http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Star_W ... ay_Special

I am going to add a poll, just because I've never added one.

I was 13 years old. I WANTED to like it. I REALLY wanted to like it. I loved the brand-new Star Wars movie...it made science fiction briefly popular. Heck. I could wear this t-shirt:



I remember being excited to watch it all week, could not wait until Friday rolled around. It was right around American Thanksgiving.

We were on eastern time so the two-hour extravaganza started right at 8pm, then it was right off to bed afterward.

The first 10 minutes are howling Wookiees, we are off to a great start. I didn't really know who Art Carney was, but I though the trader guy reminded me of Barney Rubble. I was vaguely disturbed by the softcore disco virtual reality headset bit.

Hmmm. That effects shot was from the film.
Hmmm. That effects shot was from the film.

Harvey Korman?? Bea Arthur???

So much filler. SOOOOO much stretching out of thin material....

Hmmm. That effects shot was from the film.
Hmmm. That effects shot was from the film.
Hmmm. That effects shot was from the film.
Hmmm. That effects shot was from the film.
Hmmm. That effects shot was from the film.
Hmmm. That effects shot was from the film.
Hmmm. That effects shot was from the film.

Hey, a cartoon! Made by the guys who did Cosmic Christmas last year.....Boba Fett? I like the Y-wing. This is the best part.

Ok, back to the variety show stuff. You know, an awful lot of popular shows were variety shows.

Hmmm. That effects shot was from the film.
Hmmm. That effects shot was from the film.
Hmmm. That effects shot was from the film.

They shot NOTHING new for efffects??? What a rip-off....

Ok, it's the big ending....I am actually getting bored by this point and my awareness of kitsch is rudimentary.

She's SINGING a song to the Star Wars theme??!! Why does she look so spaced out???? Ok. it's over.

I'm going to my room to think about what I've done.

Yes I watched it when it originally viewed but I cant remember much about it. I must have been five when it came out.

Now days I watch the six Star Wars films and realise just how suited they are for children (that is the nicest way I can say it). No wonder Sir Alec Guinness wished he never had signed on to it.

The Star Wars Holiday Special sums up everything wrong with letting George Lucas write or direct.

My resentment stems from massive dissapointment. A great idea gone rubbish.

I will always have a skewed view of this because I was 12 in 1977.

Aw, nuts, the recently posted Star Trek trailer really sucks too. Dammit.

I remember watching it when it aired... I never wanted to see it again.

Now, as far as t-shirts go, this is the one I lived in:

I was, mercifully, not yet a month old and have so far been spared the horror. Still avoiding it as well as possible but I fear one day my curiousity will get the better of me.

I was 13, and I had *both* of those shirts. I don't remember much about the holiday special, other than being underwhelmed.

I was 8, i saw most of it, i coudln't stay awake for some of the middle, (now i am glad as it prob saved me from some emotional wounds). I woke up for the end when Han and Chewie came busting in, and saw about the best parts of it. The Cartoon and the End.

But in College like 12 years ago i got a VHS of it as a Birthday present, it took 3 days to watch it as an adult becuase it was just Sooooo painful to watch. I could only stand it for like 30-45 minutes at a time and then would have to stop, and take a break for a day.

I still own it, but i have not watched it since then....
Had the C#PO and R2 t-shirt as well as the poster one.

Can't say I missed it. Didn't watch it when it came on, but don't remember why, more than likely, there was something else more important happening!

As far as Star Wars, A New Hope is concerned, and Empire and Jedi, loved those movies.

Skunk

For we who grew up tall and proud
In the shadow of the mushroom cloud
Queen

Check out what games I’m working on and their status by visiting .

Saw it live I was so little though that I completely overlooked how bad it was

I've heard 'net rumors that Lucas is going to make the first three films in the set. I'm looking forward to it, I'm sure he'll do something *awesome*!

Nope, I was in boot camp. I wonder which was worse?

Luckyjoe

I live by the Mantra "just say NO to Star Wars".

