RUMOR: Unedited Original Star Wars Trilogy Coming to Blu-Ray

[Magmarock]

Search your feelings you know it to be true. In all honesty my heart is racing. I boycotted the prequels and the blu-ray trilogy. The only Star Wars I bought was the 2006 DVD set which came with the original versions taken straight from the laser disk.

Even without the alterations I still wasn't happy with the blu-ray transfer to be honest. The colour correction is off and light to black ratio was too high.

however Disney are very good as restoration and while they aren't my favorite company they do have a respect for preserving older films and if that is anything to go by I'd say that the future of the original trilogy is looking brighter.

 

[iamscottevil]

seek out harmy's despecialized editions. blu ray quality, nearly the exact original cut and color.
Also look into 'the secret history of star wars' where it talks about the talented editor of star wars, marsha lucas who's been wiped from the marketing on these films.

 

[DrOswald]

Step 2 in undoing everything Star Wars since 1983. I call that a good thing.

 

[iamscottevil]

hey, star tours was awesome! 1986

 

[Magmarock]

Awesome news!!!! I SO hope this is true, because I wanted to buy the blu-rays (more than anything, I wanted that 7th disk with all the deleted scenes) but flat out refused when I saw the ridiculous scene-killing addition of NOOOOOOO at the end of jedi when Vader saves Luke. I am still furious over that, and have still refused to buy the blu-rays because of it.

So this is truly great news, to me!!!!

Here here, boy is it hard to articulate just how stupid and insulting that was.

 

[swiftdraw]

Eh, I enjoyed some of the add-on stuff from the late '90's re-makes, even if the CG does not hold up in HD at all. Things like Falcon blasting out out Mos Eisly under fire, the AT-ST's running escorts for the AT-AT's, and making Cloud City more lively added on to the movies for the better. Others, like the music bit in Jabba's Palace and the thing with Greedo... Yeah, not sad to see them go.

As for the Prequels getting purged, I'm willing to bet that won't happen. Not so long as the Story Group keep referring to George Lucas for story boarding and universe building.

 

[SonOfVoorhees]

Awesome news, BUT, they better not rip fans off buy releasing them as a box set at an obscene amount of money. They have released so many different versions of these movies i hope they release them for £20 for all three. When you think about it there really isnt anything new they can add documentary wise is there? Am sure we all have those. Maybe just release all three movies minus those extras for £20.

Wonder if they will release them in the cinema again? Star Wars:The unedited edition. lol

 

[Sniper Team 4]

Great. So if this does happen, I will have to buy the trilogy again. That will make, let me see here...five different versions of the trilogy. VHS, original DVD version, special edition DVD version, Blu-ray version, and now this version. The collector in me will be happy.
The only thing I wish they would keep in the original trilogy that's only in the special edition is the scene in the fighter bay. The one where Biggs comes running up to Luke, and then Red Leader comes over to talk to them. That part is cool and it actually gives us some background on Biggs instead of him just showing up in the fight and Luke acting like he knows him in the middle of the fight.

Okay, look. You can't do that to the prequels. I'm sorry. I know they're terrible (Episode III is the worst for me by far!), but they are the films. They are the highest level of cannon. Destroying my beloved E.U. was bad enough, but to go out and completely wipe out the movies now too? No. That is wrong on a fundamental level and is something I hope is just a rumor and doesn't come to pass.

 

[faefrost]

New Rumor: THPPPPPPPPPPPPPT

THPPT

You know, some of the fixes were actually quite nice. The correction of the blue filter is the biggest thing I would hate to see disappear. The see-through snow speeder thing can stay corrected. I think they cleaned up some of the light-saber effects. You know, the simple high-def touch-ups.

I think some of the cleanup fixes, such as removing artifacts and correcting for color shifts from aging film stock would still be done. Whatever they release still has to be basically cleaned up and "remastered" for Blu Ray to avoid looking like ass. It's the major inclusions of all the new CGI crap that needs to be stripped out.

And yes Lucas is probably both correct and somewhat disingenuous when he says the originals were destroyed in the remastering. Probably the original stock masters were damaged. But they did convert all of it to digital. Yes we will never see the exact projected film version of Star Wars that we saw back in 77. But they can surely rebuild a cleaned up version of it from the digital.

 

[Hiramas]

Hey, Blu-Ray should give us enough space to enjoy both versions in on edition, should it not? That would be a nice release.
To the second part: nooooo
I don't think so. Apart from the fact that the movies were bad in many ways, the story was pretty ok. It gave us a LOT of stuff about the SW Universe we take for granted now, but which did not exist before. It would be foolish to remove them. The same way i believe they will not scrap the entire old republic EU. Too much money invested in SWTOR and other stuff.
IF they are really clever, they retell the past Jedi EU in a good way, using a lot of stuff people already know. Like they let marvel do it.

