So, I’m availing myself of certain search methods best left unmentioned I stumble across an interesting video file. It showed a scene from Star Wars which I dimly remembered from seeing the film in the theater, and others having mentioned seeing, but everybody’s recollection was so hazy that we couldn’t be certain that it ever existed. Turns out that it does. It is Luke running into a cantina in Mos Eisley and telling Biggs about the space battle going on. Biggs, Luke, and a couple of other people run outside and use Luke’s binocs to look at the action.
Nice to know that it still exists out there and that Lucas was unable to destroy all the copies of it.
Maybe you saw some kind of preview print? Because I don’t remember it being in the movie and I saw it pretty early in its run.
Those scenes were in the book and in the Marvel comic adaptation, however. (along with Luke first observing the battle when shots are still being fired.).
Why is Lucas so hateful of those scenes? They, and a few other scenes establish Biggs as a minor character. Not exactly ground-breaking, but hardly worth destruction.
To be fair, they weren’t just in the comics, either.
I remember from my Star Wars picture book (what can I say? I was 3 when it came out) that there were scenes of Luke & Biggs. Luke is wearing a Gilligan hat, IIRC.
-Joe, never knew what that style of hat is called.
They were never in the movie. Ever. They are available as images, and as a complete clip on a CD-Rom called, I think, Behind the Magic.
They were filmed because the Studio didn’t think the fact that we’re not introduced to our hero until about 20 minutes into the film was a good idea, so these would help introduce Luke earlier. But George hated that idea, he wanted a clear line of Droids lead to Desert lead to Jawas lead to Luke. When it came to the final edit, he left the scenes out. They’ve never ever been in a final cut of the film.
I don’t remember exactly when I first saw Star Wars in the theater, other than it was some time after the Mad Magazine issue featuring Star Wars came out.
As for why Lucas hates those scenes, I think it’s pretty obvious: He’s an idiot.
Merijeek, you’re exactly right about the hat Luke’s wearing. No idea of what the name of it is.
I believe there were a few copies of the film illegally circulated that were early edits. Perhaps you saw those.
You may also have seen the clips on a TV show showing behind-the-scenes shots of that scene?
But most likely what you are mis-remembering are the images from the Storybook, and implanting them into your memory of the film, even though they weren’t actually there in the theatrical release.
So the questions are: How would I have seen the early edits of an illegal copy when I was roughly eight years old? If I saw it on a behind-the-scenes show, which one was it? Never saw one of the storybooks for the first film, Empire, yes, Star Wars no.
I don’t know. Explain to my why I’d bet my left nut that I saw a snowspeeder kamikaze into a walker on Hoth.
I was 5 when Empire came out. I (obviously) hadn’t read the novelization. If you count the walkers throughout one of them disappears. We go from five, to four (legs tied), to three (Luke & Grapple), to two.
How’d that last one get it? The scene I know for certain I saw!
Merijeek: YES! I remeber that, too! When I tell anyone about it, they look at me like I’m all wierd or something.
Well, I am all wierd, but I’m definitely not something.
But I remember it was General Veers who bought it. Right after they blow up the shield generator, he looks up from his targeting scope, out the front viewport, just in time to see a snowspeeder coming straight at him.
I still have a pretty good memory of my Star Wars picture book. As I recall, it starts with Luke alone out fixing one of the family’s water-dealies when he notices the laser flashes from the battle between the cruiser and the Star Destroyer. He whips out his binoculars and is able to see the coup-de-grace that disables the cruiser and the Star Destroyer dock with the cruiser.
If they did really film this, I can understand why Lucas dropped this from the final cut. The opening shot of the ships passing above the camera was brillant. Having Luke watch on via binoculars from Tatooine would have been confusing and superfluous and ruined the flow from the opening scroll straight into the battle.
The Biggs scene occurs back “at the ranch” and basically consists of a discussion about Biggs heading off to join the Imperial Academy and Luke wishing he was leaving too, which led into the dinner scene with Uncie Owen & Aunt Beru. Keeping the Biggs scene would tightened up the scenes at the end where Biggs gets blown up, but probably wouldn’t have contributed too much otherwise.
And I was 25. The scene was not in the movie, and I only heard about it last week. I have no idea who Biggs even is. The film’s open was shown entirely in space; that space ship going over your head in the opening shot was unforgettable.
It wasn’t call Episode IV at the time, either. I refuse to rename the films.
I’m not arguing one way or the other, but these are my memories:
I was 7 when Star Wars came out. I was never what you might call a Star Wars fanatic… I loved the film, to be sure, but I only saw it once in the theaters, and while I had many of the action figures, I was never a member of any of the fan clubs or had any of the story books or anything else.
So, a handful of years later, when it was shown on HBO, it was the second time I’d seen the movie. And I have a very vivid memory of sitting there watching it the first night it was shown with my friend Danny, and turning to him and asking him if there was a scene missing. He had no idea what I was talking about, and I told him I was talking about the scene where Luke talks to his friend (I don’t think I remembered his name was Biggs at the time) about the battle. He had no idea what I was talking about, so I shrugged it off, assumed it had just been taken out of the film for some reason.
It wasn’t until some 15-20 years later that, while reading through a friend’s copy of Star Wars Insider, that I discovered it was a controversial issue as to whether that scene ever existed and whether it was actually in some released prints. The consensus seemed to be that ‘no’, it was never in any released print.
So, I don’t know one way or the other. I’m positive I saw that scene in the theaters. I suppose it could be a misplaced memory, but I really don’t think so.