When I talk to my 14yo nephew about the Star Wars movies, he’s not really that big a fan and has a hard time remembering which Episode number goes by which subtitle. At one point, he asked me why I don’t just call them by their episode numbers, and I said that it wasn’t until the prequels came out that their numbers even were on the box or that Star Wars was marketed as A New Hope.
Then I showed him images of OT posters and VHS boxes to prove my point.
God those were awful posters.
They’re my favorites. I love the way they all connect with stars coming out from the middle, and not repeating the same characters (though I wouldn’t’ve shoved all the protagonists into ANH’s poster, as it leaves it little for the others; Chewbacca and Jabba? That’s all we’ve got for 6?). I’m using it as the inspiration for my custom covers, using roughly (though not exactly) the same style. It shows consistency between movies, which I’ve learned on OT.com is generally tossed out the window in favor of nostalgia (just look at the topic of this thread). The original posters are not the greatest. The first one has our protagonists idealized (buff Luke, sexy Leia) in a way that seems totally at odds with the film itself. The ESB poster, is okay, I have no major gripes with it, but it could use more Lando. The RotJ poster really should’ve used a different shot of Luke. The one picked just looks…odd.