I'm really not sure if I should be cringing at the news that Disney is buying Lucasfilm. Apparently, they have already started planning for "Episode 7" to be released in 2015, and for a new Star Wars film to be released every 2 or 3 years after (probably indefinitely, until they stop making money).

George Lucas is being retained as a "creative consultant", but it is yet to be revealed just how involved he will be.

This could be very good news or very bad news for Star Wars fans. On the one hand, Disney seems to be intent to milk the franchise for all its worth and could very likely drive it into the ground with the inevitable straight-to-dvd released (see Bambi, Aladdin, and Beauty and the Beast). This could be good news for the more feeble-minded fans who happily eat up anything with the words "Star" and "Wars" and the Lucasfilm logo on the box.

But can we really say for sure that Disney will further tarnish the franchise any more than Lucasfilm has already done with the prequel movies? After all, Disney has a track record of making pretty good movies. Their handling of the Marvel film licenses has been respectful at the very least. Sure Captain America and Thor didn't blow critics away, and Iron Man 2 received mixed opinions. But considering that all those movies were really just feature-length teasers for the exceptionally-well-executed Avengers movie, they turned out pretty well.

Fourty-five years ago today, on September 8th, 1966, the first episode of Star Trek was aired on CBS.

We can celebrate this occasion today with news about the release of Star Trek: The Next Generation on Blu-ray later this year. Paramount and CBS have announced that a Blu-ray sampler disc will be available later this year to promote the series' Blu-ray debut. The studio says the sampler will contain four episodes, but since two of those episodes are "Encounter At Farpoint" parts I and II, I really only consider there to be three episodes. The other two included episodes are "Sins of the Father" and "The Inner Light".

Read an article today at TG Daily saying that Lucasfilm will start production on 3-D Star Wars with The Phantom Menace.

The plan is to re-release all six Star Wars movies in 3-D in "episode" order: starting with The Phantom Menace and ending with Return of the Jedi.

However, if The Phantom Menace does not perform well enough, the studio may scrap the remaining five 3-D adaptations.