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Preserving the...cringe...Star Wars Holiday Special (Released) — Page 7

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AHEM!!!!

http://cgi.ebay.ca/Star-Wars-Holiday-Special-Shooting-Script-Very-Rare_W0QQitemZ160097285444QQcategoryZ18833QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
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Ah piss!I would haved loved to get that!I need something from the special for my collection.

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http://www.bigbaddaddyvader.com

Original Star Wars Props and Production Material

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Originally posted by: bigbaddaddyvader
Ah piss!I would haved loved to get that!I need something from the special for my collection.


I only discovered that thing twenty minutes before it ended! Christ, it ended up selling for close to a hundred dollars.
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Originally posted by: crazyrabbits
AHEM!!!!

http://cgi.ebay.ca/Star-Wars-Holiday-Special-Shooting-Script-Very-Rare_W0QQitemZ160097285444QQcategoryZ18833QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
I was in the bid war for this one. I held the high bid for up to the last 15 seconds, and then suddenly it was sniped away out of nowhere by the guy who won it. I couldn't get another bid in.

I suspect bid-sniping software was used. Cheater!!

Anyway, I actually have the script already (though that copy was in better shape and did have a few extra pages that mine doesn't). It's up online and available to download at my site here:

http://www.starwarsholidayspecial.com/text/script.htm

--SKot

Projects:
Return Of The Ewok and Other Short Films (with OCPmovie) [COMPLETED]
Preserving the…cringe…Star Wars Holiday Special [COMPLETED]
The Star Wars TV Commercials Project [DORMANT]
Felix the Cat 1919-1930 early film shorts preservation [ONGOING]
Lights Out! (lost TV anthology shows) [ONGOING]
Iznogoud (1995 animated series) English audio preservation [ONGOING]

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I could barely sit to watch this!
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I have two jpegs that I downloaded at some point _long_ ago that are designed as inserts for the Holiday Special.

And both of them claim that the disc has a "text commentary" among other bonuses:

* interactive menus
* behind the scenes photo gallery [only one claims this]
* production art gallery
* text commentary
* vintage Kenner toy commercial
* DVD-ROM content

So my assumption is that someone, somewhere, for some reason produced such a thing.

Which leaves me with only one question:

Does anyone know where to find this text commentary?

Thanks,

- amtt

“Before the Dark Times. Before the Prequels.”

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Originally posted by: MattMahdi
I have two jpegs that I downloaded at some point _long_ ago that are designed as inserts for the Holiday Special.

And both of them claim that the disc has a "text commentary" among other bonuses:

* interactive menus
* behind the scenes photo gallery [only one claims this]
* production art gallery
* text commentary
* vintage Kenner toy commercial
* DVD-ROM content

So my assumption is that someone, somewhere, for some reason produced such a thing.

Which leaves me with only one question:

Does anyone know where to find this text commentary?
Ah, well... the real story here is that the most common DVD cover was done up between Sluggo and myself, basically as sort of a "wish list" of what we'd like to see on the DVD. It was never really intended to reach as far as it did. However, it became the most common cover out there, and started showing up on all the eBay auctions for bootleg HS DVDs. I guess it's kind of flattering in a weird way, particularly for Sluggo, who did most of the graphic work.

I don't think such a thing was ever actually produced, unfortunately. We talked about a text commentary as something that would be very cool to do someday.

--SKot

Projects:
Return Of The Ewok and Other Short Films (with OCPmovie) [COMPLETED]
Preserving the…cringe…Star Wars Holiday Special [COMPLETED]
The Star Wars TV Commercials Project [DORMANT]
Felix the Cat 1919-1930 early film shorts preservation [ONGOING]
Lights Out! (lost TV anthology shows) [ONGOING]
Iznogoud (1995 animated series) English audio preservation [ONGOING]

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Originally posted by: SKot
Originally posted by: MattMahdi
I have two jpegs that I downloaded at some point _long_ ago that are designed as inserts for the Holiday Special.

And both of them claim that the disc has a "text commentary" among other bonuses:

* interactive menus
* behind the scenes photo gallery [only one claims this]
* production art gallery
* text commentary
* vintage Kenner toy commercial
* DVD-ROM content

So my assumption is that someone, somewhere, for some reason produced such a thing.

