"Star Wars" Blu-ray Sets Announced

Goaty · 05 May, 2011, 04:28:22 PM

As it was Star Wars day yesterday on 4th May, there was announced of new Star Wars Complete Blu-ray sets, but bad news, it not original!

But nice cover by the way!

There will be three versions available from September 16th - a 3-disc 'Prequel Trilogy' set, a 3-disc 'Original Trilogy' set, and a 9-disc 'Complete Saga' set. The latter includes both the aforementioned 3-disc sets combined with another three discs of special features. Here's the breakdown of the 9-disc set:

Disc 1: Star Wars: Episode I, The Phantom Menace
Audio Commentary with George Lucas, Rick McCallum, Ben Burtt, Rob Coleman, John Knoll, Dennis Muren and Scott Squires
Audio Commentary from Archival Interviews with Cast and Crew

Disc 2: Star Wars: Episode II, Attack of the Clones
Audio Commentary with George Lucas, Rick McCallum, Ben Burtt, Rob Coleman, Pablo Helman, John Knoll and Ben Snow
Audio Commentary from Archival Interviews with Cast and Crew

Disc 3: Star Wars: Episode III, Revenge of the Sith
Audio Commentary with George Lucas, Rick McCallum, Rob Coleman, John Knoll and Roger Guyett
Audio Commentary from Archival Interviews with Cast and Crew

Disc 4: Star Wars: Episode IV, A New Hope
Audio Commentary with George Lucas, Carrie Fisher, Ben Burtt and Dennis Muren
Audio Commentary from Archival Interviews with Cast and Crew

Disc 5: Star Wars: Episode V, The Empire Strikes Back
Audio Commentary with George Lucas, Irvin Kershner, Carrie Fisher, Ben Burtt and Dennis Muren
Audio Commentary from Archival Interviews with Cast and Crew

Disc 6: Star Wars: Episode VI: Return of the Jedi
Audio Commentary with George Lucas, Carrie Fisher, Ben Burtt and Dennis Muren
Audio Commentary from Archival Interviews with Cast and Crew

Disc 7: Star Wars Archives: Episodes I-III
Deleted, extended and alternate scenes
Prop, maquette and costume turnarounds
Matte paintings and concept art
Supplementary interviews with cast and crew
Flythrough of the Lucasfilm Archives
Additional Content

Disc 8: Star Wars Archives: Episodes IV-VI
Deleted, extended and alternate scenes
Prop, maquette and costume turnarounds
Matte paintings and concept art
Supplementary interviews with cast and crew
Flythrough of the Lucasfilm Archives
Additional Content

Disc 9: The Star Wars Documentaries
Star Warriors (2007, Apx. 84 Minutes): Some Star Wars fans want to collect action figures...these fans want to be action figures! A tribute to the 501st Legion, a global organization of Star Wars costume enthusiasts, this insightful documentary shows how the super-fan club promotes interest in the films through charity and volunteer work at fundraisers and high-profile special events around the world.

A Conversation with the Masters: The Empire Strikes Back 30 Years Later (2010, Apx. 25 Minutes): George Lucas, Irvin Kershner, Lawrence Kasdan and John Williams look back on the making of The Empire Strikes Back in this in-depth retrospective from Lucasfilm created to help commemorate the 30th anniversary of the movie. The masters discuss and reminisce about one of the most beloved films of all time.

Star Wars Spoofs (2011, Apx. 91 Minutes): The farce is strong with this one! Enjoy a hilarious collection of Star Wars spoofs and parodies that have been created over the years, including outrageous clips from Family Guy, The Simpsons, How I Met Your Mother and more — and don't miss "Weird Al" Yankovic's one-of-a-kind music video tribute to The Phantom Menace!

The Making of Star Wars (1977, Apx. 49 Minutes): Learn the incredible behind-the-scenes story of how the original Star Wars movie was brought to the big screen in this fascinating documentary hosted by C-3PO and R2-D2. Includes interviews with George Lucas and appearances by Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher.

The Empire Strikes Back: SPFX (1980, Apx. 48 Minutes): Learn the secrets of making movies in a galaxy far, far away. Hosted by Mark Hamill, this revealing documentary offers behind-the-scenes glimpses into the amazing special effects that transformed George Lucas' vision for Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back into reality!

Classic Creatures: Return of the Jedi (1983, Apx. 48 Minutes): Go behind the scenes — and into the costumes — as production footage from Return of the Jedi is interspersed with vintage monster movie clips in this in-depth exploration of the painstaking techniques utilized by George Lucas to create the classic creatures and characters seen in the film. Hosted and narrated by Carrie Fisher and Billie Dee Williams.

Anatomy of a Dewback (1997, Apx. 26 Minutes): See how some of the special effects in Star Wars became even more special two decades later! George Lucas explains and demonstrates how his team transformed the original dewback creatures from immovable rubber puppets (in the original 1977 release) to seemingly living, breathing creatures for the Star Wars 1997 Special Edition update.

Star Wars Tech (2007, Apx. 46 Minutes): Exploring the technical aspects of Star Wars vehicles, weapons and gadgetry, Star Wars Tech consults leading scientists in the fields of physics, prosthetics, lasers, engineering and astronomy to examine the plausibility of Star Wars technology based on science as we know it today. We will continue to update this news post with more details as they become available.

