User:Brandon Rhea

"We have every right to dream heroic dreams."

- President Ronald Reagan

Brandon Patrick Keelan Rhea (born March 7, 1989), also known as “Jedimasterbac” or simply “Bac”, is a Star Wars writer best known for his Alternative Star Wars Saga. He has been a member of the online Star Wars community since June, 2004 and has been able to make a name for himself ever since. He is an Administrator on TheStarWarsRP.com and Fi-Sci.Com, as well as the Head Administrator and Head Writer on Sequel-Trilogy.Net. He is also a two-time and current VIP on TheForce.Net. On Star Wars Fanon, he has been User of the Week, has served as a High Priests and is currently a member of the Decreton Lords.

In his outside life, Brandon Rhea is a college freshman at Raritan Valley Community College and an Eagle Scout from BSA Troop 62 in Flemington, New Jersey. He is a Brotherhood Honor member of Sakuwit Lodge 2 where he has recently completed his term as Lodge Chief. He is also the Vice-Chief of Order of the Arrow Section NE-2B, serving Eastern Pennsylvania, Northern and Central New Jersey, Long Island and all of Europe.

Early Life/Rhea Legacy
"Always remember the idea that we are all equal. People rise and fall each and every day, but the ideas of equality, justice and freedom are everlasting. You can kill a man, you can hold his life in the palm of your hands and you can strip him of his existence, but no matter who you are or how much you try you cannot kill the ideals that he stands for."

- Brandon Rhea, November 12, 2006

Brandon Patrick Keelan Rhea was born on March 7, 1989 in New Brunswick, New Jersey. He has lived in Raritan Township, New Jersey for his entire life and has attended Francis A. Desmares Elementary School, Robert Hunter Elementary School, Reading-Fleming Middle School and Hunterdon Central Regional High School, the school he graduated from on June 21, 2007. While a Senior, he also attended the National Youth Leadership Forum for Law from November 7, 2006 to November 12, 2006 in Washington, DC. He will be attending Raritan Valley Community College in the Fall of 2007 where he will eventually transfer to either Drew University or Rutgers University. After college, he hopes to go to Law School and eventually become a politician. His life-long goal is to become President of the United States. Regardless of the legacy he leaves as President, he will always remember the legacy of his family before his birth.

Congressman John Rhea was a 19th Century politician, serving in the United States House of Representatives as the Chairman of the Committee on Post Office and Post Roads during the tenth through the thirteenth Congresses and a member of the Committee on Pensions and Revolutionary War claims during the fifteenth through the seventeenth Congresses.

Jack Rhea, Brandon’s paternal grandfather, served in the United States Army during World War II, holding the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. Jack fought on Omaha Beach in Normandy on D-Day and was awarded for his heroic actions during the Battle of the Bulge. He received two Purple Hearts during the war. Later on, Jack went on to become a professional Scouter, serving as the Director of Camping at Philmont Scout Ranch in Cimarron, New Mexico, where Brandon’s father grew up, and later as the Assistant Chief Scout Executive of Operations for the Boy Scouts of American, essentially making him second-in-command of the organization. Jack and Bart, as well as his brother Ron, are Eagle Scouts.

On his maternal side, Brandon’s great-grandfather Patrick Keelan, whose name inspired half of Brandon’s name, was the fire chief of Elizabeth, New Jersey. His son Thomas, Brandon’s maternal grandfather, also served during World War II in the United States Navy. Thomas helped build the ramp that launched the Enola Gay when it bombed Hiroshima during the final days of the war in the Pacific. Brandon’s maternal grandmother’s brother in law, Fred, was at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941 when it was attacked by the air and naval forces of the Empire of Japan.

Boy Scouts of America
"Without you, our lodge weekends would be nothing. Without you, our lodge would be nothing more than a clique. Without you, there would be no brotherhood of cheerful service. I was like you all once. I was an ordinary Ordeal member, but I stood up to become the Pahaquarra Chapter Chief. You all can stand up and raise your hand, just like I did. You all can help us to succeed."

