Spike TV has been airing the Star Wars movies (both the originals and the new ones) during the past couple of days. It has been an enlightening experience especially after watching this series of YouTube videos.



I had no trouble making it through all seven parts of the review. Although the YouTube video doesn’t take itself very seriously (the running joke about the narrator being some kind of sex criminal was a bit tired), it’s analysis of what made the originals so good and the new trilogy so bad was seriously well done.

Right now Spike TV is showing the special edition of Return of the Jedi. Ultimately, the special editions didn’t bother me too much. They weren’t nearly as bad as the special edition of E.T.: The Extra Terrestrial. Spielberg’s decision to remove all the guns and replace them digitally with walkie-talkies took all the drama away from the final chase.

There were two things that Lucas’ special editions did ruin, though, and both of them were in Return of the Jedi. I didn’t really care when he replaced Sebastian Shaw with Hayden Christensen in the final funeral scene. That choice actually made some sense. Before the funeral scene we only see Shaw as Anakin once, and his face was barely recognizable, all scarred up and pale and dying. When I first saw the original trilogy I had to ask who that guy standing with Obi-Wan and Yoda was. Everyone now knows that Hayden Christensen is Anakin, for better or worse, and he looks genuinely happy to be there. Good for him. After a promising performance in the quite decent movie, Life as a House, his delightfully bad performance in the Star Wars movies effectively ruined any hope he may have had for a career. I'll give him this one.

No, what Lucas ruined actually had more to do with the soundtrack. They added an ugly CGI alien to perform a terrible song for Jabba the Hut. I actually had the action figures for the original band. Their original song meant a lot to me. And then they destroyed the ending of the movie by getting rid of the Ewoks’ celebration song with some lame new theme so that they could show everyone in the galaxy celebrating. The Ewok song was awesome, mostly because it sounded a little like they were singing, “Don’t believe the hype! Jub! Jub!” Classic.

I’ve actually thought about trying to rewrite the new trilogy, but I’m sure some other fan of the originals has already done it. Ultimately it won’t do anyone any good anyway. The problems with those movies can't be resolved with a special edition. George Lucas will just have to live with his failure for the rest of his life.