 

[Riff Moonraker]

Awesome news!!!! I SO hope this is true, because I wanted to buy the blu-rays (more than anything, I wanted that 7th disk with all the deleted scenes) but flat out refused when I saw the ridiculous scene-killing addition of NOOOOOOO at the end of jedi when Vader saves Luke. I am still furious over that, and have still refused to buy the blu-rays because of it.

So this is truly great news, to me!!!!

Here here, boy is it hard to articulate just how stupid and insulting that was.

Agreed. When I first saw that, I honestly felt like something broke inside me. I STILL havent gotten over that. Lucas... thank you for bringing this universe to all of us, yeah I owe you that, but I could kick you between the legs for that stunt with Vader.

 

[Mahorfeus]

I guess... I just never really minded Lucas' changes. Well, except for maybe the NOOOO in Return of the Jedi.

Good for the people who wanted the original versions, though.

 

[Kurt Cristal]

What, and ruin the novelty of watching it on LaserDisc?

No seriously, I have it on LaserDisc. But yeah, a bluray would be nice.

 

[Grabehn]

So I can finally have a copy to back my "No... that guy from Starwars 3 wasn't the ghost at first"? That's kinda nice.

 

[Zeraki]

I was under the impression that Lucas had the original films destroyed. I really hate rumors like these, because they usually turn out to not be true.

It would be awesome to not have to worry about my old VHS copies breaking down anymore, but I'm not going to hold my breath waiting for this on Blu-Ray.

I guess... I just never really minded Lucas' changes. Well, except for maybe the NOOOO in Return of the Jedi.

I honestly liked the 1997 Special Edition and would quite like those on Blu-Ray as well. The edited DVD and Blu-Ray versions can go straight to hell though.

 

[Jingle Fett]

10 Hours of M. Bison saying "YES!" isn't enough but it's a start. Still have the originals on VHS with the Leonard Maltin interviews at the beginning and the main thing that pissed me was that those originals weren't also made available on DVD and stuff. Otherwise it would have been fine! I think we might see the birth of a new meme, "Good Guy Disney"

About decanonizing the prequels...not sure how I feel about that. They might not have been the best movies but they had some neat ideas and I do have a certain affection for them...If it does happen, what I would like to see happen would be for Disney to make semi remakes of the prequels, rather than dropping them all together.

Basically take the general original timeline and events, but reassemble them more coherently and efficiently, and only make changes where needed. For example (even though I honestly don't mind him much), they could do stuff like remove Jar Jar from Episode 1 or make him less annoying, as well as make the events of Episode 1 more directly relevant to Attack of the Clones so it leads in better. Anakin could be changed from angsty brat to...well I don't know, but someone more worthy of the title of Darth Vader. Attack of the Clones could be...I don't know, what if new Episode 1 ended with the beginning of the clone wars, Episode 2 was all about the clone wars, and episode 3 was about the whole Anakin to Vader thing.
Just thinking aloud, anyway the point is they can rework and reshoot the prequels so they're good (plus some of the old CG VFX have aged really badly).

 

[Junks]

seek out harmy's despecialized editions. blu ray quality, nearly the exact original cut and color.

I second that. Harmy's restoration is excellent. It's even more impressive when you think about the effort that went into it. Making frame-by-frame corrections must be a gigantic arse. So if you want to see the unadulterated original trilogy, I'd recommend downloading them (a bit faffy but worth it) rather than praying for the veracity of a rumour.

http://originaltrilogy.com/forum/topic.cfm/Harmys-STAR-WARS-Despecialized-Edition-HD-V25-MKV-IS-OUT-NOW/topic/12713/

http://originaltrilogy.com/forum/topic.cfm/Harmys-THE-EMPIRE-STRIKES-BACK-Despecialized-Edition-HD-DVD9-AVCHD-and-SD-NTSC-DVD5-AVAILABLE-NOW-Read-1st-post/topic/12511/

http://originaltrilogy.com/forum/topic.cfm/Harmys-RETURN-OF-THE-JEDI-Despecialized-Edition-HD-AVCHD-DVD9-NTSC-DVD5-available-SEE-FIRST-POST/topic/12905/

 

[Diddy_Mao]

Interesting if true.
I always assumed Disney dropped into damage control mode the second they acquired the rights. They've got an uphill battle to prove that damaged goods are in safer hands now.

If they're able to distribute the OT with minimal retouching and no Special Edition nonsense they'll be able to chalk up a pretty big win for themselves.

 

[luckshot]

if this happens i will be forced to buy a blu-ray player, i figure if these are the only movies i got for it then it would still be worth it.

the second rumor almost makes it all seem like a prank so i guess wait and see until an official announcement

 

[Khrowley]

I actually wonder why Disney hasn't done this sooner if at all considering they just LOVE re-releasing their properties for minimum effort/maximum profits.