Original/Unaltered "Star Wars" Trilogy on Blu-Ray in 2017

The only bad change, in my opinion, was the Luke to R2 dialogue “you’re lucky you got outta there” subbed for “you’re lucky you don’t taste very good.” It wasn’t really a new change, as the 70mm release of Empire had that line variation in the soundtrack.

 

I don't see this as a contradiction. Vader is obsessed with finding Luke for his own purposes, then basically plays dumb in front of The Emperor. At Bespin, he reveals his real motivation: He wants Luke to join him and overthrow the Emperor so they can rule as father and son.

In Return of the Jedi, The Emperor's blind spot towards Luke continues, unable to sense Luke as he passes through the shield on his way to Endor. I get the feeling that if Luke did join his father, The Emperor wouldn't have seen it coming. Snoke sure didn't when he met his demise in TLJ.

 

Yes, agreed—and if Vader’s plan in ESB was for he and Luke to rule the galaxy as father and son, then there would have been no place for the Emperor. If Luke had turned to the dark side and joined Darth Vader, I wonder what Vader’s plan for the fate of the Emperor would have been?

 

Straight down the shaft, but Vader probably would've made Luke do it as a way to prove himself. If you thought TLJ was divisive, can you just imagine the reaction THAT would've gotten?

 

Or the original planned ending of Jedi, which was Han dead , Luke going off alone to rebuild the Jedi and find his sister and Leia,( who wasn't intended to be Luke's sister ) is left to shoulder the burden of building the new republic. No upbeat happy ending. No ewok village celebration. No force ghosts smiling and nodding with approval. And honestly... Probably a better film. I can imagine such an ending being as divisive as The Last Jedi is now. Difference is there would be no social media or YouTube to watch a legion of butthurt fans screaming that George Lucas ruined Star Wars.

However, that was when Lucas was still thinking about 9 chapters. By the time he started fiming Jedi his crumbling marriage and fatherhood caused him to abandon this plan and decided to wrap everything up in a neat bow in JEDI.

It just struck me while writing that paragraph...the Status quo of our trio of heroes by the end of The Force Awakens mirror how they were supposed to be by the end of Lucas' original concept for VI. Luke out of the fight, Han dead and Leia still a leader. One could even conclude that Rey is the stand in for Luke's original Sister, who was supposed to be a huge focus of the story in Lucas' post Empire Strikes Back broad outline of the sequel trilogy.

Which is Star Wars tradition. A lot if the concepts and ideas Lucas had in early drafts of Episode IV were recycled and used in the prequels, and many of those ideas and ideas from Lucas' early conception of the sequel trilogy were revived in this current trilogy by Disney.

 

For those who are looking for a more adult version of Jedi, there’s Vader’s Valkyrie.
https://m.fanfiction.net/s/10324626/1/Vader-s-Valkyrie

It’s fan fiction, but pretty good fan fiction. It follows through with the concept of Vader recruiting Luke to overthrow the Emperor. The end is a far cry from Jedi’s happy ending.

 

I like the "taste" line - it's funnier and more memorable...

 

I started reading it last night and couldn't stop. Whomever wrote this...Very well done.

And wow that was a dark ending. Very close to the tone Lucas originally was invisioning with Episode VI before he decided to get happy with the ending after the negative feedback of both Empire's somber ending and after realizing he really couldn't go on telling Star Wars stories then and made VI the end.

Although, I suggest to anyone here who felt like the current Sequel trilogy ruined or killed their childhood not to read the above fanfic. Now this version of Jedi is the childhood murderer you've been looking for!

 

Yep! I was pretty dismayed when it wasn’t present in the special edition.

 

I got the impression that a lot of the snappy one-liners (like this one) were punched up by outside writers, possibly by Kasdan in this case. I don't think they came from Lucas. I like that line a lot, too. I don't think Lucas is that funny as a writer, but I can tell you he has a reasonably-good sense of humor in real life.

One of the theories of Lucas' own Star Wars films is that he originally made them just to make enough money to make his own "personal" films and make him financially independent. Instead, he kind of got diverted from his original goal and wound up just making a lot more Star Wars films. I think he got caught up in the "grand mythos" idea and so, instead of making a few kids' fantasy films -- what they were originally intended to be -- he got caught up into trying to make them a lot more grand and epic. But I think that actually hurt the series overall. The current films I think have a better balance between a little comedy, a little tragedy, some small character moments, and some epic battles. And they're not too overblown and serious.

