What gets me is the CGI’d head-turn that Luke now pulls in SW when Leia kisses him before the swing. What loser turns his head before being kissed by a Princess?
One who can smell incest a trilogy away, clearly.
Uh, remember that scene with the tongue, and how Threepio says, “Oh, I can’t bear to watch?” (Right after they de-carbonite Han?)
shudder
Plus, he was like, totally going to like, kill her friends, and that like, totally sucks. 
Come on, I can’t be the only person who was really turned on by that. Right?
Right?
Actually, Jabba the hutt was one of the most well known crime bosses in the galaxy. So maybe he didn’t do anything to her specifically, but he had that strangling coming.
While I agree 100% with your assessment, I’d like to point out that in the book Tales of the Jabba’s Palace (I think it was that one…either that or Tales from the Mos Eisley Cantina, it’s noted that Greedo was, essentially, a teenager trying to act all big and bad. This was his first attempt to collect a bounty.
Given that Lucas has said repeatedly that the books are canon unless the trilogy contradicts the point, this could be the effect that he was going for.
However, it still sucks, and should never have been altered.
On the other hand, that was a really stupid fuckin’ story, one of the worst in a drastically sub-par collection. As such, I think it should be declared “too dumb for cannon” and summarily ignored. Just like Attack of the Clones.
“There is no Greedo.”
Well, there is not shot. Greedo isn’t supposed to shoot at all. But it’s not even that. Had Harrison Ford dodge the blaster shot on film and then blast Greedo, it would have set in fine with anyone watching the film. Not only would Han be a badass, he would be a fast badass! What irks me is that the scene looks really fake. It would be just as bad if Han’s dialogue were dubbed with a South African accent for that one brief scene. All in all, a true WTF moment.
Has Lucas ever spoken on this matter???
One can surmise that it’s a “Han must be moral” kinda thing, but I’d like to hear his own explanation for why he thinks the “fixing” actually works as a fix. Every quote I’ve ever read from him about the changes to the original trilogy only makes mention of the technological restrictions he originally faced that he could now transcend. The Greedo thing obviously doesn’t fit into this category.
When I got the DVDs, the first thing I did was turn on the commentary track, then skip ahead to this scene thinking there was no way they could ignore it.
They ignored it. The commentary focuses solely on the Huttese language.
The only thing I can think of that links to this is the fact that they had to reshoot the scene without Harrison Ford and a different actor playing Greedo. It wouldn’t make sense, though, because Han would still be trying to dodge it on the original footage.
My guess is that the scene probably made one of Lucas’ daughters cry.
He got what he wished for.
(Control over actors, technology with no limits, bottomless money pit, endless schedules and a chorus of “That’s just Genius, George” greeting every decision)
Mel Brooks (who also neglected to buy a return ticket when he boarded the bus to Sucksville) called it “The Green Awning syndrome” - when you’re hot Hollywood will give you money to make your pet project film about flies crawling on a green awning
How much better would Kubrick’s later stuff have been if he’d had a soulless bean-counter leaning over his shoulder bitching about every re-take, every day over schedule?
The real tragedy is that Greedo was easily the most competent bounty hunter in the Star Wars universe, insofar as he came the closest to actually managing to collect a bounty on his own merits. (I refer only to the first five movies here: maybe there were multiple incidents of supremely effective bounty hunting in Revenge of the Sith, but I wouldn’t know. I tend to doubt it though.) No letting the Empire do all the heavy lifting; no subcontracting his bounties to lesser minions; no elaborate Wile E. Coyote-like death traps involving flying remote drones and killer millipedes. He managed to discreetly track his quarry and catch him off guard, even while wearing a fluorescent hunting vest. His one fatal mistake was taking time out to gloat, but that could happen to anyone, really.
Original GL quote:
He can’t? Really? Then why even bother making 3 prequels that do exactly that–attempt to re-create a cold-blooded murderer as a misunderstood/disillusioned/flawed/“tragic” hero? At least Han does a lot more substantial to redeem himself than Vader ever does.
In that case, the early scene where Darth Vader casually strangles an Alliance officer should’ve been modified so Vader was only giving him a great big noogie. “Where’s the plans? Where’s the plans? Say ‘uncle’!”
Well, killing an armed bounty hunter who’s pointing a pistol at you while gloating about killing you is pretty foul. Nobody can come back from that. Slaughtering a roomful of defenceless children? Pfft. That’s, like, a misdemeanor at worst. A little community service, and Vader’s totally rehabilitated.
In the remixed revised extended extra special edition Greedo is not a bounty hunter but a credit counselor and he helps Han get out of debt by consolidating his loans into one low monthly payment.
I hear that in the next, next re-release of Star Wars, Han and Greedo recognize each other as old high-school classmates. They spend their time in the cantina chatting and laughing about the good old days, then they exchange phone numbers (and a few punches on the arm) before going their separate ways.
In the next re-release planned after that, Han Solo is going to drop by the hospital to visit Greedo, who’s dying of cancer, and will ask Han to adopt his two small children. Then there’s a tender goodbye scene that won’t leave a dry eye in the house, unless you’re just made of wood or something.
Side note: if you Google some variant of “Greedo ‘shoots first’”, the results, well … you’d swear the internet was invented solely as a medium for this debate.
Actually, if you’ve seen the deleted scenes on the Ep1 DVD, you’ll see that a rodian named Greedo picks a fight with little Ani, only to be summarily warned by Qui-Gon. So that would’ve put Greedo as the same age as Vader…