Lucas can’t write or direct?
Um, the ten zillion fans who saw the original “Star Wars” film in the theater eighty-five times during its first release disagree with you.
(YES, I know it’s called Episode IV: A New Hope, but when I was a kid and saw it in the theater, the poster said, “Star Wars.” Trying to change movie names retroactively is never a good idea, fanboys.)
The original “Star Wars” film was a mash up of other SciFi plots, characters, ands themes — all hijacked by Lucas.
After he had depleted the reservoir of that larceny — there was “no there, there”
Just my opinion.
He had a lot of help with that script. Most notably Gary Kurtz, Katz and his wife, and a group of close friends, Millius, Spielberg. They pointed out some flaws, and even though it irked George, he made the fixes.
He didn’t have all of the “yes men” he had with the prequels.
Lucas's genius was cobbling together all those elements into a new and genuinely exciting format. That's what made Star Wars work. It might not be original but its fundamentally a very good action-packed coming-of-age story and it hit the cinemas at a time when there was a dearth of such stuff. In other words, George Lucas got lucky.