A Rogue group of Star Wars fans have spent thousands of dollars and painstaking amounts of hours to restore the 1977 Star Wars: A New Hope to it’s original theatrical glory…
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In an article by Entertainment Weekly, we’ve learned that a group calling themselves Team Negative1 spent thousands of dollars several years and painstaking time and effort to restore an old faded print of Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope to what some experts are calling the best HD version of the original cut of the film…and then they leaked it online. That’s right, the power of the internet at it’s finest, folks.
"“The Silver Screen version is without the special editions’ dialogue tweaks, visual polish, and Mos Eisley’s added CGI creatures, and Han naturally shoots first (Atad points out that it’s actually jarring to realize that not only does Han fire first, but Greedo doesn’t shoot at all).”"
EW goes on to talk about how George Lucas has staunchly defended the multiple extended and digitally remastered editions of the originals, going so far as to almost sound belligerent about it in an interview with Today:
"The special edition, that’s the one I wanted out there. The other movie, it’s on VHS, if anybody wants it."
Lucas went on to talk about people throwing rocks at him and the millions of dollars put into the remakes, but what many fans (myself included) feel he’s lost sight of, is that none of us wanted Greedo shooting first…or at all, in the first place. None of us wanted a horribly CGI’d Jabba in Mos Eisley by the Millennium Falcon, because that just was a terrible choice.
Next: Rest in Peace Han Solo: Harrison Ford Will Not Be Returning in Star Wars: Episode VIII
If Team Negative1 is willing to share the “Silver Screen Theatrical Version” of Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope for free with everyone on the internet, then they are doing something that George Lucas set out to do in the very beginning, and that is share a fantastic story set in a galaxy far, far away, and told in the best way possible…the way it was meant to be. Bravo for those guys.