Did Han shoot first?

"That we know of."


​

 

I'f I could give this post and your previous breakdown post a thousand likes I would. Seriously. This is a fantastic breakdown of the character, the arc, and why it was important to just leave it alone. Han shoots first. Period. By changing that you change his character archtype, and thus the entire story. I love George and I think it is good that he allowed them to at least make it so they shot at the same time, but his constant tinkering with the films is annoying.

There are things about the SE I love. I love how much cleaner the film is, I love how they made the colors pop. I just think they should have left THIS alone.

 

Can we change the poll option of "Who cares *old man grumbling*" to "Who cares *Maclunkey!*"?


Seriously though, the Maclunkey thing might be one of the most inexplicable edits in all of Star Wars. It's just, I have no idea what this was meant to accomplish, and from a meta-perspective, that's kinda why I love it.

 

I'd love to see what they were thinking by adding that bit of dialogue, but yeah, I laughed and I love it. I'd prefer they put it back to Han shooting first, but oh well. We can't always get what we want. LOL

 

Short answer: because he could.

George Lucas is a tinkerer. Desperate to land the distribution rights for the prequels, Fox bankrolled LFL’s ‘restoration’ of the OT. He was handed free money to ‘clean up’ those movies and he used the opportunity to experiment. Just like the Jabba scene, it wasn’t about story or character, it was about technology. It was about the digital future of film editing and being at its forefront. Simple as that.

As Jurassic Park tried to teach us though: just because you CAN do something, doesn’t mean you SHOULD do something.

*This is only my opinion

 

That's the problem with a lot of films, and why I think so many people pushed back on the OTSE in the first place. It didn't add anything other than allowed him to play with new toys in an old sandbox, and to some, actively made the films worse.

He needed a Kathleen Kennedy back then. To pull him aside and say, "George, no."
She did it for Spielberg. It helped save his career.

 

Perhaps the time has come to acknowledge Greedo is dead.. and it matters not who shot first, but who got up from table alive.

 

I'd bet that, given enough time and left to his own devices, Lucas would eventually find a way to either not kill Greedo or have someone else do it:

• Han fires first and only, just like the original. Expanding blue circles emanate from the barrel of his blaster. Smoke and sparks have been digitally removed and Greedo has been stunned. When Han tosses a coin to the bartender on the way out, the "mess" he's referring to is the spilled drinks caused by Greedo's unconscious body falling to the table.
• 
  
• Han says "I'll bet you have" and a blaster is heard firing and Greedo's body slumps over the table. Han's head is digitally turned (badly) to look across the room. New footage is filmed of another bounty hunter with a smoking blaster in his hand. "I've come for the bounty on this Rodian, alive or dead doesn't matter to me" he says, followed by "We're even now, Solo". Han leaves.
• 
  
• Han says "I'll bet you have" and before Han fires, Greedo says "Consider this a warning" and puts his blaster away. The footage of Han unholstering his blaster is shown in reverse and new footage is filmed of Greedo getting up and leaving.

You get the idea. They're not great, but I'd actually prefer some of these to what we got.

 

One day Greedo being killed by Han will be cut so that Greedo is alive in the canon, and can get a mini-series called “Greed(o) is Good.”

 

What Greedo says is a Huttese turn of phrase, ma klounkee, which roughly means "this will be the end of you" and is a direct callback to Sebulba threatening Anakin in The Phantom Menace.

Research is your friend.

 

Hey thanks, but maybe a LITTLE less snark? Manners and politeness are your friends as well.

 

Are you talking to me?

If so no snark intended. I made “Greedo is good” from Gorden Gecco’s “Greed is Good,” from “Wallstreet.”

 

No not you brother.

 

He was talking to me because of the "research is your friend" comment I tacked on to the end of my post.

Snark aside, though, it really wasn't hard to find out what this new edit to Han and Greedo's confrontation means and what the intent was behind it.

 

Oh *wipes sweat from Mando mask* Good.

 

Should the audience have to research what a character is saying? Especially since everything else that character says is subtitled?

 

Yes.

Especially before objecting to what's being said.

 

They shouldn't. It's not as if they can't subtitle it, like they had done for the rest of the scene.

Personally, my only complaint is why was THIS needed? Just have Han shoot first the way it was in the original. Easy.

 

No edit to this scene was ever “needed”. Just be grateful it doesn’t now awkwardly cut to a bizarrely choreographed musical number led by a truly unpleasant CG character.

 

Somewhere, George Lucas stirs from a deep sleep...."I've had a revelation!"

--- Double Post Merged, Nov 15, 2019, Original Post Date: Nov 15, 2019 ---

The onus of understanding is on the film maker. This isn't subtext in a film, this is the literal text.
It should not require research.

If you need to research to understand subtext or themes of a film, that's fine. Unless you know what to look for, it can be difficult.
However, the actual text, spoken dialogue should not require research. Especially when it's entirely superfluous to the scene and added 40 years later.