George Lucas Is A Motherfucker

I respect an artist's integrity and the choices he makes to protect it, but, when his choices just fuck with people, that's just wrong. And George Lucas is that kinda guy.

None of what follows will be any surprise to Star Wars fans, but I'll recount the whole thing just for posterity's sake. It all started back in 1997, when George Lucas decided to rerelease the three original Star Wars movies as a gear-up for the impending release of The Phantom Menace. Instead of doing just a plain, old rerelease, he went back and reedited and changed the movies to correct things that he thought were wrong with the movies. (I, personally, never had any problems with these new versions, except for Star Wars. Not to sound like a fucking film geek, but the "Greedo shot first" thing is gay.)

Following the theatrical release, the "revisions" were released on video, but VHS only; no DVD. These were now the "official" versions of the films. The original versions (like the aforementioned version of Star Wars that I preferred, that had had seven previous video releases) were no longer available. They also came out with a fourth version of the trilogy boxset that was nothing but the revisions. But, once again, no DVD. Disappointing, but Star Wars fans made due.

Jump ahead seven years, and now there's a DVD boxset of the revised movies. Seeing as VHS is essentially a dead format, this is huge news, as no one owned them on DVD until now, and Lucas was even nice enough to add a ton of extras and even make additional changes to the movies (like adding Hayden Christensen at the end of Jedi). Needless to say, everyone (including me, who had never owned any of the previous versions of the movies) went out and bought that set. Even if you preferred the old versions, you bought them, as they're the only thing available on DVD.

Until tomorrow, that is. On September 12, Lucasfilms is releasing the DVDs again, this time with the original versions of the films as a bonus disc for each movie. Remember that original version of Star Wars that I liked? Well, now I can own it on DVD. Too bad I already own that version I don't care for so much (and I don't buy shit twice).

I have one thing to say on this whole thing: Make up your fucking mind. You're either going to go with the originals or the revisions. Stop rereleasing the fucking things. If you're going to take them away, take them away forever; don't say they're gone, and then release them a year and a half later. In fact, if you'd've done this the first time, you could have saved some money by not having to release these things twice in such a short time.

Oh well. When you have all the money in the world, and sole control of the most popular movies in the world, I guess you can do whatever the fuck you want. Even if it means acting like a real motherfucker to your fans. Thanks bunches, George.