[Chefelf]

Lucas Wants TV 'Star Wars' Film Banned
 

Moviemaker George Lucas wants his first Star Wars sequel banned, as he is so disappointed with its quality. The one-off, two-hour-long The Star Wars Holiday Special was originally screened on the CBS network in 1978 and tells the story of Chewbacca's journey home with Hans Solo to celebrate Life Day with his family. During the course of the much-maligned movie, Carrie Fisher's beautiful Leia is seen reducing Hans Solo and Luke Skywalker to tears with a song. A contributor on the Star Wars website comments, "The Holiday Special has always been the red-headed step child of the Star Wars family." While a source at LucasFilm adds, "The Holiday Special was the biggest f***-up ever. The Force was definitely not with Mr. Lucas the day that doozy was born."

http://imdb.com/news/wenn/#3

civilian_number_two just sent me this link. I figured I'd do my part and post it here to help spread the word (and generate even more publicity) about Lucas's biggest blunder: The Star Wars Holiday Special.

[Vwing]

Oh I just saw that on IMDB and was going to post it. You beat me too it .

I've actually never seen the holiday special. Is there a link or something where I can download it, so I can see it in all its terrible, terrible glory?

Also, is it bad enough that it can be viewed as funny, or is it just painfully bad?

[Chefelf]

I've actually never seen the holiday special.  Is there a link or something where I can download it, so I can see it in all its terrible, terrible glory?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Lucas has been pretty diligent about removing all reference to it from the face of the Earth. I'm sure you'd be able to find it in certain file-sharing communities if you looked hard enough. I'm not sure where, exactly.

Also, is it bad enough that it can be viewed as funny, or is it just painfully bad?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Nope, it's just painful. There are certain elements that can be viewed as funny, mostly the musical numbers and the inclusion of Bea Arthur are amusing but overall, just painful. The first 20-30 minutes is unbearable as there is virtually no English dialogue. It's just grunting wookies with no translation.

For more information check out the ultimate resource: http://www.starwarsholidayspecial.com

I highly recommend downloading: "Just One More Round Friends" It's brilliant.

[Hannibal]

Actually, it is rather bizarre, more strange than "bad" in the sense of any kind of movie, because its not exactly a sequel. It is a "must see" for even those who hate star wars in my opinion. There are the usual things that make people gasp such as Carrie Fisher singing to the star wars theme, the bad TV-special effects, Mark Hammil with 10 coats of makeup and a really shitty cartoon, as well as Bea Arthur. On the other hand there are some interesting moments in it for American Television. The first 10-15 minutes or so are Wookies walking around grunting. Some people have suggested this is the stupidest idea since Howard the Duck, but think about it: for 15 minutes in the setting of a sit-com, two creatures walk around on screen not speaking english, and no subtitles are provided. Its courageous, but not in the over all context. Its funny, yet somewhat noteworthy. Also, its fascinating to also have scenes in a family oriented show, where Imperial Troops invade the home and living room, intimidating an otherwise peaceful and law abiding family of Wookiees. Long before Jackboots pointed machine guns at Elian Gonzales, we see in the heyday of run of the mill American TV, stormtroopers barge into a home, point gun's at Chewbacca's son and terrorize his family, search his house, etc. Its simply eerie. Art Carney, who actually does a reasonable job as the go-between/underground black marketeer gives Chewbacca's Dad what could be considered a virtual-reality sex-machine or electronic nitrous oxide trip. What's even more bizarre is seeing imperial troops dig Jefferson Starship music videos.

There are some truly bad moments in it, and completely farcical skits which most uptight star wars fans would share Lucas' nausea, however, the peculiar moments about unlawful search and seizure, the unusual parody of sitcoms with unitelligible wookiee speech is almost genius. Don't misundertand me, this show is crap, but whoever thought of having a scene where Wookiees in a treehouse walk around speaking jibberish should be commended for the size of his balls. We're talking about television here in like 1980. Fascist thugs invading the household? Black marketeers, smugglers? The scenes are all pretty much crap, the acting is bad, the musical numbers are freakish and overall, its like it came out of another dimension, but it definitely passes on some very strange vibes like you've never experienced before. Not exactly funny, not exactly Plan 9 From Outer Space, its not exactly horrifying, its so far beyond, its creepy.

