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Created by a team of students and teachers at the Pavlovo Arts College in Russia, the largest padlock in the world (according to Guinness World Records) measures 56.8 inches tall, 41.3 inches wide, and 10.2 inches deep. Altogether this hefty lock, including key, weighs 916 pounds

One of the earliest known vacuum cleaners was so large that it had to be hauled from house to house via a horse-drawn carriage. Its giant hoses were popped through the windows of customers, and a gas-pow

Dolphins are known to be one of the smartest animals on the planet—possibly because they can conserve their brain power. Because they must be constantly on the lookout for predators, the marine mammals have developed a neat trick of maintaining partial consciousness eve

It sounds like something out of a sci-fi novel, but British inventors John Foden and Yannick Read have come up with a bicycle that actually flies. The XploreAir Paravelo is composed of a folding bicycle and a lightweight trailer that contains a biofuel-powered fan motor

For millions of people, the coffee break is a key but often under-appreciated part of each day. To stop and give the break its proper due, the town of Stoughton, Wisconsin, hosts an annual Coffee Break Festival. The gath

Bonobo," the common name for apes, may sound like some sort of translation of a meaningful term, but in fact, it was the result of a typo. Researchers reputedly first found the animals in the town of Bolobo, Zaire, in the '20s, but the name of the place was misspelled "Bonobo" o

For those who romanticize a burial at sea, the company Eternal Reefs offers an innovative solution. It mixes the cremated remains of a person with concrete to create a "pearl" onto which loved ones can etch personal messages, handprints or (environmentally friendly) mementos. The pearl is then encased in a "reef ball" that is dropped into the sea, where it provides a new habitat for fish and other

Compared with the snowy tundras and barren deserts the Star Wars cast and crew had to endure, filming in the Redwood forests of Northern California, to create the forest moon of Endor for Return of the Jedi, must have been a cakewalk. Except for actor Peter Mayhew, who played Chewbacca. During the several-month shoot, he had to be constantly chaperoned by bodyguards in bright vests, to protect him from hunters.

To create the barren desert planet of Tatooine, Lucas found the perfect setting in Tunisia. What he didn't account for was how even a little movie production could lead to socio-political tensions. Tunisia shares a border with Libya, which, at the time, was ruled by dictator Muammar Gaddafi. Reportedly, the Tunisian government received threats from Gaddafi, warning that a conflict was inevitable if they didn't remove a military vehicle from the Libyan border

According to Matthew Wood, sound editor on The Rise of Skywalker, changes to the script came in so late that he had to travel to the home of Adam Driver, who played villain Kylo Ren throughout the latest trilogy, to record him delivering a few new and necessary lines in a rather low-tech place. "I ended up opening up one of his closets where he had all of his suits, and I just pushed the suits out of the way and said, 'hang your head in here,'" Wood said on the SoundWorks Collection podcast, per The Week.

When we think of Darth Vader, the first name that comes to mind is James Earl Jones, the voice behind the series' most infamous villain. But the man in the costume was somebody entirely different, a British bodybuilder named David Prowse. And Prowse apparently isn't among Lucas's favorite people

While doing an interview on BBC's The Graham Norton Show, Samuel L. Jackson insisted that he still owned the purple lightsaber that his character, Mace Windu, used in some pretty epic battles in the Star Wars prequels. But the most shocking revelation? What Jackson claimed was engraved on his lightsaber, which is not suitable for young childre

ost people believe that legendary bounty hunter Boba Fett first appeared in 1980's The Empire Strikes Back. But hardcore fans know it happened a little earlier, in the much-maligned Star Wars Holiday Special in 1978—and they'd be wrong, too. His history goes back a little further.

Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac) goes against General Leia Organa's (Carrie Fisher) orders in The Last Jedi, but not without consequence. Isaac revealed in an interview with Stephen Colbert that the scene in which Leia demotes Poe was a difficult one to get right, leading to the lat

Long before Yoda was created with animatronics and puppetry, by master Muppeteer Frank Oz, the plan was to hire an actual actor… a simian actor, that is. According to The Making of Star Wars: Empire Strikes Back, they planned to dress up a real monkey in a Yoda costume and mask. There are photos of the monkey in training and the weirdly hideous Yoda mask prototype.

The original trilogy ends on a happy note. The Dark Side is defeated and all of our favorite characters survive. But, according to J.W. Rinzler's behind-the-scenes tell-all The Making of Star Wars: The Return of the Jedi, the seminal tome about how Episode VI was made, that wasn't the original idea.

he R2-D2 we all know and love speaks only in beeps and whistles, a robot language that most of his friends can understand. But in the original draft of Star Wars, written in 1974, R2-D2 spoke in complete sentences.