I buy the figures cause their pre-painted and I can use them for real Sci-Fi stuff, other than that, IMHO it is a piece of crap (all of it) and I only watch it cause my kids think it's cool.

In Weird Al Yankovic's "White and Nerdy" video at about 2:20 seconds in he buys a bootleg copy of the Holiday Special in an alley. That scene was so funny I almost fell off my chair. I am ashamed to admit I was tempted to buy a very cheesy looking bootleg DVD at this years Wizard World convention. Yet I managed an incredible amount of restraint after remembering how deliciously awful it was back then. Oh to see the world through the innocent eyes of youth once again. It took so little to captivate me.

I was 9 when the Holiday Special came out. It was heaven. Since I first saw A new Hope in theaters back in '77. I have pretty much breathed Star Wars. I cannot help loving it. I missed the CN Clone Wars series, but am pretty good about catching the one when I can (I am at work for most showings, but sometimes on a Sunday night I can catch it.) I love the SW Minis game. I have no one to RPG with.

But best of all was showing the entire series of six movies to my kids, 7 and 5, from Episodes 1 to 6 and see it through their eyes... to them it is the story of Anakin, and they say it was sad that he lost his way for a while and did bad things but it was OK because he saved his son in the end. They see it TOTALLY differently than I did!

Oh, my god. I even didnt know this existed.

I only remember the cartoon serial with C3Po and R2D2 and no other connections to the Star Wars movies. What was it called, Droids?

I thinked this was the lowest point the StarWars Hype could go.

I have to confess that I sometimes enjoed the Ewok cartoon serial.

I watched it with my gaming group of the time. I was a senior in high school. I forget if the original D&D was out then or if we were still playing with our homebrew hack of the Chainmail rules. By the end of the show we were throwing dice at the TV. Gods, those were the days. I think we were supposed to be studying for exams or something, but we were just goofing off.

Becky

There's absolutely no doubt that the less Lucas has to do with a Star Wars movie, the better it is. The only reason Star Wars was any good (I refuse to call it "A New Hope") was because it had been vetted, critiqued and criticized several times over by Lucas's friends and colleagues (which included Coppola and other then-young filmmakers).

Once Star Wars broke, the guy started believing his own hype, but he didn't yet have the clout to ruin Jedi. With the sequel a huge success, he was basically unstoppable.

What I find saddest of all is how much the prequels diminish the world of the original trilogy, not just by being so awful that their stink rubs off on them, but by taking what felt like a sprawling galactic empire with centuries - maybe millennia - of history and reducing it to about ten planets, 25 or so people and all major events occurring within one generation. I mean...Darth Vader built C3PO? Are you fucking kidding me? That reveal was when I knew that Episode 1 was going to be excruciating to watch even if Jar-Jar were to drop dead right then and there.

So, really? When Vader chokes Admiral Ozzel for mocking his adherence to an "ancient religion", this was the religion of the dominant force in the Empire...what, at most ten years ago? Tatooine is an unknown backwater planet where it is safe to hide Luke, except that's where daddy Darth grew up? Ugh, don't get me started...

And I saw the original SW Holiday Special on tape, but only a few months after the Swedish transmission, so I voted on-air, because it certainly was close to that than seeing it on som bootleg tape years later. If you can, catch the Rifftrax version. It makes it almost watchable...almost.

marginally off topic, but now at least that there are the prequels, maybe Lucas will finally stop futzing with the originals.

*rant mode off*

For more info on the holiday special, and to be astounded that Starwars.com actually ackowledges its existance: http://www.starwars.com/movies/saga/20081117a.html

SD

My bad, I meant Empire, of course. While I wasn't quite gutted over Jedi, I was at least underwhelmed. I saw SW 13 times, ESB 10 and RotJ 2. I think at the time I chalked it up at least in part to getting older , though.

I just wish they would redo the fight scene between Obi Wan and Darth in Episode IV (A New Hope). After seeing all the amazing fight scenes in Episodes I, II and III it made Darth and Obi-wan's fight kinda look like two old guys going after each other with canes, not two jedi masters having a rematch.