Why do you hate the Star Wars Special Editions?

[Thumper17]

I have heard a ton of people express hatred/disgust for the Original triliogies special editions.

Why?

All it is is some flashy effects, people in the background. With the exceptions of the "Han shot first" and Hayden Christienson being switched in for the third movie (Bad move lucas, BAD BAD move.) The additions seem largely harmless and, as mentioned by Lucas in the commentarys it is what he always intended the series to look like.


Why so much hate?

 

[Onyx Oblivion]

WHAT IS THE BIG DEAL OF HAN SHOOTING FIRST?

Seriously, when watching the new editions, I slowed the scene down on purpose...Greedo shot first by, like, a millisecond, and Han still comes off as a badass either way.

Star Wars fans are nuttier than Sonic fans, I swear.

 

[Thumper17]

I'm really interested in the reasons for hating them.

 

[Moc]

Ok simple answer: Would you think if a painter thinks like thirty years after he finished his masterpiece," I think I could improve this", and then starts to put some paintbrushes here, and some there, and then puts it back into the museum. Would you argue that this was dignified and the integrity of that painter is still 100% intact?

 

[English Stew]

It's not the special editions themselves that make me mad, it's that Lucas DESTROYED the origional film reels so that no one could see them again.

When you consider the cultural impact that those reels had, you realize that Lucas did something equitable with burning all the first editions of a famous book, or smashing a significant sculpture. What Ol'Georgy did was a crime against history, simply put.

 

[MorganL4]

Simple, they screw with the integrity of the originals, and yet as you stated in your own post add NOTHING to the actual film itself, its Lucas screwing with a beloved film franchise for the sake of an extra buck. It's that simple. Id be just as angry if they were to take Its a wonderful life and give it modern day special effects and then throw it in theaters and charge people for it... and then to make matters worse unless you are like me, and to make matters worse, they have taken the theatrical versions out of print. THAT is my biggest complaint.

 

[Vausch]

I don't hate them really, the background changes were fine but I'll try to justify fanboyism on the major ones.

1. Han's meeting with Jabba: I don't care how bad-ass Han is, he's also smart enough to know not to step on a guy's tail you owe a lot of money to that can hire pretty much anybody to kill you at any given time. Not worth taunting. Plus that effect... weak, jagged and all around bad.

2. Han Shot First: Yes this is silly, but Greedo shooting first makes Han look reactionary rather than a proactive badass. It's like if Greedo hadn't shot at him he'd have just walked off like "Oh okay Mr. Greedo I'll be a good boy and get Mr. Jabba his money" Seriously, it seems like every change people complain about is because it makes Han look either stupid or lessens his cool by a notch. Han always shot first in my eyes.

3. Hayden Christensen as Anakin in Return of the Jedi: Fuck you Lucas. I don't want anything reminding me of the prequel trilogy and that was just a kick in the teeth. I understand your thinking was "oh he's going back to when he was a Jedi" but I don't care. You failed.

4. The beak in the Sarlacc: Unnecessary, pointless, looks rather sloppy and adds nothing to make the creature look more threatening like Lucas claimed.

 

[Arluza]

because they are not what the fans saw in theaters that made them love them. I've seen the theatrical and (I don't know which) special edition. the original look better and was better filmed. The new editions digitalize everything, and cut out interesting 1970s film stock type stuff.

 

[Adzma]

The Special Editions would be tolerated on a much larger scale if Lucas remastered and released the original theatrical cuts as well. Look at Bladerunner, that has many different cuts and versions, yet Ridley Scott has enough respect for his fans to release the theatrical version alongside all the other newer versions.

If you've actually seen both versions, you'll understand that the theatrical ones are vastly superior. If you want to delve deeper, I suggest going to Save Star Wars [http://savestarwars.com/]. That site pretty much sums up why everyone hates the Special Editions.

 

[Gaiseric]

I don't like them 'cause he kept adding and tweaking things so that now some parts stick out like a sore thumb. He doesn't know when he should just leave something alone. And that he makes only the special editions available and not the original version(this is why I don't own the movies except a random VHS copy of A New Hope)

 

[Goofguy]

It doesn't really bother me. I very much enjoy the original trilogy but I am nowhere near fanboy enough to get worked up about the changes, regardless of how big (Hayden Christensen as Anakin Skywalker in RotJ) or how small (the sarlacc's new beak) they are.

 

[Thumper17]

Ok simple answer: Would you think if a painter thinks like thirty years after he finished his masterpiece," I think I could improve this", and then starts to put some paintbrushes here, and some there, and then puts it back into the museum. Would you argue that this was dignified and the integrity of that painter is still 100% intact?

I'd like to counter that by saying Leonardo Da Vinci never felt he finished the Mona Lisa and that Paintings and Movies are vastly different mediums.