Those are my thoughts, discredit them now if you like.

[Despondent]

Blue Harvest site

scroll down towards the bottom for a realplayer version. That's where I got my old dusty copy

(I'd like the PT banned, personally.)

[Hannibal]

That link isn't working Despondent

[civilian_number_two]

It does now.

[Vwing]

Yeah it's not working for me either, Lucas must have already gotten to the site!

[Hannibal]

Perhaps George Lucas' only way out of the Star Wars Holiday Special is to remake it with all new special effects, refilm all sequences and present it back on Television as some kind of Star Wars Reunion. It will never go away, no matter what he thinks. He's a fool for ever considering such a thing in the first place.

[The Scornful Roman]

Does this decision on the part of Lucas smack anyone else as just wrong? It's like the whole thing about not having the 70s and 80s OT available on DVD for the old-school fans to enjoy. Shades of Orwell's 1984, anyone? Sure, SWHS may be junk, but even junk can sometimes have sentimental value (or value for a Mystery Science Theatre 3000- style mock-fest). I haven't seen the Holiday Special, but I have enjoyed the 80's cartoon film Heavy Metal, and I heard that the animated sequence with Boba Fett was somewhat similar to that. I'd also like to see the cartoon sequence for no other reason other than whatever it is, it's gotta be cooler than the lame-brained 'introduction' of Boba Fett in Episode Two! :yuck:

It's just that the idea of one person, one very influential and powerful person, can abitrarily ban a film and prevent his fans from renting it instead of illegally downloading it, gives me the creeps. Why is George Lucas so obsessed with 'fixing' the flaws of his earlier movies and erasing a whole other film? Why can't he just relax and say, "Well, that was a mistake, but maybe a fan out there enjoys it for whatever reason. Oh well, I'll do better next at protecting the integrity of my franchise"? That's the sane thing to do, if you ask me.

[Chefelf]

Sadly I've had problems downloading video from blueharvest for months now.

They're probably been all taken to a Lucasfilm concentration camp of some sort.

[Hannibal]

"Sure, SWHS may be junk, but even junk can sometimes have sentimental value (or value for a Mystery Science Theatre 3000- style mock-fest). "


Agreed.

It might be interesting to note at this time that when the DVDs came out, a local big name video rental franchise here had a bazillion copies on the wall for rent(entire wall of the trilogy DVDs), two weeks later they had 3 copies of each DVD and were taken off the new release 3.50 status.

Van Helsing came out a little bit later, again a bazillion copies for rent, its now the end of November and all copies of Van Helsing are still on the wall being rented and in new release status. Van Helsing isn't exactly the greatest film in the world, but its sad to (or not sad but revealing) see that Star Wars doesn't appear to be as popular as it once was. Copies of Phantom Menace can be found in bargain bins around the country, as well as Attack of the Clones. Nobody wants that crap any more.

[The Scornful Roman]

Van Helsing-- excellent case in point. I personally didn't like it (except for Richard Roxburgh's Dracula ); I thought that it was ludicrous, silly, and just plain dumb. Does that give me the right to ban it, and deny someone who wants to see it and enjoy it the right to see it? No. Does it give the director of the movie the right to ban it 20 or 30 years down the road if he looks at it and thinks, "Oh MAN, that movie stinks! Pull the dusty old copies from the overstocked video store shelves, STAT!" No.

(Keep in mind that I'm NOT saying that Steven Sommers or whatever his name is CAN do that or that he will do that, I'm using it as a hypothetical example.)

[civilian_number_two]

To be fair, Hannibal, more people will be interested in renting VH than SW because anyone interested in SW bought it. That boxed set moved like herpes.

VH, not so much.

[Michel Orla]

It's worth seeing for those two images alone. Better than anything we see in the PT. Damn that Lucas :angry:

This post has been edited by Michel Orla: 29 November 2004 - 10:20 PM