Which leaves me with only one question:

Does anyone know where to find this text commentary?
Ah, well... the real story here is that the most common DVD cover was done up between Sluggo and myself, basically as sort of a "wish list" of what we'd like to see on the DVD. It was never really intended to reach as far as it did. However, it became the most common cover out there, and started showing up on all the eBay auctions for bootleg HS DVDs. I guess it's kind of flattering in a weird way, particularly for Sluggo, who did most of the graphic work.

I don't think such a thing was ever actually produced, unfortunately. We talked about a text commentary as something that would be very cool to do someday.

--SKot


Yeah, it is a little weird. Not quite as weird as seeing the reconstructed cut scenes I and my friend Brad did years ago (which are hosted on T-bone's Star Wars site) for sale on a compilation DVD on ebay or at a con. Rather surreal.
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Originally posted by: Sluggo
Originally posted by: SKot
I don't think such a thing was ever actually produced, unfortunately. We talked about a text commentary as something that would be very cool to do someday.

Yeah, it is a little weird. Not quite as weird as seeing the reconstructed cut scenes I and my friend Brad did years ago (which are hosted on T-bone's Star Wars site) for sale on a compilation DVD on ebay or at a con. Rather surreal.

And that explains why _SO_ many iterations of a Google search came up empty!

Which isn't to say that I'm not losing my mind --- only that I can no longer consider this to be symptomatic.

After reading ever more deeply into SKot's site, particularly the names and biographies for the characters, I'm realizing how little I know about the inner workings of the SWHS. I'm certainly not qualified to build such a thing.

Hypothetically, though...what's the simplest way that one _could_ go about building a text commentary?

“Before the Dark Times. Before the Prequels.”

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I'd ask daveytod or Jambe Davdar. They both cleverly used text commentary in their excellent docos. I suppose you could add it all to a subtitle track. You might want to PM SKot to make sure something isn't already in the works...
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I remember I really liked the way that starwars.com did text commentaries for the DVD releases that you could access through dvd.starwars.com (I think). I suppose something like that might be possible as well, though I don't know how it would be done.

Currently no one I know of is working on a text commentary, though talk of it continues. I'm certainly willing to put my knowledge into such a project. Probably the best thing to do is get the commentary text written first, and then worry about the technical details of making it work.

--SKot

Projects:
Return Of The Ewok and Other Short Films (with OCPmovie) [COMPLETED]
Preserving the…cringe…Star Wars Holiday Special [COMPLETED]
The Star Wars TV Commercials Project [DORMANT]
Felix the Cat 1919-1930 early film shorts preservation [ONGOING]
Lights Out! (lost TV anthology shows) [ONGOING]
Iznogoud (1995 animated series) English audio preservation [ONGOING]

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i'd be more than willing to help with such a thing if work on a Holdiay Special Ulitmate Edition ever happens

FINISHED:
The Sith Revealed - A Scrapbook
Episode III The Video Game - The Movie
24: The Missing Day
Star Wars - The Interactive Board Game DVD
Battlefront - Journal of the 501st
The Clones Revealed

email me for details daveytod AT btinternet DOT com

 

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Originally posted by: SKot
Currently no one I know of is working on a text commentary, though talk of it continues. I'm certainly willing to put my knowledge into such a project. Probably the best thing to do is get the commentary text written first, and then worry about the technical details of making it work.

You know, there's a certain amount of sense in that suggestion....

“Before the Dark Times. Before the Prequels.”

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I cannot believe I'm typing this, continuing this topic, but it's a project that I haven't been able to let go.

Over the summer I decided to learn what it took to author a DVD. I'd found the end of Nero's abilities when their tech support answered my question: the reason I couldn't find the widescreen menu option is that it wasn't there, and there were no plans to include such a thing in the future. Then I discovered, with much pain, that I was limited to only ONE audio track....

I'll state at the outset that I wasn't out to produce original content, but to gather together all I could on the "Star Wars Holiday Special" and create the best disc I possibly could.

