George Lucas Explains Why Greedo Shoots Han Solo First in Star Wars (in revised edition)

Time ^ | November 30, 2015 | James Hibberd

[C19fan]

Deep inside a compelling Washington Post profile of George Lucas is the Star Wars creator defending perhaps his most infamous bit of Special Edition tinkering: having Greedo shoot Han Solo first rather than the scruffy-looking smuggler taking a pre-emptive action.

[Rastus]

But at least in his case, he saw the error of his ways and disowned the revised version. He now advocates releasing movies in their original form. And that’s probably the only time I’ll defend Spielberg, leftist Obama fundraising scum that he is.

[Rastus]

Everybody loved that scene, yet Lucas and Spielberg deeply regret it to this day, and I’m not joking. Sad. The whole thing was ad libbed because Ford was sick and couldn’t film much longer, and it turned out to be one of those magic moments on film.

[Rastus]

I remember that and it was George just twisting the knife. He knew the fans were pissed, knew he wouldn’t relent, so he wore that as a little in your face.

[Kommodor]

He who shoots first gets the princess ... is that something like the early bird getting the worm?

Need to practice up on my Weaver stance, I guess.

[Idaho_Cowboy]

Cuz he's a liberal and can't stand that he made a movie that had a preemptive strike in it. Han shot first.

[Idaho_Cowboy]

Gee what about Raiders of the Lost Ark when Indy shot the Arab swordsman?....

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The 'unarmed' Arab swordsman. He was just getting his life turned around and was working his way through school selling Camel's. How could hollywood have been so insensitive and racist and not even give us a proper trigger warning!

[gdzla]

I’m so glad I bought the collectors edition of the first three Star Wars movies on lazer disc before they got buggered up.

[TalonDJ]

When someone is pointing a weapon at you they are employing the threat of deadly force. Any retaliation is justified self defense and not ‘preemptive’.

[a fool in paradise]

Since Star Wars lifted elements from other films (samurai films that served the inspiration for spaghetti westerns, plus cliff hanger adventure serials), it is perfectly in-line with the spaghetti western genre for the stranger/hero to shoot someone in a cantina and to pull the trigger first.

[a fool in paradise]

Ah yes, the Arab swordsman. His brief existence... his hope and promise... his fledgling career in travel... it shall forever be known as Camel Lot.

[RansomOttawa]

Nothing is more ridiculous than Spielberg replacing all the guns with walkie talkies in ET! There’s lame and then there’s WTF!

In defense of Spielberg, when E.T. finally came out on DVD, both the version with walkie-talkies and the one with guns were included in the package.

It took years for Lucas to release the original theatrical versions of the original trilogy, and when he did, it was a very low-quality transfer that was only available for about a year. He just wouldn't stop tinkering with them, and whatever the latest iteration was, was always the "offical" one.