 

[LandoCristo]

IDk about you guys, but when I threw out my VHS player, I bought the Special Editions, and it came with the originals as well. And I actually prefer the original versions, for most of the reasons mentioned, even though I had only seen the Special editions before that.

 

[Moc]

Ok simple answer: Would you think if a painter thinks like thirty years after he finished his masterpiece," I think I could improve this", and then starts to put some paintbrushes here, and some there, and then puts it back into the museum. Would you argue that this was dignified and the integrity of that painter is still 100% intact?

I'd like to counter that by saying Leonardo Da Vinci never felt he finished the Mona Lisa and that Paintings and Movies are vastly different mediums.

OK first of all, you seriously understand the jibberish I type? OK you have my admiration. Secondly: Look I get your point, but see, many people regard the original trilogy as nearby perfect, and so doing some paintbrushes on this painting lead it away from being perfect. Also I think its George Lucas policy of not releasing the original trilogy, and acting like it does not exist, I am a bit too young to ever have seen the original trilogy (I know no one with a VHS of the originals exept for an total asshole and my uncle, whom I see very rarely. Also I know, that I am a bit in a minority in my age class (I turned 19 today), for hating the original trilogy, but maybe that is another move from me to furthermore get more space between me and society ( If being an atheist and a cynic plus a quite dark sense of humor is not enought)

 

[kane.malakos]

As a huge Star Wars fan, I have several reasons to dislike the special editions. I'll break the changes down into three main things and deal with them from there.

Spoiler

1. Han shooting first. It's not as big of a deal as some people make it out to be, but it bugs me. The scene in the original cut established very clearly what kind of guy Han was. He was a stone-cold badass. He was the type to shoot a guy under the table and act like it was nothing. This establishes his character, and makes his personal journey more poignant, as we see that he learns to care about people, he becomes friends with Luke and Leia. We still get some of that with the special editions, but we lose out on the "Holy shit he just straight-up murdered a guy" feel of the first scene. Instead, he's much less morally ambiguous, which lessens the impact of his character development. Plus Greedo misses him from about a foot away, which is kind of stupid.

2. Updating the special effects. The main problem with this is that a lot of them look like crap. A lot of the colors are off and the CGI looks dated already. Hell, Darth Vader's lightsaber looks pink in a bunch of the scenes because of shoddy coloring. The original editions had perfectly good special effects, and updating it to CGI added very little. There are some shots I like in the extended editions, like adding windows to cloud city and showing more of the wampa, but most of them are unnecessary.

3. Added content. The main issue I have with the added content is that it is awkwardly shoehorned in where it wasn't needed. Take the scene when Ben and Luke are entering Mos Eisley. In the original, it looked like a shithole, which is exactly what it's supposed to be. In the special editions they added a dewback walking two feet in front of the camera, which seemed to serve no other purpose except to tear the focus violently away from the main characters. There's a bit where a speeder swerves around a ronto, causing a jawa to fall off. Why was this needed? It just adds a "funny" scene with no real point except to distract the audience. By adding buildings in the background and more people walking around, it also detracts from the "wretched hive of scum and villainy" feel that Mos Eisley should have.
Most other changes were either pointless or annoying. Why did we need a CGI Jabba to threaten Han? Why did we need a shitty-looking CGI alien singing an annoying song in Jabba's palace? Why did we need the Sarlacc to have a beak?

I guess a lot of it is nostalgia. The original movies were excellent, and all of George Lucas's attempts to "fix" them just change things that didn't need to be changed or add stuff that is either pointless or annoying. Spoilered for wall of text.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

I grew up on the Special Editions, not the theatrical cuts -- yet I still prefer the theatrical cuts. The reason? In adding the extra scenes, Lucas screwed up the pacing on three of the most tightly paced films of all time. The biggest offender for this is the Jabba scene in Star Wars. In the original cut, the escape to the Falcon is just that -- an escape. They manage to get aboard just before the Stormtroopers that had been following them caught them, and blast their way out of a hostile space port. In the Special Edition, Han takes the time to talk to Jabba, and they just kind of stroll out of there leisurely. It's a significant change, but it's one that you have to watch both cuts to understand how major and terrible it is; I know I was happy with the Special Edition when I was a kid.

 

[SilverHammerMan]

I don't mind them, some of the effects are a bit jarring but other than that, it's all good. However I have a huge problem with the Hayden Christianson (hope I spelled that right) replacement. First off, the prequels were not good, they had some cool ideas and characters and concepts, but they weren't really good. And secondly, maybe I'm over thinking this, but I don't like the implications that Hayden-Anakin at the end brings, it seems to me to say that Vader sort of.... reverted, to being Anakin, and I for one object to that. I prefer the original, Vader becomes Anakin yes, but it's not him reverting, it's him.... growing, becoming good again, not reverting. It's kind of hard to express, but you might be able to pick up my line of thought.