This Star Wars Deleted Scene Proves George Lucas Was Already Thinking About the Special Editions in the ’70s

The Special Editions of the original Star Wars trilogy are a major point of contention in Star Wars fandom, and one element of Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope shows how long George Lucas had planned for, or at least thought about, them. The Special Editions of Star Wars began during the 20th anniversary commemorative re-release of A New Hope in 1997, with Lucasfilm polishing up the visual effects of A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi, along with re-integrating deleted scenes and other discarded elements. At the time, this sounded like music to the ears for Star Wars fans across the planet, only for the Special Editions to incur considerable backlash from the Star Wars fanbase, and arguably kicking off the contentious relationship between Star Wars and its most diehard fans (as well as with George Lucas, as outlined in the documentary The People vs. George Lucas).

The alterations the Special Editions made to the original Star Wars trilogy have given Lucas somewhat of a reputation as an artist continually modifying and tweaking his own work long after its release. At the same time, one of the scenes featured in A New Hope‘s Special Edition – and more specifically, the deleted original version of it – showcases that the changes made in the Special Editions were always on Lucas’ mind since the beginning of Star Wars.

The Deleted Jabba the Hutt Scene From A New Hope Shows Jabba as a Human Character

Jabba the Hutt didn’t originally appear in A New Hope in 1977 (the movie itself not even re-titled Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope until years later), but is name-dropped multiple times by the Millennium Falcon’s pilot Han Solo (Harrison Ford) as a gangster to whom he owes a significant amount of money. However, Jabba was meant to appear in A New Hope, with George Lucas filming a scene of Han meeting Jabba by the Millennium Falcon to discuss his debts, with Jabba portrayed by Thomas Declan Mulholland. The scene was ultimately deleted from the movie, and later re-added into the 1997 special edition of A New Hope, with a CGI Jabba in the design of his appearance from Return of the Jedi.

Indeed, Lucas already had the general design of Jabba the Hutt in his mind at the time of filming A New Hope, with Jabba described as a slug-like alien mafioso in the movie’s original script. Lucas had Mulholland act as a human stand-in whom he hoped to replace with the alien design of Jabba later. Ultimately, Lucas wasn’t able to realize Jabba as he’d intended until his appearance in Return of the Jedi. However, having Jabba already scripted with the full design in mind exemplifies Lucas’s full imaginative scope as the creator and overseer of Star Wars.

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Jabba’s Appearance in Return of the Jedi Shows George Lucas Always Wanted To Go Back and Adjust Star Wars

The fact that Lucas filmed a placeholder scene for Jabba the Hutt in A New Hope with a general vision of what he wanted the villainous space crime boss to look like shows that the seeds of the Special Editions of Star Wars were already in George Lucas’ mind as far back as the the franchise’s infancy. Despite Star Wars being known as a massive game-changer in visual effects and epic sci-fi world-building for its time, it is easy to forget how modest A New Hope was in terms of its budget ($11 million) and effects. Both were significantly expanded upon with The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, which is the nature of sequels to major box office hits. Even still, there was a great deal in the ’70s and ’80s that Lucas wanted to do with Star Wars that he simply wasn’t able to do, given that visual effects technology was not capable of it at the time.

That, of course, changed greatly with the Star Wars prequels, where Lucas was able to mine all of his envisioned plans for Star Wars with the advancements in visual effects and, most especially in CGI, making more and more elaborate sci-fi worlds and characters possible. Still, he didn’t quite have what he needed at the time for Jabba the Hutt, and A New Hope‘s deleted scene with the villain stands as a sort of bookmark on Lucas’ part for something he wanted to, and eventually did, go back and re-integrate into the movie as he’d envisioned it. However, that hasn’t necessarily gone over well with Star Wars fans.

Why the Star Wars Special Editions Are So Controversial Among Fans

Despite Lucas adding many new scenes and effects into the Special Editions of A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi, many Star Wars purists have bemoaned the retroactive alterations made by George Lucas as changing much of the essence of what made Star Wars the break out sci-fi space opera hit that the original trilogy became. The infamous “Han Shot First” internet argument emerged from Lucas altering the scene of Han Solo shooting Greedo to have the bounty hunter take the first shot at Han, which many Star Wars fans have argued undercuts the anti-heroic nature of Han (to say nothing of Greedo missing from just a few feet away and the clunkily edited-in dodge of Han’s head). Other changes to inserting Hayden Christiansen’s Anakin Skywalker in the final scene of Luke’s seeing the Force Ghosts of Anakin, Yoda, and Obi-Wan have also ruffled many fans’ feathers. In going back and tweaking Star Wars to match many of his original but at-the-time unrealized ideas, George Lucas inadvertently kicked off a major backlash within the Star Wars fanbase.

Many Star Wars fans continue to petition Lucasfilm to re-release the original versions of the original Star Wars trilogy on home media and streaming for that reason. In the end, while Lucas ultimately managed to bring Jabba the Hutt to life as he’d envisioned him in Return of the Jedi, the deleted Jabba scene in A New Hope highlights that a retroactive remolding of the original Star Wars trilogy along the lines of the Special Editions was always inevitable. As with so many things in the Star Wars universe, Lucas had to wait for the effects to catch up with what he wanted to do, with his creator-introduced Star Wars retcons ultimately coming to the chagrin of the very Star Wars loyalists the Special Editions were made for.

All the Star Wars movies are available to stream on Disney+.