Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Why Disney Can't Give Us High-Def Star Wars Where Han Shoots First

Posted by Soulskill on from the i-find-your-lack-of-distribution-rights-disturbing dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Lost amid the disappointment of the Star Wars prequels were the unfortunate edits George Lucas has made to the original trilogy when he re-released them. Lee Hutchinson points out a few of the worst: 'In Return of the Jedi, Jabba's palace gains an asinine CGI-filled song-and-dance interlude. Dialogue is butchered in Empire Strikes Back. And in the first movie, perhaps most famously, Han no longer shoots first.' Lucas flat-out refused to spend time and money remastering the original versions of the movies. But now Disney is in control of the franchise (and the business case for releasing different versions of the same films has been proven). So there's hope, right? According to Hutchinson: maybe, but not for a while. While technological advances have reduced the price tag for such an endeavour, lawyers will keep it expensive. It turns out 20th Century Fox still owns distribution rights to the Star Wars films. Because of complex and irritating legal reasons, Disney was not able to acquire those as well. Thus, Disney will have to get Fox's approval and probably cut Fox in for some of the profits, if they were to re-release the series."

9 of 210 comments (clear)

  1. At least there's hope . . . by Kimomaru · · Score: 5, Insightful

    . . . because there was no reasonable chance of this happening with Lucas. Man, how do you mess up Star Wars?!

    1. Re:At least there's hope . . . by rudy_wayne · · Score: 5, Informative

      From TFA:

      When Disney plunked down $4 billion at the end of 2012 for the Star Wars franchise, it didn’t actually get everything, because Lucasfilm didn’t actually have everything to sell. Disney can release whatever new movies it wants, or dress Mickey Mouse up in Jedi robes and have him wave a light saber at guests in the Magic Kingdom, or hand-wave away the entire Star Wars Expanded Universe—it paid for the rights to do all of those things.

      Turns out, what it can’t do is sell you new copies of the six Star Wars movies (aka Episodes 1 thru VI). "Fox owns distribution rights to the original Star Wars, No. 4 in the series, in perpetuity in all media worldwide. And as for the five subsequent movies, Fox has theatrical, nontheatrical, and home video rights worldwide through May 2020."

      When George Lucas filmed Star Wars in the late 1970s, he had to turn to 20th Century Fox to both finance and distribute the film; the success of the first film enabled Lucasfilm to finance the other five movies itself (though Lucas did require some additional assistance from Fox in fully funding The Empire Strikes Back’s production). Lucas continued to use Fox as a distributor for all of the six existing Star Wars films—and Fox retains those distribution rights under the Disney sale.

    2. Re:At least there's hope . . . by bitt3n · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Man, how do you mess up Star Wars?!

      It must really annoy Lucas to hear people ask this even after he produced a detailed three-part instructional video on the subject.

      --
      how many pairs of boxer shorts should you own?
  2. Despecialized Editions by crow · · Score: 5, Informative

    If you look around, there has been a fantastic fan effort to create the Despecialized Editions that are as close to the original theatrical runs as possible for the original trilogy. They've mixed in the HD sources for the current releases with older footage to undo all the changes. It's pretty amazing.

    1. Re: Despecialized Editions by Spottywot · · Score: 5, Informative

      Harmys despecialized editions can be found here http://originaltrilogy.com/for... This site invites you to create an account to get access to the torrent link, but the torrents for all three movies should be quite easy to find on the usual torrent trackers. They are all great quality hd versions with the original soundtracks. Happy hunting, with no need for Disney to intervene.

      --
      In a cybernetic fit of rage she pissed off to another age...
    2. Re: Despecialized Editions by Guspaz · · Score: 5, Informative

      Just as an FYI followup to this, Harmy has been working on the despecialized editions for years, so there are a few different versions hanging around. The latest version is v2.5. The improvements in quality from his first release to his most recent release are huge.

      He also did preliminary attempts at Empire and Jedi, but he only did a rough first pass on those, so the work on them is nowhere near the quality of his work on Star Wars. He plans to revisit Empire and Jedi once he's satisfied with the original.

  3. Look for a good Fan Edit by grub · · Score: 5, Informative


    There are some very well done Fan Edits which take footage from various versions of the film and create a fan-friendly version. Han shoots first, no CGI Jabba the Hutt, etc.
    You can often spot the differences when they went from HD to a DVD or Laserdisc source to keep the story true to the original, but that's part of the fun.

    --
    Trolling is a art,
  4. Fine by Greyfox · · Score: 5, Informative
    Can they give us an HD Wookie Life Day Christmas Special?

    I'm contractually obliged to mention this in every Star Wars thread on the Internet.

    --

    I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?

  5. It's not "Han shoots FIRST"! by Anonymous+Freak · · Score: 5, Informative

    First implies an order.

    An order implies there is more than one.

    Han doesn't shoot *FIRST*, Han shoots.

    There is no "first," because there is no "second."

    There is no "second" because Greedo doesn't shoot at all.

    Stop with "Han shoots first" - start with "Greedo never shoots".

    --
    Another non-functioning site was "uncertainty.microsoft.com."
    The purpose of that site was not known.