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There should be a proper release of the 1977 Star Wars at this point — Page 2

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I still think they will never be released again. Lucas considered them garbage versions and rough drafts he wanted people to forget about in time. Most people don’t even realize the films were changed and how many versions of the Special Edition there are. The films have been out there in an altered state for more than half the lifetime of the original film. The only reason there won’t be a fifth version of the Special Edition is Disney taking Star Wars off of Lucas hands.

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I seriously doubt George cares one way or the other anymore.

As for a potential botch job, I’d gladly take a grainy transfer even if it had less fine detail than the DNR’d 2019 version.

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Lucas won. He has essentially rewritten history. Most don’t even know about the changes and of those who do know, not all of them care. I’m thankful for the fan preservation efforts for my own use, but the other part of the effort was to preserve an essential piece of cultural history for the future. I think the only way that happens to a significant enough extent is an official release similar to Blade Runner: Final Cut, and I don’t see that happening. I’d like to know people could easily revisit what was. I just wish someone would straightforward ask about it. The silence is deafening.

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On a long enough timeline, the unaltered versions get restored by Disney simply because they run out of ways to keep repackaging and reselling the same movies again and again without including them.

At this point there’s no logical financial reason why they haven’t done it yet, other than to keep milking these releases as much as possible (the deleted scenes should’ve been among the bonus features on the 2004 dvd but they saved them for the blu-ray, the 2011 blu-ray should’ve been remastered in 4k but they saved that for the uhd, etc).

Like, they’re honestly going to tell me that they thought the Maclunkey version in hdr would sell like mad but there just wouldn’t be enough interest in the OOT to make it worth their while?

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Fang Zei said:

On a long enough timeline, the unaltered versions get restored by Disney simply because they run out of ways to keep repackaging and reselling the same movies again and again without including them.

Agreed. I doubt Disney would release them out of the goodness of their hearts (although they’d market it as such), but rather because they’ve just about killed the golden goose.

As noted, the 50th anniversary is probably the soonest we can realistically hope for a formal release, but even then I doubt they’d spend much time on properly restoring it.

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Isn’t Mickey Mouse supposed to enter public domain soon? Will Disney ever let that happen? Will Disney have to release the unaltered OT to keep it out of public domain? I don’t know about copyright laws, not that they matter. Disney can probably get whatever extensions they want passed.

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Disney frequently enjoys keeping movies they own locked away, and they’re certainly not in the business of releasing old versions of anything.

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Mocata said:

Disney frequently enjoys keeping movies they own locked away, and they’re certainly not in the business of releasing old versions of anything.

The only thing I can think of off the top of my head is The Muppet Christmas Carol. Jeffrey Katzenberg made the executive decision to remove “The Love is Gone” from the theatrical release because he thought it would be too sad, but it was reinstated for the home video release. When it came time to release the dvd, widescreen and fullscreen versions were both included on the same disc, but only the 4:3 version had the deleted song. Apparently they’d lost the original negative for the deleted footage, so the only known source for the longer version of that scene was whatever film element they’d used for the 4:3 transfer, assuming that wasn’t simply the old fullscreen laserdisc master dumped to dvd. It’s kinda like the GOUT in reverse.

When it came time to remaster the movie for 4k and hdr for Disney+, the o-neg for the song was still nowhere to be found, so the version that went up on the service was once again the theatrical cut just as it had been on the blu-ray and the anamorphic dvd transfer. But it just so happens that the missing pieces of o-neg were finally found just a couple months ago, leading fans of the movie to speculate whether Disney will offer that version for streaming at some point in the future.

This actually brings me to something I was going to bring up earlier. We live in a post-#ReleaseTheSnyderCut world now, where something that no reasonable person thought would ever happen is now being financed to the tune of $70 million. The studios are all looking for ways to make money on the cheap with their business disrupted due to the current unpleasantness, and an OOT restoration would cost a small fraction of what AT&T is spending to finish the Snyder Cut.

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Disney just released a censored version of Lilo & Stitch. There’s nothing reasonable about them.

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Fang Zei said:

This actually brings me to something I was going to bring up earlier. We live in a post-#ReleaseTheSnyderCut world now, where something that no reasonable person thought would ever happen is now being financed to the tune of $70 million. The studios are all looking for ways to make money on the cheap with their business disrupted due to the current unpleasantness, and an OOT restoration would cost a small fraction of what AT&T is spending to finish the Snyder Cut.

Bingo. Nothing is impossible. #ReleaseTheOriginalTrilogy

Star Wars Revisited Wordpress

Star Wars Visual Comparisons WordPress

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Fang Zei said:

We live in a post-#ReleaseTheSnyderCut world now, where something that no reasonable person thought would ever happen is now being financed to the tune of $70 million. The studios are all looking for ways to make money on the cheap with their business disrupted due to the current unpleasantness, and an OOT restoration would cost a small fraction of what AT&T is spending to finish the Snyder Cut.

