I grew up during the mid 1990’s Star Wars Renaissance so as a young kid this era was for me what 1977-1983 was for the generation before me. In my lifetime thus far, this was the most exciting time to be a Star Wars fan. I would often watch the films casually when they aired on Sci-Fi or whatever in the earlier 90s, but the Special Edition campaign and all of the hype surrounding it was what turned me into a ride or die Star Wars nerd for the rest of my childhood. I saw all 3 Special Editions in the theater as they were released and My mom bought me the Faces box set for my 9th Birthday in March of 1997. I’m honestly surprised that I even got the SE VHS Trilogy the following Christmas, as my parents were generally the type who didn’t see the point of owning more than one version of the same movie in the pre DVD era.

I remember for several years into the late 90s the Faces tapes were still readily available at a lot of places so I proudly displayed both on my shelf and never really thought much more into it until sometime in 2000 whenever the first re-release of the SEs came out on VHS with no mention of them being the SE on the box. It was during this time that I noticed all video rental chains which had previously stocked both versions in mass quantities were now only stocking the SE exclusively.