 

I believe I read somewhere that "You're lucky you don't taste very good" was a Hamill ad lib. Reportedly, the line was switched for the Special Edition, because the original audio had degraded and, rather than use substandard audio for the theatrical release of the Special Edition, Lucas chose to go with a different take that was in better condition. That take was the "You were lucky to get out of there" line as it was originally written. According to The Secret History of Star Wars, Lucas was none too pleased that Kershner allowed the actors to improvise, but Kershner believed that it made for a more believable performance. I think the results speak for themselves. The three principle actors are at their best in Empire.

 

Well that was true for Mark until The Last Jedi! I think for all of the movies small issues it was his best live action acting.

As for Carrie and Harrison, definitely. They both seemed to be wooden in Return of the Jedi (as did Mark at times) and while Harrison was fine in TFA, it was clear Carrie was getting her sea legs back. However she's decent in TLJ.

I think Lucas' biggest mistake was not getting Kershner back on Jedi after it was clear he wasn't going to be able to have Speilberg direct it. I Know Kershner went over budget which caused tensions between Kurtz and Lucas, but he made a great movie, and that came out in the direction and letting the actors inhabit the characters more comfortably rather than forcing them to read clunky dialogue that doesn't fit their personalities.

 

Kersh was a member of the DGA so couldn't come back even if he wanted to, Lucas (and by extension his company) having left that union after they tried to impose over $250, 000 in fines on both him and Kershner over having no credits at the start of Empire... incidentally, the latter didn't want to come back; he publicly ruled himself out of the running for Jedi in interviews at the time.

Spielberg having been Lucas' first-choice to direct Jedi seems to be an urban myth; at the time, he was finishing up on E.T. and about to transition onto the second Indiana Jones film. Instead, Jedi producer Howard Kazanjian drew up quite a broad list of potential directors that was reproduced in Rinzler's recent 'making of' book - and in the link below - and which makes for interesting reading.

For me, Richard Donner would have been perfect for Jedi, but Lucas didn't want another auteur after the tumultuous and profligate Empire shoot, so he's lucky that his actual first choice of David Lynch turned him down... they would have ultimately killed each other on that film! Personally, I think Richard Marquand was the right choice under the circumstances - watch 1985's Jagged Edge, the guy was a terrific director in his own right - but Lucas was keeping more of a tight creative rein on that production than it's predecessor and it shows, somewhat to it's detriment.

Ewok Orgies & 9 Other Things a New Book Reveals About The Making of 'Return of the Jedi'

 

In the J.W. Rinzler book The Making of The Empire Strikes Back, they surprised me by revealing that Lucas did not resent Kershner going over budget, even though that put Lucas on the brink of financial ruin. Lucas blamed producer Gary Kurtz for allowing the film to go overbudget and not keeping Lucas more in the loop. Kershner and Lucas were friends before the film (Kershner had been one of his favorite professors at USC), and the moment Empire was finished, Lucas did ask the veteran director if he wanted to helm the third and final Star Wars film. Kirshner decided no, because the stress had been pretty intense over that 3-year period, and he knew it'd be more of the same for Jedi.

Surprisingly, Lucas did allow the actors on the set some leeway in ad-libbing, but they always had to perform at least one circled (approved) take as written. Once that was in the can, they'd do a few more and fool around with the dialogue and the situation, and sometimes pieces did get used in the final edit, and sometimes not. I'm not sure how loose Kershner was, but I know he was extremely painstaking in terms of the look and also with camera movement and camera blocking, to the point where they went way, way overschedule while shooting. Famously, Harrison Ford did get to ad-lib his line "I know" in the Carbonite scene, which turned out far better than originally written.

In addition to Kurtz effectively being fired at the end of Empire, Lucas was very insulted by 20th Century-Fox, because the studio had been reluctant to bail him out after the movie went $10 million over budget. They had agreed to loan him the money only on the condition that Lucas surrender the copyright for the film and all the merchandising back to them for the privilege. Lucas was incredibly stung by what he felt was them trying to take advantage of him when he was down, but luckily co-producer Howard Kazanjian was able to arrange financing with a Boston bank, which temporarily bailed Lucas out of debt for a year until the movie was finally released in the summer of 1980. (At least this is the way I remember the story.)

