Jawas are apparently instant-gratification crafting at its finest. I rediscovered the pattern in my favorites, popped out to buy the felt, and he was done before 8 PM last night. He still needs some detail work, like stitching to hold his hood closed and his sleeves up, and his belt needs to be considerably fancier, but right now he's a recognizable Jawa. Or maybe a she. I dunno.
I made he/she/it while watching the first Pirates of the Caribbean, which reminded me of how much I love that movie. I've had blazing arguments with people who hated it where they pointed out that it's rather formulaic, where I pointed out that the plot's actually well-thought-out and pirate movies as a whole historically tend to be rather formulaic.
I'll point you to one of my favorite authors, Rafael Sabatini, who was a darn fine formulaic writer who manages to make you gasp with every book and who was one of the heroes, if you will, of the swashbuckling genre. Warner Bros. adapted two of his books, Captain Blood and The Sea-Hawk, both starring Errol Flynn. He was the James Bond of his day- the choice for a swashbuckling epic. A Flynn movie was almost guaranteed to do well.
Swashbuckling movies are all about the action, the excitement, the suspension of disbelief. They are very good at what they do. They may tend to the formulaic, but that dosen't lessen their charm. Like fairy tales, it's sort of the point- no matter what happens, you always know the good guys will win.
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