So I started looking around, and settled on DVD Lab Pro. I gathered together all the pieces I could find: the KCCI broadcast, which _may_ be from Rikter's disc but I'm not sure; a Google video of the broadcast with commercials; the historical clips from SKot's excellent site; the MMM audio commentary (which was actually the genesis of the project); and a poor-quality download of Harrison Ford's Holiday Special surprise on Conan O'Brien. And I got working on authoring a disc containing all the pieces.

Sadly, the summer ended, my car's clutch failed , and so at the end of the month-long trial period I had to let the project rest. Ultimately I gave it the designation "0.9," since it was only a good shadow of what I hoped to accomplish and, given time, would love to bring to completion. I did bring the disc to a close, along with an acknowledgment that it wasn't all I had hoped it could be --- especially in the commercials' quality (which included an audio glitch, since they were added in the final days) and the Conan clip.

Since then I bought a RapidShare account, and in the near future I'll be downloading Rikter's KCCI disc to see how it differs from the somewhat spare version I acquired a while ago. And I've wondered whether the materials I used over the summer are available elsewhere in better quality. I'm sure they _must_ be.

But even as I've grown more aware of what _is_ out there in terms of preservations and years-old content, and as I've marveled at what people have put together, there's seems to be a dearth (aside from the KCCI disc mentioned above) of SWHS.

Only sharing my mutterings. But I'd love to see this program collected in the best possible form. Italicized are portions where I really didn't get there or they just don't exist:

KCCI broadcast, with selectable audio commentary
A second, more technical and historical commentary [nonexistent, but would be welcome]
Text commentary [nonexistent, but possibly a simpler solution than an audio commentary]
The TVLand and Fox News clips
The Conan O'Brien clip [where the only download I've found was ghastly]
The commercials from the original broadcast, selectable and indexed
Scene selections of course are a must [and, in the end, I think I did a pretty good job]
Song selections are another section of which I'm proud
And a history of Kashyyyk: its appearances, references, and origins.

I've wondered for a long time when the Ralph McQuarrie's painting of the wookiee house was made: I'm _assuming_ that it was the inspiration for all things Kashyyyk-related, but I don't have any evidence aside from the fact that everything post-SWHS has echoed a similar style.

So these are my ramblings. Hope someday to complete the project ... or, with bitterness, see someone else's ultimate disc that puts mine to shame.

“Before the Dark Times. Before the Prequels.”

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I think this project is headed in the right direction.

BTW, the Kashyyyk paintings (some of them) were done for the book, The Illustrated Star Wars Universe. They certianly were inspired by the Holiday Special. McQuarrie did paintings for the Special earlier than the book came out.
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Originally posted by: MattMahdi
Ithe MMM audio commentary (which was actually the genesis of the project);

Maybe I'm just ignorant, but what is this commentary?

Good luck on this project. I'm sure that many of us would love to see the final product.
Other suggestions for the disc are:
I think I've seen some TV commercials for the SWHS on some disc I have, but I could be mistaken. If memory serves, they were included on the KCCI disc, but I could be wrong. I'll try to look around tonight.
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Maybe I'm just ignorant, but what is this commentary?

[snip]

I think I've seen some TV commercials for the SWHS on some disc I have, but I could be mistaken. If memory serves, they were included on the KCCI disc, but I could be wrong. I'll try to look around tonight.

MMM Commentaries does quite a few fan commentaries, and they did a marathon session of the Star Wars sextet a while ago. Their SWHS commentary is interesting, and entertaining, reminding me kind of a Kevin Smith commentary (but with language far, far cleaner). It makes the watching more fun, and many months ago I had the crazy idea of grafting it onto the special itself as an alternate optical track.

(Then, of course, I realized that Nero would require me to duplicate the entire program. Not impressive.)

The MMM site is here:

http://www.mmmcommentaries.com/

And they've apparently just started taking a look at Buffy. Not sure how I discovered their site....probably a Google search on the SWHS.

(If you do find the commercials, I'd love to see them. Haven't since .... well, not sure .... certainly have only the dimmest memories of the original broadcast itself!)

“Before the Dark Times. Before the Prequels.”

