General Star Wars Random Thoughts Thread — Page 298

Fun fact, the first time I bought the trilogy on DVD was in 2006, and I unwittingly put on the bonus disc of ANH. Having not been following the controversy of the changes and being somewhat technologically inept, the next time I watched I put in the primary disk and immediately thought “what the hell, did these movies get updates through the internet or something!?”

I had a humble little tube TV back in the day, and I rarely payed attention to the aspect ratio.

The first time I saw the OT as a kid (I was 7 years old and saw it with my uncle) I saw the 1997 SE. When I asked my mother if she’d get me my own VHS set so that I could watch them at home she went to a second-hand video-store and unknowingly bought the unaltered version. It surprised me a bit at first, seeing that my version was different, but I quickly ended up preferring the original version (even at that age). I would however watch the 2004 SE version once I upgraded to DVD, but I didn’t think of it as “better,” I would even watch my VHS version occasionally. Usually just on my own though, since my friends seemed to prefer the SE (though it being a DVD rather than VHS may have contributed to that.)

Alderaan said:

Back in the 1980s we had the following:

1. Official “lifetime rental” copy of the original Star Wars
2. homemade VHS copy of Empire Strikes Back recorded off Showtime
3. homemade VHS copy of Return of the Jedi w/ the last 5-10 minutes cut off

The picture quality of these copies was not good and deteriorated year after year, but I must have watched those tapes hundreds of times. Return of the Jedi was hard to see after a few years. Then Return of the Jedi came out on TV for the first time in 1989, and I remember being so excited because I could finally watch the entire movie all the way through the end.

By the 1990’s you could catch a random afternoon showing of any of the Star Wars films on cable. The FOX fanfare would start blaring when you flipped through the channels, and sometimes it would be another movie and you’d be disappointed, but often it would be Star Wars and you could stop everything you were doing and watch the movie for the next two or three hours. More popular were the weekend marathons, including one that I remember was hosted by Carrie Fisher, where the original Star Wars would play on Friday night, The Empire Strikes Back would play on Saturday night, and Return of the Jedi would conclude the trilogy on Sunday evening.

By those days, growing up through grade school and middle school, I was playing Star Wars on Nintendo and quoting Luke/Vader/Emperor dialogue back and forth with my Dad when I challenged him in some contest or game. I bought “The Faces” VHS box set in the mid-90s, the first thing I ever bought and owned on my own. Nothing brought me more joy than sliding those tapes out of their beautiful sleeves and popping them in the VCR, allowing me to toss out the faded bootleg cassettes I’d had previously, and replace them with (for the time) new and pristine tapes.

Ominously, they began with a message: “Own the Original Star Wars Trilogy: For the very last time”. That warning made no sense to us at the time. How could we have ever known?

This is a good post.

I remember those random 90s showings and the “For the last time” campaign and everything. I can still recite the pre-special-features featurette that rolled before the Special Edition VHS tapes I got for Christmas one year.

Watched ROTJ despecialized today with my sister. She’s probably seen the BD version 2 or 3 times. She knew we were watching a different version, but she is not familiar with the specific changes and probably didn’t notice any of them except maybe Lapki Nek (how could you not?). But as the credits role she asks “wait, I never heard Vader say ‘nooooo.’” I told her it was a change, and she’s like, “that’s stupid.”

Goes to show what a stupid and, really, damaging change it was. A) she recognized its absence having only watched a couple times and not in a couple years. And B) not necessarily being a huge SW fan, instantly understood how awful that line is and how it degrades from the gravity of the moment.

Just goes to show: the whole point of the SEs was to make the films worse.

If the first KOTOR ever got made into a movie, it would get criticized for being too much like A New Hope & Empire Strikes Back. If the second KOTOR got made into a movie, it would get criticized for not being Star Wars-y enough and boring.

TavorX said:

If the first KOTOR ever got made into a movie, it would get criticized for being too much like A New Hope & Empire Strikes Back. If the second KOTOR got made into a movie, it would get criticized for not being Star Wars-y enough and boring.

So the obvious solution is to combine the two into one movie. That way it’s Star Wars-y, but still unique.

I LOL’d.

For George, because I know you’re listening:

Will you release those “experimental films”? Pretty please?

I never really thought about the fact that Tarkin knows who Darth Vader actually is and he probably knows that the entire galaxy is run by a Sith Lord.

I’m sure he’s compartmentalized the knowledge of his Sith overlord. As long as he gets a planet destroying weapon, he’s happy.