LexX said:
Interesting points.
I think some may forget that we are talking about planets here. Tatooine could be bigger than Jupiter all we know. It can have millions or even billions of towns small and large. If I lived middle of Sahara (okay, impossible) and thought it was the most boring place ever, it doesn't mean that there isn't anything else happening on the whole planet. If I knew there was one airport (spaceport) pretty close, it doesn't mean it's the only one on the whole planet. Even then, Mos Eisley could be a 10 hour ride away from Luke's home even at landspeeder speed, which could be a couple of thousand kilometers, who knows
And if there aren't any cool car races right now happening at my local town of 12 people... well, I'm pretty sure there are lots of races going on 24/7 here on Earth. If I lived on Tatooine I'd try to come up with something fun to do then, even though the podrace as a story element is boring and ridicilous and shouldn't exist just because of that.
The Jabba angle is pretty good, but then again, we don't have anything other to hold against the "Tatooine is a dead rock" comment than a young man who wants to be somewhere else than at his home.
Btw, I'm not defending PT or anything else at all here as I don't like the choices made either, just more to think about for your own imagination.
Another casualty of the Biggs scenes being cut was the backstory that Luke and his friends race their Skyhoppers to alleviate the boredom. (Which was an update of Lucas' own young life as reflected in American Graffiti.) Only Luke's statement in the Rebel briefing about shooting Womp Rats in his T-16 made the final cut.
Now if George really wanted to tie into the OT, Anakin should have been a Skyhopper racer. But the desire to do his own take on the chariot race from Ben Hur was too strong...
JEDIT:And drmurph beat me to it. ;)