Bank snow storm. Or maybe because every scene will literally be Dante and Randall arguing about Star Wars as Rosario Dawson stands just out of frame, firing her agent over text message.
Most likely, though, Clerks III plays like Empire because the film’s very existence makes you want to scream into the face of a terrifying reality and then hurl yourself down a ventilation shaft.