One of the all-time great nerd rumors is that a re-release of the unaltered editions of the original Star Wars trilogy is on the way. The trilogy has gone through a number of edits and variations over the years, resulting in some fans wishing that they could just watch the films as they first saw them as kids. These rumors have always turned out to be false, but the newest one claims to have some actual credibility thanks to a building amount of evidence from sources. It looks like a re-release of the original trilogy could be hitting shelves as soon as this year.
The folks over at Making Star Wars are more than familiar with these types of rumors. By their own admission, they don't run these rumors because they are usually false but this time "evidence and tips have been piling up" from "several sources" claiming that an unaltered cut of the original trilogy will be re-released this year on time for the 40th anniversary of Star Wars. As of now, we have to take this with the old blogger standby of a grain of salt until more concrete evidence pops up to validate these rumors.
It does make sense that Disney and Lucasfilm would release what is the single most requested thing from Star Wars fans in time for a milestone anniversary. Disney likes making money, and Star Wars fans like spending money on merch. It's a relationship made in heaven, and with George Lucas out of the picture, there really isn't anything keeping this re-release from happening other than confusing casual buyers with multiple versions of the same set of movies. Plus, they'll want to capitalize on the titanic amount of hype going into Star Wars: The Last Jedi, and what better way than with a nostalgia-heavy re-release?
For those not in the know, the Star Wars original trilogy premiered in 1977, 1980, and 1983. Since then, the films of seen a number of different edits tweaking things both big and small, resulting in a few different versions. Generally, Star Wars fans don't like these editions, because most of the changes are either superfluous or clearly stick out. These changes range from things like changing the Obi-Wan's Tuskan Raider yell from A New Hope, adding better (that's debatable) visual effects, inserting Hayden Christensen's ghost in Return of the Jedi, and putting in an entire song and dance number to Jabba's Palace.
Yeah, you can see why people might want to not watch that anymore.
The fate of this potential re-release is still hanging in the air, so keep checking in with CinemaBlend and we'll keep you updated with new information as soon as it becomes available.
