Rain doesn’t dampen festive spirit of Joliet’s annual Star Wars Day

Joliet — The force was strong Saturday in Joliet as thousands of ”Star Wars” fans braved the chilly rain to attend the Joliet Public Library’s 13th official Star Wars Day.

The library has been hosting the event, which features food, games, entertainment and merchandise vendors, for 13 of the past 15 years, with the 2020 and 2021 events being canceled because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“At our peak before COVID, we were getting close to 10,000 attending,” library Deputy Director Jim Deiters said Saturday. “We’ve not had that many for the last few years, but we think there are between 3,000 and 5,000 attending today. It’s been really good, especially considering the rain.”

Because of the weather, most of the day’s activities were moved indoors at the Joliet Area Historical Museum, the Renaissance Center and the Ottawa Street library branch, although fans did not let the rain dampen their spirits or stop some outdoor activities.

The event kicked off with a parade of cosplayers from the 501st Legion Midwest Garrison, a cosplay organization that attends events while raising money for charity. More than 200 costumed fans marched down Chicago Street from the Will County Office Building to the library, representing Storm Troopers, imperial commanders, rebel heroes, Jedi knights, Sith lords, Mandalorian warriors and alien creatures from across the galaxy.

“We like to say we get older, but we never grow up,” said Ray “Rex Fett” Bosques, the 501st Legion Midwest Garrison “commanding officer.” “I was 8 years old when ‘Star Wars’ first came out, and all I wanted to do was meet the characters. Now I have a chance to be a character and give kids the opportunity to get to do what I wanted then.”

The 501st Legion started as a small group of Storm Trooper cosplayers who would attend events together, eventually appearing in screen-accurate costumes on request at events in exchange for charitable donations, said Kim and Hawk Worley, the couple serving as the group’s volunteer leaders for Joliet’s Star Wars Day.

Eventually, the group’s founders met with George Lucas at a parade in California, where they were asked to appear, and Lucas granted the group official use of all “Star Wars” intellectual property, provided it was done for charity and everyone taking part was a volunteer.

Today, Kim said the group and its sister organizations include more than 15,000 members on six continents and have raised millions of dollars for charitable organizations around the globe, including the ALS Foundation, Susan Komen for the Cure and Make a Wish.

“It’s just so much fun,” said Kim, who originally was recruited into the group by members at a comic convention. “It’s about suspending disbelief and letting the kids experience a little bit of the legend in real life.”

Kim, Hawk and their child, Faith, have been coming to the event since 2012, when Faith was only 2.

“It’s evolved a lot over the years,” Kim said. “I can’t even tell you how many people we’ve recruited to help us do good in the world just here at this event. I know I’ve personally helped 15 sign up, but there have been a lot more.”

Even for fans not committed to professional-level costuming, cosplay is a big draw at the event, with hundreds of fans attending in various levels of homemade and store-bought costumes of characters from all three “Star Wars” trilogies and spinoff TV shows, comics and video games.

“I’m freezing, but it’s worth it,” said Amber Regalado, who was dressed in the iconic “slave Leia” bikini-style outfit. “Last year it was really hot, and I was the only one dressed comfortably in this.”

Regalado traveled from Kansas to attend the event with family members including her parents, stepmom, fiancé, brother and her brother’s girlfriend.

“It’s a big family thing for us,” she said. “It’s something we look forward to every year and [a] great way for a community of people with the same hobbies to have fun together.”

Regalado was not the only person for whom the event is a family affair. Chris Gomez, who was attending with his girlfriend Julie Zuniga in matching costumes as Anakin Skywalker and Padme Amidala, said he started coming with his dad when he was very young.

“I’ve pretty much been coming here since I can remember,” Gomez said. “My dad’s a huge ‘Star Wars’ fan, and seeing him geek out over it was always great. He absolutely got me into it.”

“This is my first year, and it’s awesome,” Zuniga said. “It’s so cool to see everybody dressed up.”

Some cosplayers were able to shop for accessories for their hobby from vendors who were selling 3D-printed and handmade props and weapons.

“We’ve been doing this for close to 10 years, and we love this event,” said Joel Weinberg, owner of “Shoot First Cosplay Weapons” who sells a variety of custom-made, 3D-printed lightsabers. “The Joliet Public Library is incredible. They’re great to the vendors, and we always have a great time.”

Weinberg’s lightsabers are hand-painted, 3D-printed hilts over PVC pipe and include the light-up blade color of the buyer’s choice. At Joliet’s Star Wars Day alone, he had 29 styles available to choose from.

“More so than the character lightsabers, I’ve noticed people love customizing them,” Weinberg said. “I think a lot of people just always wanted to be a Jedi, and this way they get something that’s just theirs.”

Along with custom lightsabers, guests could buy a variety of merchandise with a “Star Wars” theme from vendors, including home goods, toys and figurines, jewelry, soaps, blankets, shirts, and prints by numerous fan artists.

“I’ve been drawing since I was a little kid,” said Chicago-based artist Steve Palencia, who had a booth in the library with more than 20 different prints of “Star Wars” characters and ships. “When I was little, I took my mom’s eyeliner pencil and used it to draw X-wing fighters on the kitchen table. I got in trouble for that, but I’ve always been into it. Always.”

Palencia has been attending the Joliet event since its second year, selling his art, and said it’s always fun.

“It’s usually a good turnout, and the people are great,” he said. “It’s a good event.”

Another event regular is a celebrity in the “Star Wars” community, John Jackson Miller, an author who has written extensively for “Star Wars,” including tie-in novels and Marvel “Star Wars” comic books.

Miller is the author of several “Star Wars” novels, some of which have been deemed noncanonical “Legends” since Disney’s purchase of Lucasfilm, and several new novels that now fall into the official series timeline.

His most famous works include the Legends “Kenobi” story, which influenced the Disney+ TV show last year, and the “Knights of the Old Republic” comic series at Marvel. Most recently, he published “The Living Force,” a story about the Jedi Council that takes place one year before the “Star Wars” prequel trilogy.

“I started out as a journalist editing a magazine for comics in 1993,” Miller said. “Doing that, I got to meet people from Marvel and Dark Horse Comics and Lucasfilm. As I was starting to branch out, I was hired by Marvel to write for ‘Iron Man,’ which led me to meeting the people behind the ‘Star Wars’ comics.”

From a single test issue of a “Star Wars” comic book, Miller was given the chance to write “Knights of the Old Republic,” which spanned 57 issues from 2006 to 2012, and eventually was given the opportunity to write tie-in novels.

“‘Kenobi’ was probably my most popular novel, and even though it’s in Legends now, nothing Disney has done has erased any of it, which makes me happy,” Miller said. “They even used ideas from it for the series.”

Miller was selling copies of his “Star Wars” and “Star Trek” tie-in novels and signing them for fans, including entire 7½-pound collected editions of “Knights of the Old Republic.”

“I’ve been coming to this event for the last eight years, and it’s always the busiest few hours I have every year,” he said. “There’s a huge wash of people coming through here, and I see more people and do more business in a few hours here than I do at C2E2. It’s a really good event.”

“There’s really something for everybody here,” said Karla Gonzalez Castillo, who was attending with her sister-in-law and their combined six children ages 3 to 13. “It’s a family tradition we really enjoy, and it’s great for the community.

“It’s just about ‘Star Wars.’ Everybody likes ‘Star Wars’ across all races and genders and ages. It’s for everybody. Isn’t that just great?”