 

Lucas didn't write the "Empire" script. Leigh Brackett did the first drafts and Kasdan did the rewrites, so he wasn't an "outside writer" - Brackett and Kasdan are the credited writers...

 

I watched some bits of the HD "De-specialized" edition again the other day, and frankly those versions are good enough. I'd rather have those versions floating around and Disney *not* owning 20th Century Fox than Disney owning Fox and, maybe, possibly some day getting better versions on 4K and BD. That awful acquisition, which I think will hurt the industry in so many ways, is not worth new Star Wars BDs or Wolverine and Fantastic Four and Thor all being in the same movie.

 

I found this to be an interesting paragraph, considering the backlash over new Force powers as seen in The Last Jedi:

 

I think a lot of the backlash re the new Force powers stem from the idea that if it's not something expressly shown in the original trilogy on screen, then that should be the limit on Force powers, even if those limits were largely due to Lucas' limitations given the technology in the 70s and 80s . I remember quite a bit of complaining about the acrobatics and supernatural aspects of the Jedi in the Prequels as well, like Super speed and the high jumping and even the faster speed duels.

 

Lucas wrote the story, and everybody else wrote from his outlines. My point is that there's a lot of ad-libs in Lucas' movies, and he actually encourages it... once they shoot the script as written. Famously, Carrie Fisher commented years ago that George's main direction seemed to be "faster and more intense." And sometimes they got a little frustrated and crazed on the set, and some of those moments actually got in the film, particularly with overlapping dialogue and arguments. George seems to often look for a way to make dialogue scenes seem "more real," and I think the ad-libbing is part of that.

BTW, there were actually about six writers on Empire Strikes Back, and the Rizner book goes into most of them. They just didn't get credit because they were punching up and rewriting. But they were very well-paid.

 

Naw, you can make a non-DGA film and still employ a DGA director provided they get permission first. Lucas was merely protesting a formality where you had to notify the guild in advance before changing the director's credit, and the technicality was that he had done it himself on Star Wars without reprisal, so he assumed there'd be no issue on Empire. When the DGA fined him, their comment was, "well in that case, you were the director, so that made it different."

Richard Marquand, who directed Return of the Jedi, was also a DGA member and he had no problem working on that film. But even if the production is non-signatory, they still have to contribute to the DGA health & welfare fund. I think Lucas' protest was more about the formality of how unyielding the guild was, not that he would never again use any DGA directors on his projects. He did so on the Young Indiana Jones show in the 1990s, too.

 

That went out the window by the time of Revenge of the Sith, tho

 

You guys might like to check out this forum with fan-made covers, etc...

Original Trilogy - Discussion Forum

 

I know ROTJ is the third best film (although still fantastic). But I think a lot of that lies in the fact that it is Act III. Someone once said, Act II is always the most interesting, and I think that is true. It would be difficult for ROTJ to be as good as Star Wars, which created the universe. And it would be difficult to be as good as Empire, which put our heroes in peril. What Jedi did well, was tie up all loose ends in a satisfying conclusion.

 

I maintain the last act is what saves the movie. The three way finale on Endor, in space and the throne room of the death Star is a grand. Other than the current one, it was Mark's best performance as Luke. Plus Ian Mcdarmed is amazing and chillingly gleefully evil. He was the best thing in the prequels and I would watch the hell out of "Darth Sidious: a star wars story".

Throw in Andy Serkis as Darth Plageous ( yes...See what I'm doing there? ) and Andy Park as Maul and let them go really Dark with the story and you'd have probably the best Star Wars Prequel ever. A movie focused on the Sith from that point of view as the protagonists of the story would also be something different and would do something fresh with that aspect of the universe.

 

Star Wars and Empire are clearly the two best movies of the series. But I think there's an argument to be made that the throne room in Return of the Jedi is the best scene of the series. It is top shelf stuff with Luke, Vader and the Emperor juxtaposed with the space battle and Endor.