Star Wars Celebration News Trifecta: Blu-ray Blues, Jon Stewart Toy Love, Darth Maul’s Bro

? Remember when you were a kid and someone would point at your shirt and say “hey, what’s that?” then as soon as you’d look down they’d annoyingly stick their finger into your face and make a ‘boink’ sound? Well George Lucas did that to fans at this past weekend’s Star Wars Celebration V event in Orlando when he announced that all six of the Star Wars films would be released on Blu-ray next year. Trouble is, it’s the special editions of the original trilogy that are being issued — not the original theatrical versions that don’t include embarrasingly bad CGI Jabbas or impromptu Max Rebo Band showstoppers. (Apparently, Lucas explained to the New York Times that the “classic versions” of the film would be difficult to upgrade to HD for the time being). In other words, expect the same kind of double dips for the Star Wars films on Blu-ray as you’ve seen with them on every other format in the past. The announcement wasn’t a complete disappointment though. Mark Hamill showed up during a interview with Lucas conducted by Jon Stewart (more on him in a second) to present the above deleted scene from Return of the Jedi that will be one of the goodies included on the new set. It’s brief, yet totally wonderful…and its inclusion in the extras seems like a surefire way to entice the hardcore fans and purists who only want to buy the theatrical versions on DVD. Fuck.

?? During the aforementioned panel, R2-D2 made a surprise appearance to present Jon Stewart with this action figure bearing The Daily Show anchor’s likeness. It comes complete with goateed and non-goateed variant heads. As you can see, it is tremendous and therefore not available for purchase by consumers. It may ease the pain somewhat to know that you can watch the entire hour-long interview with Stewart and Lucas over at Collider.

? Also making its debut during the Celebration V weekend was this new trailer for the third season of The Clone Wars. Jump to the 1:50 mark for a look at the series’ new villain, evil mercenary Savage Oppress. Because a galaxy far, far away is apparently a small world (after all), Oppress is the brother of Darth Maul. And he’s pissed. Or something. I’m guessing he’s a savage who enjoys oppressing people, but that’s just a hunch. Find out for yourself when the show returns to Cartoon Network on September 17th.