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Saturday, September 18, 2004

 

There...Is...A-no-ther...ugh.

Like every other guy born from 1967 to 1973 who wasn't raised either in a cave or by acid-damaged luddite hippies on a commune whose sole electrical appliance was the water filter on the living room bong, I was greatly influenced by the original Star Wars trilogy. From an unshakeable--albeit susceptible to burial deep, deep within my psyche--belief in the ultimate triumph of good and virtue to a life-long attraction to short brunettes to spiritual beliefs that proved to be embarrassingly similar to The Force, the saga of the Skywalker family shaped my life in many ways.

I don't want to get into any kind of analysis of this, as it's been done to death in doctoral theses and magazine articles and nine out of ten indie movies released between 1991 and 2000. I lay out my love of Star Wars merely to impress upon the reader the depth, length and breadth of my excitement that the original threesome are finally being released this week on DVD.

Now, I'm not going to spend a whole lot of time carping about how Lucas has cheapened the original trilogy by foisting upon us Episodes I & II, movies so horrendously written that one might assume they'd issued forth from the typewriter of a retarded monkey. I won't dwell on acting stiffer than Ann Coulter's nipples as she stares at a picture of George W. Bush in a flight suit. I'll pause only the briefest of moments to mention the blasphemy of introducing into the Star Wars pantheon characters as truly offensive as the Asian-sounding trade ministers or the neo-Jamaican Jar Jar Binks, which appeared to be lifted from a Bugs Bunny cartoon circa 1942.

All of that I leave behind as I explore the special Advance Copy I received from Lucasfilm and share the secrets and surprises contained within...with you.

  • Hayden Christiansen now digitally inserted into the end of Jedi as the redeemed spirit of Anakin
  • Paris Hilton's vagina now digitally inserted into the beginning of Jedi as the Sarlacc
  • In first draft of the New Hope script, Luke was being raised by his two cross-dressing uncles
  • Lucas's first choice for the voice of Darth Vader: Bea Arthur
  • Using new technology to do now what he couldn't do in 1980, Lucas has used digital matte paintings to change Yoda's home planet from the swamp planet Dagoba to the South Bronx
  • Empire DVD includes a three hour documentary on evolution of Leia's hairdos
  • Screenwriter Lawrence Kasdan reveals that, in addition to Leia being Luke's sister, he pushed for Han Solo to be Luke's brother, Wedge to be Luke's nephew and Admiral Akbar to be Luke's babysitter
  • Band in Mos Eisley cantina scene not wearing masks
  • Henry Winkler blew his audition for Han Solo when he got too excited and peed himself
  • All of R2D2's dialogue improvised by Kenny Baker
  • First Jedi ending Lucas shot had the rebels enduring a long siege on Endor, during which they had to skin and eat the Ewoks
  • Tattoine Sand People originally just called "A-rabs"
  • Awkward stop-motion monster in Jabba's lair now replaced by Dick Cheney
  • Hilarious blooper reel shows Alec Guinness bitch-slapping a midget who blew a crucial line during a Jawa scene
  • Emperor Palpatine character based on Walt Disney
  • Lucas will not film Episodes VII, VII and IX, as originally promised, and has placed a curse so that anyone who does will be haunted by Warwick Davis
  • Luke Skywalker's original name: Stinky Fleaflicker
  • The only part of Jedi Lucas has not gone back and redone is the Imperial Officer saying "You rebel scum."

Hopefully, my disclosing all these wonderful factoids won't take away from your enjoyment of these classics, now completely retooled by an increasingly wrong-headed director who thinks he's "improving" them. May the Force blah blah blah.



posted by Joe  # 5:23 PM

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