STAR WARS MONTH: Post #2: Special Edition Changes

Despite the fact that ‘Star Wars’ is one of the most iconic franchises of all time, one could say that its fan-base has had it rough for quite a few years. And for the record no, I’m not referring to the prequels at the moment. I’m actually referring to probably the most controversial aspect of the ‘Star Wars’ franchise; the numerous changes that series creator George Lucas has made to the original ‘Star Wars’ trilogy. Now there have been some cases where films have been altered in subsequent home video releases, usually to fix a mistake or two within the film. But in the case of ‘Star Wars’, that’s not the reasoning for these changes. Instead, it’s because Lucas, who in 2004 claimed that the original trilogy of films only represented about 20-35% of his original vision, made these changes in order to make the films look the way he wanted them. To do this, he utilized new technology that he didn’t have back when the films were first being made due to the limitations at the time in regards to visual effects. However, pretty much all of these changes have been universally criticized by ‘Star Wars’ fans who believe that the films were great as they originally are. But at this time, despite rumors that Disney is planning to release the unedited cuts of the films on Blu-Ray, it’s unclear whether or not we’ll ever see those original cuts of the films again. Today, on Rhode Island Movie Corner, I’ll be looking at some of these changes. For the record I won’t be discussing every single change made and will instead be focusing on the most controversial of changes. Basically that is because each major home video release of the films since 1997 have had one extremely controversial change. So let’s get started… 

1997- SPECIAL EDITION: ‘HAN SHOT FIRST’

It all began in 1997, two years before the release of ‘Episode I’, when it was announced that the original ‘Star Wars’ trilogy would be re-released in theaters in honor of the first film’s 20^th Anniversary. Little did fans know that this would be the start of what would cause them nothing but frustration for years to come. Lucas spent about $10 million, $3 million to work on the audio, $2 million to work on ‘A New Hope’, and $2.5 million each for ‘Empire’ and ‘Jedi’, on editing the films, adding in some new scenes and most notably a whole bunch of new CGI visuals, including some replacements of the original special-effects work done for the film. But the one change that attracted the most controversy, one that is arguably still the most infamous change in franchise history, occurs in ‘A New Hope’ during the scene where Han Solo is approached by the bounty hunter Greedo, who is looking for him on orders from crime lord Jabba the Hutt, who put a bounty of Solo’s head after an incident where he had to drop some cargo that he had been smuggling for Jabba in order to avoid being captured by the Empire. Ultimately though, Han ends up shooting Greedo before he gets a chance to kill him. You all know the controversy surrounding this scene, which has resulted in the iconic phrase; ‘Han Shot First’.

The original cut of ‘Star Wars’ made it very clear that Han was the one who shot first and was also the only one of the two who fired any shots. However, the ‘Special Edition’ changed it up so that it was now Greedo who shot first. A shot was inserted where Greedo is shown firing at Han, who ‘avoids’ it by moving his head (this is done via CGI, by the way) to the right. He then fires at Greedo, and the scene of course ends the same way it did before. Looking at the shot in slow-motion, you can definitely notice the rather laughable work done to make Han ‘avoid’ the shot. Thankfully, subsequent releases have altered up this scene some more so that it doesn’t look as bad as it did the first time it was edited. Still though, these altered cuts to the scene still have Greedo fire a shot at Han. The only major difference is that in the 2004 DVD release, the timing of the shots was altered to make it look like Han and Greedo were firing at the same time, still maintaining that Greedo fired a shot which Han avoids. The 2011 Blu-Ray release shortened up the shot by a few more frames.

Harrison Ford's response to a question on Reddit asking him about the whole 'Who Shot First?' debate

So why did George Lucas do this? According to him, it was because he felt that having Han shoot first would make him out to be a cold-blooded killer. But really, I think it’s safe to say we all know that this wasn’t necessary. Despite being the only one who fired a shot in that scene originally, Han of course became a highly beloved character in the franchise. So clearly the fact that he fired first didn’t result in him becoming a completely unlikable character. And really, can you blame him for shooting Greedo in that scene? I mean otherwise Greedo was going to kill him; he didn’t really have a choice. Recently, Lucas revised his original statement on the scene by asserting that Greedo DID shoot first but because of the fact that the scene had primarily been done in close-ups, it was confusing as to what really happened. That reasoning does make a little more sense, though it’s worth noting that he also stated that it was the audience who wanted Han to be a ‘cold-blooded killer’ and drafts of the original script don’t mention Greedo shooting at Han in the scene. Needless to say, this edit attracted a lot of attention… but it was only the beginning.

2004- DVD RELEASE- ANAKIN’S GHOST

Two years after the initial release of the ‘Star Wars’ trilogy on DVD, another DVD release came out with a special bonus; a bonus disc for each film that had the ‘original’ versions of the films. However, this came at a price because the original cuts of the films were of fairly low quality. They were produced from the transfers used for the 1993 Laserdisc releases; as a result, the video transfers were in letterbox format and there were plenty of video errors such as low contrast and motion smearing. Needless to say, it was clear that there wasn’t really that much effort put into bringing the original cuts of the films to DVD, the one thing that fans were yearning for since 1997. But as for the main DVD versions of the films, they were given the re-mastering treatment… and once again more changes were made to the films. Along with the aforementioned editing of the ‘Han/Greedo’ scene, there were also some additions to keep the films closer to the then currently running prequel trilogy in terms of continuity. In the scene where Vader talks to the Emperor, Ian McDiarmid replaces the original ‘actor’ who played the Emperor (who was actually makeup Rick Baker’s wife Elaine with chimp eyes superimposed on her face with voice dubbing from Clive Revill). And Boba Fett is now voiced by Temuera Morrison, who played Boba’s father Jango Fett in ‘Attack of the Clones’.