Dandontdare · 05 May, 2011, 04:30:04 PM

Apparently the official website crashed as soon as these became available.

COMMANDO FORCES · 05 May, 2011, 04:31:07 PM

Rip Off twat that he is! You do know that once he has squeezed all the fans out of their cash with these versions, he'll release a 3D set

TordelBack · 05 May, 2011, 04:54:17 PM

Spectacularly ugly cover art, IMHO. There hasn't been a nice SW Video/DVD/Whatever cover in an age. The last run of photo-montage DVDs were vile.

Happily I don't have a BluRay player, so I'm safe for now. (This didn't stop me buying TPM on DVD before I had a DVD player, mind).

radiator · 05 May, 2011, 05:23:39 PM

QuoteBut nice cover by the way!

Laughably bad if you ask me - very amateurish art, and the individual trilogy covers aren't much better.

QuoteThere hasn't been a nice SW Video/DVD/Whatever cover in an age. The last run of photo-montage DVDs were vile.

Agreed. Why are the covers always so pompous looking - just use these on the covers - surely that's all what people want? And keep the original title logos, they're way cooler:

Failing that, get a cool designer like Olly Moss to design something fresh, like these:

I insist on calling the first film 'Star Wars' now - none of this 'A New Hope' nonsense.

Banners · 05 May, 2011, 05:23:39 PM

Do the original trilogy discs feature the unedited original versions or the so-called Special Edition versions?

James Stacey · 05 May, 2011, 05:30:21 PM

Special editions. The original cuts are being held back no doubt for the 'money for old rope' box set

TordelBack · 05 May, 2011, 05:45:09 PM

Quote from: Banners on 05 May, 2011, 05:23:39 PM
Do the original trilogy discs feature the unedited original versions or the so-called Special Edition versions?

Do you really have to ask?

You're getting the films as Lucas always intended them, that should be enough for the likes of you (although to be fair the original-original versions are still clogging up the shelves from the six-disc DVD releases a few years back). What I want to know is whether they include the even newer footage, at least as an in-play option, or is all the additional stuff just on the other discs, as it appears? I'm too old for swapping discs, even if I had one of those blu-whatsits.

And Banners has the right of it - there's no reason the original posters shouldn't be used, even the PT ones are almost okay, unless something reallty cool and new is designed. These blurry collages of headshots wouldn't even cut it on half the fans sites out there.

fresno bob · 05 May, 2011, 06:50:54 PM

Just cancelled my pre-order. No more special editions!

vzzbux · 05 May, 2011, 08:11:45 PM

I ordered mine many moons ago when it was first announced. What can I say I am a sucker for this shit.

V

John Caliber · 05 May, 2011, 08:36:16 PM

I wouldn't underestimate how much material might be on the two discs set aside for ancillary OT and PT - they are both blu-rays. They could be packed with all the extras from the last round of DVDs and still have many GBs to spare (if Lucasfilm was so inclined they could include every sequence of excised material). I understand that Attack of the Clones alone was originally four hours long, so there's room for plenty of cut scenes. Odd how that movie ended up, as the screenplay is a great read (on that basis alone it was my favourite SW movie), but the end product was a dog's dinner.

OT, I got my Jedi Turbo Speeder toy today... yippee! Been waiting months for it to show in the UK.

locustsofdeath! · 05 May, 2011, 08:44:23 PM

Unfortunately it appears as if the only way to get the great trio of old-school documentaries is to buy the 9-disc set.

Disappointed 'From Star Wars to Jedi' isn't included. Not sure why, other than Lucas will seem awful contradictory due to some of those ironic quotes of his...quotes many newer fans may not have heard before.

I could easily do without the Star Warriors documentary and the disc of Parodies and Fanfilms. Would rather have had a collection of old Kenner Star Wars toy commercials (if the guy bootlegging the Holiday special can find them all, Lucasfilm certainly can) or the Holiday Special animated sequence - or the Star Wars Meets the Muppets special, which is hilarious, much more hilarious than Family Guy.

A bit more time and effort to make this set special as far as documentaries and other extras and I would have bought it, despite loathing bot the PT and the Special Editions of the OT. As it is now, I'll stick to those unaltered OT discs...

Albion · 05 May, 2011, 08:57:16 PM

Still no Holiday Special.

Goaty · 05 May, 2011, 09:00:41 PM

Quote from: Albion on 05 May, 2011, 08:57:16 PM
Still no Holiday Special.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=323909610753051544#

Pete Wells · 05 May, 2011, 09:07:06 PM

I went to see the One Man Star Wars on Tuesday night and came out gagging to see the films again so I reckon I'm gonna buy these.

The show was great by the way, after the guy had performed the original trilogy he came out and just chatted to the audience for a while. He told us this was his tenth year of doing the show and he said he'd actually been doing it for a year and a half before a journalist asked him what Lucas thought of it. He admitted that he hadn't asked Lucasfilm's permission and within 12 hours received an email from them. It simply said "We know what you do. Get in touch."

He sent them a tape of the show and as a result they invited him to perform it in front of 4000 fans at a convention. It went down really, really well... so Lucasfilm demanded 25% of the cash from all future performances!

I dunno how I feel about that. It seems a lot and Lucas has so much money already. However, if someone was making a living out of something I'd written, I'd kinda want a cut too...