Today is May 4th, a fun little day in geek culture focused on an enjoyment of Star Wars, not out of any significance in the series (it’s not the release day of any of the films, although the 6 core films were all released in the month of May) but instead simply because “May Fourth” rhymes well with “May the Force” from the phrase in the series “may the force be with you.” I find it cute, but a bit of a forced celebration day, but that’s just me.
Whatever case, I do enjoy Star Wars quite a bit. Not so much the prequels, although I can tolerate those, and I am enjoying the new films being produced since Disney gained ownership, but I do feel there is a bit of a production rush happening that might cause problems down the line, for now it’s quite enjoyable to have a new film each year, one main story and one past story alternating yearly. It helps flesh out the universe, since Disney decided resetting everything was a good idea and they threw out the vast majority of the side stories told in novels over the nearly 40 year history of the series before Disney made their purchase. I ain’t mad about that though.
Star Wars is a funny thing, really, in that it’s something I’ve always known about. Growing up you naturally learn about pop culture, especially “older” pop culture elements, usually in parody form, and Star Wars was no exception. Interestingly, probably my best exposure to the films existence would have been in the cartoon Muppet Babies. Yes, seriously – I was a young child in the late 80’s and early 90’s so that certainly was a show I would have watched regularly enough, and they made many references to the then trilogy – even clips of the film were spliced in to the show, usually of space battles, the kind of thing I’d enjoy the most!
In fact, that’s what I thought Star Wars mostly consisted of, was space battle! I’ve mentioned before how much I loved space as a child, and my family knew this, so they always suggested to me that I watch Star Wars sometime, because hey, it’s got space! By the time I would finally catch the films on TV, I was actually quite bored. Again, I was maybe 7 years old, what do you expect? It especially doesn’t help that I would catch the most (for a kid) boring part of The Empire Strikes Back and, given my attention span at that time, changed channels back and forth constantly, never really paying attention enough to really enjoy the story or see when some of the best scenes in the film series (like the Hoth Battle) were coming.
There was just too little space battle and too much “story” for me. Again, I was a kid, it makes total sense, but I thought Star Wars was something amazing – it all seemed so, bland, typical, and old. Oh, how little my 7 year old self knew he was missing.
Move ahead to 1995; Christmas of 1995 to be precise – a family friend would let me borrow their VHS collection of the Star Wars Trilogy (THX version) and my now 10 year old self got super excited. I immediately went into another room of the house popped in the tapes, and watched. Finally, I was experiencing Star Wars properly enough, at an age where I could actually enjoy it. I must have watched those tapes a dozen times or more before they would be given back to their owners… but not before I got my own copies to wear out!
I was an odd kid – I wound up finding Return of the Jedi to be my favorite of the three films, and I actually still hold that to be the case. I’ve grown to understand why people love The Empire Strikes Back as much as they do, but something in Return of the Jedi really works for me. Probably the amazing musical score (especially as Vader and Luke fight that final time), the idea of a second, even more dangerous Death Star being built, or maybe just the spacecraft.
This would prove to be the perfect time for me to finally experience Star Wars, as by the end of 1996 I learned of the “Special Editions” of the films being released. It was awesome! new updates, even better remastering (which yes, was a concept I actually understood by that age) and a re-release to theaters? I couldn’t have been happier!
It would turn out A New Hope would release on my birthday and that was my present. I was seeing Star Wars, in a theater, on my birthday. Fuck yes! I enjoyed myself, too. The changes didn’t bother me, but of course, I didn’t actually know about most of the more subtle changes so all I could do was enjoy the experience.
I’d also go to see Empire when it was released, but for some reason we couldn’t go see Jedi which certainly was the worst for me since that is my favorite of the original trilogy. I remember one day since I couldn’t go see it watching my THX edition tape and sitting close to the TV with the sound way up to simulate the experience. Eh, it’s the kind of thing you do as a kid.
Of course I got the Special Editions on VHS when they were released, and enjoyed them at home as well – this included finally seeing Return of the Jedi Special Edition (I loved the new ending music, much to the shock of other fans (more on that in a future article.))
Move ahead to 1999 and the Prequels. Of course I was still a Star Wars fan, but I was also now a teenager, with all the traits you can expect of such. I saw The Phantom Menace and thought… “okay, that wasn’t bad, but.. that was different.” When it would hit home releases, I got the VHS tape and watched it and felt the same. I didn’t hate it, but I didn’t like it – it wasn’t the same. I would go see Attack of the Clones in theaters as well and I enjoyed that more, but never did get it for a home release. I wouldn’t get to see Revenge of the Sith in theaters at all, nor would I actually even see the film until many years after its release. It’s not that I didn’t care, it’s just I had other stuff going on in my life and Star Wars was kind of not a priority.
Of course now, as I said before, I’m enjoying the new films, re-watching the old at regular intervals when I feel the urge, and overall still a fan. I don’t much care for the Clone Wars CG or cartoon series at all (it just didn’t catch me) and I still rarely watch the prequels, but that’s probably what you would expect.
There ya go… for those of you who actually read it all, the story of how I grew to enjoy Star Wars.