Star Wars Blooper Reel Is Strong In The Force

By Rudie Obias | Published

This article is more than 2 years old

When George Lucas went into production on the original Star Wars in 1976, neither he nor his cast had any idea how big the space opera was going to turn out. After all, before its release, Star Wars‘ premise was the stuff of cheesy Saturday-afternoon serials and definitely not considered the height of pop culture at the time. Regardless, Star Wars went on to be a box office and critical success, and almost 40 years later, we’re still talking about George Lucas’ film and vision.

This is why watching the blooper reel above is both strange and hilarious. Star Wars is ingrained in the public consciousness, so it’s odd to watch alternative takes, line flubs, and general silliness of something with which we’re all very familiar. Not to say that the bloopers aren’t enjoyable, because they totally are.

The video is tied to J.W. Rinzler’s book on the making of the original Star Wars. It was previously unseen, unavailable, and never made its way to bonus features on Blu-ray/DVD releases of the Star Wars films. Rinzler announced that he will be releasing e-book versions of the first two making-of Star Wars books, so it’s unclear if videos like this will be packaged with the Kindle or iPad editions of the coffee table books.

The video itself is short (about two and a half minutes) and was found on Reddit. The first 48 seconds or so are completely silent, so mind your volume while watching. The latter half of the video features some of the funniest moments from the making of Star Wars.

Carrie Fisher as Princess Leia exchanging words with Peter Cushing as Grand Moff Tarkin is one of the blooper reel’s highlights, while the look on Alec Guinness’s face as Obi-Wan Kenobi with Chewbacca’s Wookiee hair in front of it is just priceless. Watching a young Harrison Ford eating the microphone from his headpiece out of frustration is a sight to see, while watching Stormtroopers navigate out of a wall is GIF-worthy. Also, Mark Hamill trying to get the correct inflection of the word “supernova” is an early sign of the actor’s future career as a prominent voice actor.

After the success of American Graffiti in 1973, George Lucas never thought that his next film would be as successful as it turned out to be. Watching the relaxed atmosphere in the Star Wars blooper reel reflects George Lucas’ approach to making the sci-fi film. Just based on the premise at the time, Star Wars could’ve easily crashed and burned at the box office and we would’ve never heard anything from it again. Luckily, the film was a success and now we’re anxiously awaiting for the seventh installment in the film series, which is hopefully still due in theaters in 2015. George Lucas and Star Wars have come a long way, but this blooper reel stands as a good reminder of the film series’ roots.

Here are a few more blooper reels from the other Star Wars movies, namely the entire prequel trilogy and a compilation of the original films. Enjoy!

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