George didn’t gaslight us like that.
Lucas has been gaslighting the fan base for 40 years. Nine films, six films, twelve films, never about Vader, always about Vader, Vader not the father, Vader always the father, Han shot in self defense, Leia was always the sister, “what I’d always planned”, “I just didn’t have the technology in 1980/1977/1983”, The Original Vision, commissioned two authors to each write a second film, the 1977 negatives are gone forever, films should never be altered, the director can alter, etc, etc, etc.
He built the franchise off of gaslighting the fan base and his constant lying created the fracturing that led to things like this very community.
Exactly.
George is the undisputed King of gaslighting. He genuinely hoped (wishes?) that people would have bought into all of his bullsh*t and believe the constant contradictory statements he makes. I believe he hoped way back in 1995 with the final VHS and Laserdisc release of the original cuts that he would be able to get away with nonchalantly suppressing the original versions of the trilogy forever and that people wouldn’t really care too much, but when that plan backfired along with the mixed critical reception of the prequels, he became deeply resentful and started screwing around with the films even more just as an exercise of power. He wanted to beat people over the head with “These are MY films, I will do whatever the hell I want with them!”. So many of the nonsensical changes made since 1997 suggest this. Fans and the media had backed him into a corner over the years with questions regarding the unaltered OT, which is the only reason he ever publicly spoke about there being any other versions besides the SE after '97.
Disney have had a lot of issues of their own in regards to their handling of this franchise, but to me nothing they have done warrants George being placed on any higher of a pedestal than them. They have both done a disservice to fans in many different ways.