It’s over and done. I’ll never be able to walk in to a movie theatre again and see a new member to the Jersey family of films, for tonight at the United Artists theatre in Westwood, I’m proud to say that I’m one of the first to see Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back.

And what can I say, it’s everything I expected, an hour and a half of dick and fart jokes, just like old times.

After lining up at 4pm, two hours before the screening, I was treated to waiting until 5:30 to get in and waiting until 7pm for the movie to start.

As the lights dimmed, the crowd went into wild cheering as the Dimension Films logo appeared on screen, and we revisit the Quick Stop one last time, back where it all started (in more ways than one, as the movie explains).

Slowly but surely each member of the ensemble cast appeared, and each time the crowd went nuts, highlighted by massive applause for Jason Lee and Affleck’s characters.

Lee and Affleck always make you crave for more, so their handful of minutes on the screen left me wanting more, but I’m grateful to have had them in the film.

The story follows our beloved Jay and Silent Bob on their cross coast mission to Hollywood, where their misadventures keep the story moving along.

Jay is his usual hilarious self, with his old bag of gestures and catch phrases, and plenty of new gay jokes, sex jokes, and enough masterbation an oral sex jokes to make even the most liberal Askew’er die with laughter.

Silent Bob is silent (as per usual), but I must say his performance is top notch, with Kevin stealing quite a few laughs.

I think the two surprises are the two new Askew’ers, Eliza Dushku and Shannon Elizabeth.

Dushku, besides being incredibly sexy onscreen, is funny in her small part.

Meanwhile, Shannon Elizabeth really captures the whole feeling and vibe of Kevin’s characters from previous movies. She fits perfectly and is very funny.

And Will Ferrell, well, he never disappoints.

In what is the final installment of all these movies, I couldn’t be happier with the way it all ends. Complaints can be made, but really, is there a need to? It seems like Kevin really got to make a movie that he want, no holding back, crossing the line, stopping, then crossing it some more. The film is very self-reflexive, taking several jabs at itself, the actors in the film, and even us, the faithful fans that stalk Kevin’s every filmmaking move.

I could say more, but I wouldn’t want to give anything away, just get ready for a good time.

Shannon Elizabeth: She seemed slightly aloof, but nonetheless sweet. She obviously was wearing little to no makeup, and she still looked great. For some reason an innocent question about DVD (”Would you like to take part on the DVD commentary?”) struck a nerve with the publicist, who but in and said “What a random question!” Very odd. Odder still was that Shannon appeared to have no idea what a DVD commentary was. Strange tidbit: not only has she not seen Kevin’s other films, she says she “feels no need to.”

Kevin: What is there to say? His usual self, and the time with him flew by way too quickly, especially in light of how he likes telling those long stories.

Jason Lee: Laid-back as usual. He remembered me from our hanging out at the Spirits back in March, which was cool. There were some awkward moments of dead air at this roundtable, though, since his roles in the film aren’t too large.

Mark Hamill: Man, is this guy HYPER. It was quite a shock. There were a couple of times where he got so caught up in telling his stories that he spontaneously grabbed my arm. The publicist had a hard time containing him when time was up.

Eliza Dushku/Jennifer Schwalbach-Smith: These two were paired off, which was a shame because there certainly seemed to be enough to talk about to warrant individual sessions. Eliza… first of all, *damn*. I always thought she was hot, but I had no idea. She wore this bust-enhancing tank-top with a machine gun on it. And she has such a great kick-back demeanor. She certainly seems more down with the Askew vibe than Shannon. Jennifer obviously ate up being on the other side of the interview fence. She’s insanely nice, and I realized it’s odd that only now she and I have met considering I had seen her at other functions. I suspect it won’t be the last though. She gave the best comment of the day, off the record when she and I chatted a little after the official session was over. I told her the Cough Curer story, and she said with a smile, “He’s a magical man. At least in his own mind.” How hilarious…

Mewes was actually going to take part after all, but he was sick, so he had to back out. Ali Larter apparently is only doing TV press for some reason, so we were deprived.

I had everyone sign my press notes, and I’m gonna get that scanned and posted on my site, hopefully alongside full transcripts of the sessions. We shall see what Kevin says about that–and about me running an early review.

I’ll leave you with what Kevin wrote on my press notes: “Mike, This time, 4 stars. Please.”

“My name was in the flyer,” Smith said. “Just, like: ‘It’s rumored that Kevin Smith made this.’ I was like, me? I don’t how I got attached to it. I guess people assume I’m a big “Star Wars” fan. But I don’t have that much free time. Of all the movies that I was going to re-edit, believe me, that would not be the first one.”

(As it turns out, “Dogma” is the first film that Smith would like the opportunity to re-edit.)

But Smith was curious and gave the film a chance. For the most part, he liked what he saw.

“You know, it looks like an edited version of that movie,” said Smith. “Some of the edits kind of make the movie flow a lot better. Smart editing to say the least.”

When asked if he would be offended if a fan decided to re-edit one of his films – say, “Clerks” for example – Smith said he wouldn’t be particularly bothered.

“I wouldn’t feel bad at all,” he said. “I would just be like, ‘God you’ve got a lot of free time. Would you like to do my laundry while you’re at it? If you really want to help me out, come over to the house, watch the kids so I can go out with my wife.’”