My final input is Disney may be evil, heartless and fake-woke, but they aren’t stupid. They saw value in buying Marvel, Star Wars, and 20th Century Fox with huge aspirations in mind and these now look like genius moves. They’ve also lobbied to Congress to prevent Mickey Mouse from hitting the public domain. They didn’t gain their corporate power and influence by dumb luck.

When/if Star Wars hits the public domain many years from now, as far as I know, it means anyone can put Darth Vader into their movies or merchandise. The studio will keep the negatives, sources, and distribution rights, but it’s possible creating fan projects would no longer be piracy.

In short, they’ll release the theatrical cuts when they deem it best for business.

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Revisiting this thread months later with fresh eyes, I’m sorry if I came off as rude and snarky.

I stand by my prediction the theatrical cuts will eventually be released, possibily for the 50th anniversary or when Disney simply wants more money. However, it’s also a safe bet there will be issues with the release such as faulty colors or excessive DNR.

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Thats Impossible!
Remember what george said in the 90’s:
“(There will only be one. And it won’t be what I would call the ‘rought cut’, it’ll be the ‘final cut.’ The other one will be some sort of interesting artifact that people will look at and say, ‘There was an earlier draft of this.’…What ends up being important in my mind is what the DVD version is going to look like, because that’s what everybody is going to remember. The other versions will disappear. Even the 35 million tapes of Star Wars out there won’t last more than 30 or 40 years. A hundred years from now, the only version of the movie that anyone will remember will be the DVD version [of the Special Edition).”

-TGWNN

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That guy with no name said:

Thats Impossible!
Remember what george said in 2004:
“(There will only be one. And it won’t be what I would call the ‘rought cut’, it’ll be the ‘final cut.’ The other one will be some sort of interesting artifact that people will look at and say, ‘There was an earlier draft of this.’…What ends up being important in my mind is what the DVD version is going to look like, because that’s what everybody is going to remember. The other versions will disappear. Even the 35 million tapes of Star Wars out there won’t last more than 30 or 40 years. A hundred years from now, the only version of the movie that anyone will remember will be the DVD version [of the Special Edition).”

I think George said that around 1997, for his 1st Special Edition. And they were never released on DVD in the end!
We got the different 2004 version instead on DVD.
Though that is still a great quote. 😃

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Johann-500 said:

That guy with no name said:

Thats Impossible!
Remember what george said in 2004:
“(There will only be one. And it won’t be what I would call the ‘rought cut’, it’ll be the ‘final cut.’ The other one will be some sort of interesting artifact that people will look at and say, ‘There was an earlier draft of this.’…What ends up being important in my mind is what the DVD version is going to look like, because that’s what everybody is going to remember. The other versions will disappear. Even the 35 million tapes of Star Wars out there won’t last more than 30 or 40 years. A hundred years from now, the only version of the movie that anyone will remember will be the DVD version [of the Special Edition).”

I think George said that around 1997, for his 1st Special Edition. And they were never released on DVD in the end!
We got the different 2004 version instead on DVD.
Though that is still a great quote. 😃

oh, sorry typo.

-TGWNN

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It’s funny now looking back. George went on about how every new version of the trilogy would be his “final cut,” but I think once he’d started making changes, the floodgates were opened and his instinct to tinker and revise just became overwhelming. So every one of those “final cuts” ended up being just another “rough cut” on George’s neverending quest towards his “perfect” versions.

But, knowing now that the changes to the Reliance remasters were never even finished, those “definitive” cuts George was so adamant about simply don’t exist, and they never will. But I’m okay with that.

Now that I think about it, I wonder what versions George watches.

But we can’t turn back. Fear is their greatest defense. I doubt if the actual security there is any greater than it was on Aquilae or Sullust. And what there is is most likely directed towards a large-scale assault.

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Crazy thing is I don’t even think George watches these as much as we’d like to think he does. I think it’s just simply a case of he wants them “finished” just for the sake of them being “finished”.

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That guy with no name said:

Thats Impossible!
Remember what george said in the 90’s:
“(There will only be one. And it won’t be what I would call the ‘rought cut’, it’ll be the ‘final cut.’ The other one will be some sort of interesting artifact that people will look at and say, ‘There was an earlier draft of this.’…What ends up being important in my mind is what the DVD version is going to look like, because that’s what everybody is going to remember. The other versions will disappear. Even the 35 million tapes of Star Wars out there won’t last more than 30 or 40 years. A hundred years from now, the only version of the movie that anyone will remember will be the DVD version [of the Special Edition).”

To borrow a quote from Home Alone - “Too bad Acey ain’t in charge no more”

😉

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crissrudd4554 said:

Crazy thing is I don’t even think George watches these as much as we’d like to think he does. I think it’s just simply a case of he wants them “finished” just for the sake of them being “finished”.

Or… he’s just saying that to justify this stuff.