The Special Edition at 25!

 25 years ago, George Lucas and 20th Century Fox brought back the original Star Wars Trilogy back into theaters for the 20th anniversary of Star Wars. It also served a double purpose: Lucas wanted to use this as not only a chance to add scenes he wanted to back in the original releases, but also to finance the 3 prequels he was writing and casting at the time. For many, this was their first chance to see the original films on the big screen. For me, I had only seen Return of the Jedi in movie theaters in its original run. But to see all of them in theaters was a treat worth waiting for!

I can remember when I first saw the Special Edition Trailer. I was seeing Star Trek First Contact, and suddenly there it was! The rumors I had heard were true! Thankfully First Contact was a wonderful movie, but I was ready for late January of 1997! My parents had been divorced for a long time, and my mother made me promise to wait a week to see it since she wanted to be the one to take me, and my younger brothers who at this time were old enough to go see it in theaters too. I found it fair since she had taken me to see ROTJ way back then and also my youngest brother was almost the age I had seen ROTJ when it came out so double the fun! It was amazing to finally see Star Wars on the big screen, and with other people. Sure I knew what was going to happen but I didn't care. But the new scenes: a bigger shot going into Mos Eisley, the dewbacks actually moving at the escape pod, Jabba meeting Han at Docking Bay 94, etc. I loved it all! Well, except for Greedo shooting first. But it was still good. I could only imagine leaving the theater how people could wait 3 years for the next movie way back then. Of course a couple weeks later I would see the next movie.

I went with my Dad to see The Empire Strikes Back. This time we went to the newest movie theater to see it, at our town's 1st true mega plex. There were a lot more people but thankfully once the film started nobody talked. That's rare today, LOL! Anyway, there were a couple added scenes with the Wampa, the Battle at Hoth cleaned up the snowspeeders interiors which in the original had a "phantom" effect which you could see the Hoth ground and battle sequences transparently through the cockpit. Also at the end, Vader tells his shuttle pilot to alert his Star destroyer that he would be arriving. Also Piett's rank insignia is placed correctly since in the original version that scene was shot via a mirror to double the set size on camera. But it would be a few weeks until Return of the Jedi came out. And on my birthday weekend at that!

But that didn't happen. My birthday was Jedi-less. Fox delayed it a week. So the week after my birthday I took off work so I could go see Jedi. I actually made it a 3 day event, seeing all 3 movies in 3 days.  My dream was to do all 3 in one day but sadly I never had the chance to do that. Times ran together, so it was impossible to do it at one theater. But anyway I saw Jedi after seeing the other 2. And I enjoyed it the most since I remembered seeing it at the small movie theater in my shopping mall in 1983. There were new scenes added to, new dancers and singers in Jabba's Palace including a new musical number. I was sad that "Yub Nub" got deleted for a new musical number at the end, but at least we still got Sebastian Shaw as Anakin Skywalker at the end, which gave Anakin his redemption and brought the OT to a close. Since I hate the sequels I will not aggravate myself about them.

Later in 1997 the Special Editions came out in a boxed set for VHS. The gold box was the standard version, but the silver box was the wide-screen versions which are the best way to watch it. Nothing new was added until the DVD release in 2004. Temuera Morrison voiced Boba Fett, Ian McDiarmid finally would appear as Palpy in ESB, and Hayden Christensen would appear as Anakin at the end of ROTJ. So no, the 1997 Special Editions had none of that appear. I still have the VHS versions, but sadly no working VHS player to watch them on.

It is hard to believe it's been 25 years since the OT was last in theaters, although a few years ago some theaters showed the OT and Prequels before Episode 9 hit theaters, enabling everyone who wanted to see all 9 Skywalker Saga movies back to back the opportunity to do so. Now they are not only on DVD but Blu Ray, and 4k versions stream on Disney Plus. I've long been a supporter of bringing these movies back, simply because there is an entire generation that has only experienced the original trilogy on a small screen....it's time to experience them on the big screen again. Hopefully it's soon.