- Brandon Rhea, June, 12, 2006

In 2000, Brandon joined Boy Scout Troop 194 in Flemington where he advanced to the rank of Life Scout. Positions he held in Troop 194 include, but are not limited to, Patrol Leader and Troop Guide. In 2004, he transferred to Boy Scout Troop 62, also in Flemington, due to outspoken issues he had with the adult leadership of Troop 194. In Troop 62, Brandon advanced to the rank of Eagle Scout and held positions such as Assistant Senior Patrol Leader and Senior Patrol Leader.

Also in 2004, Brandon was inducted into Sakuwit Lodge 2 of the Order of the Arrow, the National Honor Society of the Boy Scouts of America, as an Ordeal Honor member. He became a member of the Sakuwit Lodge Executive Committee only five months later. His first position was that of the Chief of the old Pahaquarra Chapter, serving as the order’s regional representative in Hunterdon and Warren Counties. The next year, when the three chapters became six, Brandon was the regional representative in Hunterdon as the Chief of the Lenape Chapter. That year, he also served as the Lodge Ordeal Committee Chairman, planning and overseeing the induction of new members. In June, 2006, Brandon was elected the Chief of Sakuwit Lodge, overseeing the entire lodge that serves all of Central New Jersey. In 2007, Brandon chose not to run for re-election and Randy Breingan Jr. was elected his successor. Brandon has also actively served on the Council of Chiefs of Section NE-2B, the order’s organization that serves eastern Pennsylvania, northern New Jersey, Long Island and all of Europe. At the 2007 Section NE-2B Conclave, Brandon was elected Section Vice-Chief where he will oversee the Lodge Assistance Program. As a member of the Order, Brandon was able to attend the National Order of the Arrow conference, joining 10,000 other Arrowmen at Michigan State University in August, 2006 for the largest gathering of Order of the Arrow members in history. It is interesting to note that Brandon’s father was also a Lodge Chief and that he was bestowed with the Vigil Honor, an honor Brandon hopes to be bestowed with sometime in the future.

Sequel-Trilogy.Net
Sequel-Trilogy.Net started out as a collaboration between Brandon, Michael Jones, Gregg Tasoulas and a few others that did not stick around for more than a few days or a few weeks. Their intention was to created a site that acted as if the Original Star Wars Trilogy had not yet been ceated, meaning that the only Star Wars films in existence would have been the Prequel Trilogy. The dates for the first three films were the same, but then they wrote up press releases, acting as George Lucas, saying that Episode IV would be released in 2008. The intention of the site was never to mislead anyone, unlike fans such as SuperShadow, but rather to give readers a look at what internet spoilers for Episode IV would have looked like. The idea died a slow and painful death. However, they soon decided to change the focus of the site to general Star Wars news and fan fiction.

The Alternative Star Wars Saga
"I have always maintained that I do, as a matter of fact, write these stories more for the fans of Star Wars than I do for myself, although I obviously cannot deny having sense of pride when I write them."

- Brandon Rhea

Brandon and Gregg soon set out to begin writing an “Alternate Trilogy”, an alternate universe Star Wars Trilogy, but because of conflicting ideas they began writing separate stories. Gregg decided to stick solely with Episode IV - Episode VI, but Brandon decided to expand the saga and write Episode IV - Episode IX, the latter being the story where Darth Vader is redeemed. There were many bumps in the road and, at one point, Brandon and Gregg were fired from Sequel-Trilogy.Net. While they were gone, a new staff member named Eric Giordmaina was brought in. Gregg eventually left due to personal reasons, but Brandon returned to the site after mending his friendship with Michael, both of them decreeing the entire ordeal as one big misunderstanding.

By the time he had returned, Brandon had already written a full plot synopsis for what he called “A New Beginning” and “Alliance of the Republic”. These stories soon received the official titles of Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Beginning and Star Wars: Episode V - Shadows of the Republic. In August of 2005, Brandon completed the plot synopsis’ for Episode VI - Fall of the Lettow, Episode VII - A New Hope, Episode VIII - Sins of the Father and Episode IX - Return of the Jedi. The stories were well received critically. In 2006, he began adapting Episode IV into novel form. As of Summer, 2007, Episode IV has been put on hold.