And then you have the addition of young Anakin Skywalker, Hayden Christensen, in ‘Return of the Jedi’. This occurs during the final scene of the film when Luke sees the force ghosts of Obi-Wan, Yoda, and his father. Originally, Anakin was portrayed, when he was unmasked, by Sebastian Shaw, who again appeared as a Force Ghost. But then, in the 2004 DVD release, his image was replaced with Christensen’s. Apparently the reason for this was because this was supposed to represent the last time that Anakin was a good guy before he became Darth Vader. However, in reality, it would make much more sense to have him look the way he did when he died. Plus, as some have already pointed out, the fact that Christensen obviously looks much different than Shaw should cause some confusion in regards to the scene because Luke shouldn’t recognize who the person standing with Obi-Wan and Yoda is, even if he’s his father. But the big problem with this scene is that it’s just insulting to Sebastian Shaw, who passed away a decade earlier. Just another bone-headed decision on Lucas’ part which, like with the ‘Han/Greedo’ scene, has a really flimsy excuse for being done.

2011- BLU-RAY RELEASE- DARTH VADER ‘NO!!!’

And now we come to the change that quite frankly pissed me off the most. For the most part, I’m not too upset about the changes made to the original ‘Star Wars’ films. Yes a lot of them are rather stupid and make no sense in terms of why Lucas made these changes. But because I’m not really a die-hard ‘Star Wars’ fan, they don’t bother me that much. But then came the 2011 Blu-Ray release of the ‘Star Wars’ saga. Of course there were more changes to the original films, like a weird addition of rocks in front of R2-D2 when he’s hiding in an cave from the Tusken Raiders (seriously from the way it looks you’ll wonder how he even got in there in the first place) and the addition of eyelids for the Jawas in ‘Return of the Jedi’ so that they now blink, which from what I hear was supposed to be a part of the overall design for the creatures but was abandoned for looking unsatisfactory. But the one change made that drives me crazy, and I’m sure the same can be said for the rest of you folks as well, occurs during the climactic sequence in the Death Star II when Vader sacrifices himself to save Luke by throwing the Emperor down the pit. Originally, Vader said nothing during the scene but now he first says ‘no’ while watching the Emperor torture Luke and then yells ‘No!’ as he grabs the Emperor.

Where do I begin with this? First of all, more so than any of the other changes, this ruins the emotional impact of this scene. Vader may not have originally said anything during the scene but he didn’t need to. We could see it perfectly well through the way he watched this whole situation unfold that he was about to sacrifice his own life to save the life of his son. Second of all, now we unfortunately had to relive the infamous moment in ‘Episode III’ when Vader, after learning from the Emperor that Padme died in childbirth, screams “NOOOO!!!” For the record, I’m not really as bothered by that scene as others may be but now that it’s been brought into one of the best scenes of the film series, I have to admit now I’m a little annoyed at it because it led to this frigging change. Like I said, all of the other changes made to the films… they don’t really bother me that much. But this one is inexcusable. I’m pretty certain that Lucas has not made any comment on why he made this change but even if he ever does, that excuse does nothing to hide the fact that this is, without a doubt, the absolute worse of the ‘Star Wars’ Special Edition Changes. Yep, it’s worse than ‘Han Shot First’ and it’s worse than ‘Young Anakin’ in ‘Return of the Jedi’.  

As I conclude this post, I want to talk about the main reason as to why these changes bug me. It’s not really about what the changes were. Aside from the aforementioned ‘No!’ scene in ‘Return of the Jedi’, I’m not really that bothered by things like ‘Greedo Shot First’ or the CGI additions. It’s more because of one simple fact. And that is George Lucas’ insistence that these newer cuts of the original trilogy are the ‘correct’ versions of the films. The last time the original, unaltered cuts of the films was properly released to home video… was in 1995, back when VHS was still relevant (Hell, I still have them). But since 1997, we’ve had to deal with these newer cuts of the films every time the series moves to a new media format. They did re-release the original cuts of the films back in 2006 but as I noted earlier, it seems like minimal effort was made to bring them to DVD as shown by their poor quality. And while I hear that some people did make bootleg copies of the films in their original form, I’m not really looking to watch them ‘that way’. So why do I bring all of this up? Well, guess which franchise allows its fans to re-watch its content the way it was originally made, even when it too made some modern updates?

That’s right, it’s the other big space-themed franchise with ‘Star’ in the title, ‘Star Trek’. In 2006, ‘Star Trek: The Original Series’ made its official debut in HD along with updated CGI visuals. But when the series was released to Blu-Ray starting in 2009, ‘Trek’ fans were allowed to do something that, at this time, ‘Wars’ fans can’t. They could view all of the episodes in either the original or updated format. CBS didn’t restrict them from watching the original cuts of the episode if they didn’t want to watch the updated version, unlike ‘Star Wars’. And that’s my problem with this whole ‘Special Edition’ nonsense. Despite the fact that a lot of people grew up with ‘Star Wars’ via the original cuts of the original trilogy, for almost two decades now they’ve had to see their beloved films get modern updates that they didn’t want with no real way of seeing the original cuts of the films in a proper release. Seriously, why is it so hard to just re-master the old cuts of the films and polish them up, not Lucas’ way of ‘polishing it up’ for the record, so that they could be put on Blu-Ray? That way, ‘Star Wars’ fans all over the world can finally be reunited with their beloved trilogy the way it was originally presented and quite frankly how it should be.

Check back next week for Part 3 of this Month-long ‘Star Wars’ celebration as I get a bit controversial as I discuss the ‘Star Wars’ prequel trilogy.