Lucas waves hand: "Greedo shot first from the beginning..."

[mego73]

George Lucas infers it was sloppy editing that made it seem Han shot first in 1977

5 Questions With George Lucas: Controversial - Hollywood Reporter

[Brue]

That is nice George. Why is it that in NO versions of the script (including scripts that include deleted scenes) does greedo get a shot off. I have several versins of hte script and this just isn't true. AND

IF it was just due to sloppy editing, it makes the character more appealing anyway. He had a journey to travel from mercenary to hero. If he was a hero to start with, he went nowhere. No character growth is not a good character.

[Nostalgiabuff]

either way, Greedo had a gun on him and was getting ready to shoot, so Han shooting first is not cold blooded murder, it is self defense

[SeattleEd]

I call shenanigans on Lucas. Of course it's his script and world so he is god and can do whatever he wants. LOL

[Random Axe]

I'm pretty certain it wasn't in the novelization that way either. Lucas is full of it. If he were to ever be given an enema, he could fit inside a shoebox.

[Brazoo]

He does this with a lot of his memories.

And yeah - shooting a guy who's training a gun on you and says they're going to kill you - is self defense, not murder.

[Brazoo]

It really is amazing how much he revises events in his mind. Between his personal stuff, his muddling with his movies (and even their titles), and the odd claims he makes, like 'Star Wars had a small budget for the time' (it didn't), I'm always amazed.

To be fair to him - I think he clearly has some bad associations to that period of time looking back on his life.

[Brue]

Do you remember the sequel to ET or all the rereleases of Close Encounters? How about the revisions to Schindler's List? No? Right.

[jwyblejr]

And then he wonders why fans get miffed at him.

[samurainoir]

It really is amazing how much he revises events in his mind. Between his personal stuff, his muddling with his movies (and even their titles), and the odd claims he makes, like 'Star Wars had a small budget for the time' (it didn't), I'm always amazed.

To be fair to him - I think he clearly has some bad associations to that period of time looking back on his life.

Wasn't his ex-wife the one who edited Star Wars originally?

[Brazoo]

Wasn't his ex-wife the one who edited Star Wars originally?

Exactly - she worked on the original 3 movies. By all accounts she was an editor with a great story sense, and from various sources she was one of the few collaborators Lucas had who could criticize him and have it effect his decisions. She also edited for Frances Ford Coppola and Scorsese.

By all accounts George is a great editor too - but he is often criticized for not understanding the emotional structure or characters the same way - and it seems like she brought that to his projects.

In the book Skywalking (which I read years ago), they talk at length about her contributions - which are never acknowledged now. She has been credited for rearranging the original climax of Star Wars to make it work.

Off-hand there's another story I always remember - Spielberg and Lucas screened "Raiders of the Lost Ark" for feedback - the movie originally went from Indy with the G-Men arguing about the ark directly to the big warehouse shot with the dude pushing the ark in a crate - everyone else was flipping out about how great the movie was, and Marcia caught everyone off-guard by asking 'what happened to Marion?' Everyone forgot about tying that loose end up - They had to go back and reshot the scene in the film now.

It's the kind of thing she's credited for - not being shy about her opinions and contributing valuable insight.

You'll never hear her name on a Star Wars commentary though.

[Goblin19]

That's interesting. I had never heard that before.

[Mawni]

He just likes to mess with the fans.

[kennermike]

I dont know what to say about Lucas anymore? Im out !

[Brazoo]

For more on Marcia Lucas, check out the book "Skywalking: The Life and Films Of George Lucas", which I believe was written with Lucas' cooperation, and then not authorized by him.

There's a summary of that book and other insights into Marcia Lucas here:
The Secret History of Star Wars

There's some gossipy stuff mixed in there too, but I have to say, I don't think his work has been as good without her - so I do think that lends credence to her being a key to his success to some degree. Also, he really does seem fixated on re-writing his own history.


Here's some insight into her influence:

"After THX went down the toilet, I never said, 'I told you so,' but I reminded George that I warned him it hadn't involved the audience emotionally...He always said, 'Emotionally involving the audience is easy. Anybody can do it blindfolded, get a little kitten and have some guy wring its neck.' All he wanted to do was abstract filmmaking, tone poems, collections of images. So finally, George said to me, 'I'm gonna show you how easy it is. I'll make a film that emotionally involves the audience."