Even before Disney's purchase of Star Wars, the franchise wasn't exactly at a high point. It was clear that George Lucas's vision fell flat after he finished the Prequel Trilogy. While it did have its merits, it also had its tremendous downfall, as the prequels took too many liberties with contrivances to the plot and extreme ignorance from the good forces of the Jedi. Many will be quoted to say that the original trilogy was where Star Wars truly peaked and we have never seen and will never see such a meteoric rise in the franchise again. This is where creative forces truly shined.
Many will argue whether the special editions were worth making and I will argue that they absolutely were. They brought an entire generation, myself included, into the Star Wars franchise, and I bought two Boba Fett toys among a vast array of other little tidbits. It can be seen as a cash grab, which it was, but it was also a way of George Lucas editing his original theatrical release. George did this so much, in fact, that he seems to have lost the original footage and fans have literally come out with a recreation of it. That's the level of fandom we're talking here.
While I did enjoy watching Star Wars in theaters as a small lad, I also came to find out that we had the VHS tapes in our collection already! I was ecstatic! They didn't have the shiny new special effects, but you'd better believe I binged the entire trilogy at home while also watching the special editions in theaters as they came out week by week. While I did fall in love with the SE, though, as I grew older, I came to find out that I had more of a soft spot for the VHS copies I had at home. Of couerse, at this point, those copies are long gone, so I had to find them through a convention.
It's hard to explain just how important it is that Han Solo shot first. George tried to play up to him being a good guy, but it was that roguish attitude that the public fell in love with in the first place. The fact that he would blow away a bounty hunter to save his own neck is perfectly in line with his moral boundaries. Then came the scene that launched a thousand contraveries around the Star Wars fandom. Jabba the Hutt at the Millenium Falcon. People have lauded and loathed this scene. It's either a cinematic milestone or a very sore looking thumb against other, better special effects. Whatever your thoughts on it, I would have preferred they left it out entirely, rather than putting Jabba's face on a holo screen. The special edition's Jabba scene was rough and crude, but what they did to it afterward was flat out soulless. It's a complicated mess.
That's the real problem here. George Lucas just got too handsy with his own property and in trying to perfect it, he ended up flawing an already perfect work of art. Art is not meant to be perfected in this way and constantly shoving in new dialogue and special effects only led to Star Wars becoming a convoluted pile of edits and random ADR. For some reason, they even doubled down on Darth Vader's "NOOOOOOOOOOO" as he does the same thing when he picks up the Emperor before throwing him. One of the biggest jokes and heavily memed moments in the Prequel Trilogy, yet they decide to shove it into the original trilogy. Seriously, I will never buy the blurays.
Is it really too much to ask to give Star Wars to a more respectful, creative thinker? Neither George Lucas or Kathleen Kennedy seemed to know what to do to really pump it for more money after its hayday came and went. After the Special Editions and the Prequels had their run, Star Wars began to wane. Lucas only seemed to know how to poke and prod the original work in order to get money out of it. Any other directions he tried to take the series was a bust. Then we all know how Disney sucked the soul out of Star Wars, but that's a series of articles all its own. Suffice it to say, getting the physical media where the movie was just tweaked slightly for video and sound quality is the way to enjoy it as it was originally intended. The Special Edition was okay enough to bring another generation into Star Wars and it certainly propped up the Prequel Trilogy for success in its run, but it's become much more of a novelty to enjoy it in its much more raw and pure form. Seek out the original trilogy VHS, toys, video games and anything else, it's the stuff that still ages like wine. It will be worth the effort. Stay with the Virtua Force.
