I don't really post much on forums these days, but felt compelled to respond to this.

I think nearly the entire visual success of Star Wars can be SOLELY contributed to Ralph's amazing sketches and paintings and of course imagination. True to form, Lucas never seems to mention these too much. Heck Ralph CREATED the visual look of Star Wars! Imagine Star Wars without many of these iconic images... What with talent like Ralph McQuarrie - who furnished Lucas with astoundingly realised finished visual references which were often copied on screen, John Williams' simply genius score, the guys at ILM, the set dressers and cutome departmens, set builders, Gil Tayler's amazing lighting, and the chemistry between the three main leads, I wonder how much of Star Wars' success was really the work of Mr Lucas... Certainly he came up with the story - and a damned fine one it was to, the way it borrowed from classic fairy tales, mythology, Kurosawa movies and so on.... But.....

With Lucas 100% in charge of everything, well we've seen the results haven't we - lol! I've never seen so much money and talent wasted on a bunch of shallow films.

Yep I often think of Mcquarrie's images when listening to the scores and agree it is a lot purer version of Star Wars. Even more so if you read the original novels, and/or listen to the original Radio Dramas too while looking at the paintings.

Great post :)