Some things simply cannot be unseen no matter how strongly you wish that were possible. From November 17, 1978. For the masochists among our readers, the entire Holiday Special is available on You Tube. It is amazing that this did not succeed in killing the Star Wars franchise.
I was 9 when it came out. I thought it was so cool! I think differently now. Sometimes getting older is a good thing, right?
in this case most certainly Ben! I was an undergrad at the U of I at the time and I think I missed this one. 1978, heck, the entire Seventies, was a bizarre time to be alive.
Here is the rifftrax version for those who like a little snark with their cheese.
https://www.rifftrax.com/the-star-wars-holiday-special
In his “making of” essay, SFDebris explains that Lucas rushed out the Holiday Special and its utter failure and mockery in the public square shook him out of the high success was giving him and caused him to double his efforts at making “Star Wars 2” as good as it could be.
Considering we got Empire Strikes Back just goes to show how tragedy can become victory.
I watch the Rifftrax version every year.
I will say, there are somethings I legitimately like about this special. Bea Arthur’s segment is surprisingly good, both funny and even a little touching. I also like that we actually see the Empire being oppressive toward normal people, which, when you think about it, is pretty theoretical for most of the films. Sure we see them blow up planets and try to kill the rebellion, but we don’t see very much of what life is like for the ordinary people under the Empire, which we do here. So…a few little nuggets of, if not gold, at least copper in this spell-bindingly bad special.