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LOL! What was up with Grandpa? He looked like something from Big Trouble in Little China.
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I ended up doing my own 'fanedit' of this. It was my first edit - so it is nothing special. Audio does not blend as nice as most fan edits I've seen from this community. I used the Boston TV DVD a friend gave me that he acquired online.

I ripped it into my Mac iBook and then imported into iMovie (04) and just started hacking out anything that annoyed me.
So the quality is decent but nothing you would ooh and ahh over.
I kept the original DVD - complete with commercials, etc. ("So look for the Union label...")
I call mine the Ruthless Edit. About half the show has been excised. Again, I chopped what annoyed me.

I first showed my 8 yr old the original - he got bored and left the room. now he'll watch the whole thing (especially the Boba Fett cartoon)

- After the opening w/Han & Chewie, the first 10 minutes of Wookie grunting & garbage taking out and other gibberish are gone

- the story starts with Mala checking for starships in the system and then her interaction with Luke.

- Much of the bad humor is gone (wish I could say the same for much of the lame Imperial acting - SNAP!)

- All musical numbers (except Carrie's) are axed. I had to keep some cheese.

- No 'Wookie porn'

- no 'Cirque du so Lame'

- Harvey Korman is gone - no cooking show, or cranial drinking, or video bits

- Art Carney's role is significantly reduced with many less bad puns.
- no mini aquarium or other blather (groomer, anyone?)

- Jefferson Starship's song now is somewhat of an extra part way through the credits.

- Bea Arthur never sings.

- Han is Han now. He does a lot less hugging of Wookies and going on and on about them being like family. (This is, after all, before ESB and while friendlier, I still wanted a scoundrel)

- No commercials at all (If I want to see them, I go to the original)

How I wish iMovie had a wipe transition. Most of my transitions are cross dissolves and I have learned more about editing and tricks since this, but just haven't had the time to redo it all, and zero $ to invest in better equipment / programs.

so for what it's worth, it's not a 'preservation' - but it's a heck of a lot more watchable

Better to light a candle than to curse the darkness - Chinese proverb

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First off I want to say hello to everyone here - this is my first post here and I'm loving the atmosphere here - editors and preservationists collaborating on various projects!

I'm more experienced in sound editing (not great but better than most) and this kinda thing always intrigued me...

Anyways, I have a bit of rumor I heard from a fairly reliable source concerning the Holiday Special - apparently Australia's FoxTel (sp?) station had entered into talks with LucasFilms to promote a one-off 30th anniversary airing of the Holiday Special for next year, with the possibility of a new George Lucas chat about the history of the special afterwards.

I'm not really too sure about the truth behind this but as I said the person I heard this from is usually pretty knowledgeable about the Holiday Special

As for if it will be remastered/cleaned up? Can't say, but I'm sure George still has the original negative up there at Skywalker Ranch in the vault
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Originally posted by: LinkTGF
First off I want to say hello to everyone here - this is my first post here and I'm loving the atmosphere here - editors and preservationists collaborating on various projects!

I'm more experienced in sound editing (not great but better than most) and this kinda thing always intrigued me...

Anyways, I have a bit of rumor I heard from a fairly reliable source concerning the Holiday Special - apparently Australia's FoxTel (sp?) station had entered into talks with LucasFilms to promote a one-off 30th anniversary airing of the Holiday Special for next year, with the possibility of a new George Lucas chat about the history of the special afterwards.

I'm not really too sure about the truth behind this but as I said the person I heard this from is usually pretty knowledgeable about the Holiday Special

As for if it will be remastered/cleaned up? Can't say, but I'm sure George still has the original negative up there at Skywalker Ranch in the vault

Well, that would be his ULTIMATE revenge to the OOT fans... a remastered Holiday special.

Fez: I am so excited about Star Whores.
Hyde: Fezzy, man, it's Star Wars.
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Originally posted by: OBtwosy
I ended up doing my own 'fanedit' of this. It was my first edit - so it is nothing special. Audio does not blend as nice as most fan edits I've seen from this community.

...


so for what it's worth, it's not a 'preservation' - but it's a heck of a lot more watchable


Are you planning on making this available anywhere?