As of 2007, Brandon’s main focus of the Alternative Star Wars Saga is to complete his much anticipated Shadows of the Jedi Trilogy. He has completed half of Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac and he will immediately begin working on the first of the two sequels once the first novel is complete. He has been working on the first novel since Spring, 2006. He almost completed it in Spring, 2007 but decided to work on a rewrite of it, adding in new story elements and beefing up the writing.

Fi-Sci.Com
"Turning Fi-Sci on it’s head!"

- Original slogan of Fi-Sci.Com

For months, Michael had dreamed about creating a science fiction/fantasy website. Michael, Eric and Brandon eventually made that dream a reality. They called their reality Fi-Sci.Net, later known as Fi-Sci.Com. Eric quickly began to make a name for himself in the film industry through the site. Taking over the role of Chief News Editor, Eric began to make handy contacts within the business. Under the leadership of Michael, Fi-Sci became the one stop shop for all Sci-Fi/Fantasy needs. Because there were writers from the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia, the entire globe was effectively covered at all hours of the day. As of Summer, 2007, Eric had left the site and Michael and Brandon had been busy with other things, so the site has not been as active as it once was.

TheStarWarsRP.Com
"Faith, pride and good role-playing"

- The founding principles of TheStarWarsRP.Com.

When Brandon was briefly fired from Sequel-Trilogy.Net, another Star Wars enthusiast named Steven Alldis, who had already made a name for himself, offered him a job after a discussion on TheForce.Net. Brandon ended up co-operating a site called “The REAL SuperShadow”, the first website to thoroughly expose the lies of Mickey Suttle, ake. SuperShadow. Along with this, Brandon was made a moderator of The Star Wars RP, a site hosted at ProBoards. Weeks later, Steven decided that regular modship was not a good enough job for Brandon, so he was promoted to Global Moderator. In July, 2005, Steven chose Brandon to become the newest SWRP Administrator. Along with becoming Administrator, he also created his first Role-Play character, Ussej Padric Bac, and began role-playing the story that would become Shadows of the Jedi: The Legend of Ussej Padric Bac. In November, 2005, the members made a timeline jump seventy-five years into the future and moved from their ProBoards site to an Invision based site called TheStarWarsRP.Com. As of July 15, 2007, Brandon has served as an Administrator for over two years and is currently the longest serving staff member the website has had, save for Steven Alldis.

Star Wars Fanon
"Imagination is more important than knowledge."

- Albert Einstein

In December, 2006, Brandon become a regular at Star Wars Fanon, a Wiki devoted to allowing users to express their creativity by writing and posting encyclopedia entries on fanon characters, ships, events and anything else they could think of. Users quickly began to take notice of Brandon’s writing skills when one of his articles, Bendu Order, became a Featured Article. After Bendu Order, Brandon created five other articles that became Featured Articles: Dark Guardians of Lettow, Ussej Padric Bac II, Ussej Padric Bac III, Order of the Whills and Prophecies of The Skywalker. Order of the Whills was also Brandon’s first Good Article after that policy was enacted, his second being Prophecies of The Skywalker. Brandon is also a User of the Week, a former High Priest, a current Decreton Lord and a member of the Administration, becoming an Administrator on September 1, 2007. Brandon also rewrote the Manual of Style and Layout Guide.

Personality and Traits
"His name is really Anakin. We just call him Brandon to make him feel better."

- Rob Sheneman

Brandon is an outgoing teenager with a fairly average and normal personality. His hobbies include writing, leading and solving and any all problems that are thrown at him. Things he values include family, friendship, loyalty, courage, commitment, dedication, helpfulness and reverence. He claims to fear nothing and, as a politician, despises terrorists, tyranny and communism. Brandon is also not too afraid to admit that he is a science-fiction and superhero fans, having enjoy on many occasions Star wars, Superman, specifically Smallville, Batman and, on occasion, Star Trek.

Political Beliefs
Coming soon.

Behind the scenes

 * Brandon's two middle names, "Patrick Keelan", were the first name and surname of his maternal great-grandfather.
 * Brandon is the fourth Eagle Scout in his family.
 * Brandon has a better user page than Squishy Vic.