George Lucas CHANGED The Prequels...

We all know about the Special Editions, but did you know that George Lucas also altered every Prequel Film? So what did he change? Well not much.

Join me as we look at the changes George Lucas made to the Prequels in the early 2000s.

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[SheevTalks]

I will defend changing Yoda to CGI for The Phantom Menace to my grave. That puppet was nightmare fuel.

[paullynch]

I think that the special editions of the original trilogy have their place but to deny the fans the original films is what hurt the most.

[tyjuarez]

1:41 "...And we all know Georgie boy loves messing with his movies AFTER they have finished showing in the cinema."

May 1977: Timing of end credits and a couple of compositing errors fixed last minute before premiere, earlier version shows up on some premiere prints.
June 1977: Changes SFX and Dialogue for the mono mix of Star Wars.
May 1980: Adds new VFX shots to ESB, recomposites the majority of the Battle of Hoth, directly after the premiere, so the changes don't show up on most 70mm prints.
June 1980: Slight dialogue changes for mono mix of ESB.
April 1981: Reissues SW with "Episode IV: A New Hope" crawl - while original prints have basically been running continuously for the last four years.
May 2002: Slight fixes to AOTC only visible in digital cinemas, shortened cut of the film premieres on IMAX due to technical constraints.

He also loved messing with his movies WHILE they were still in cinemas.

[CJJC]

It was common at the time for the BBFC to mandate the removal of headbutts from films rated 15 and lower in the UK, presumably due to a fear of kids getting or giving concussions through imitating the action. I remembered there being a headbutt taken out of The Matrix Reloaded but it turns out that, among others, they’ve also been cut from GoldenEye, The Mummy Returns, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle and, erm, Shrek 2.

[GonkThePowerDroid]

A slight recut of a movie should be barely noticable.
Added CGI shots in a pre 90's movie is JARRINGLY noticable.

[Pocketkid]

Most people don't pay attention to changes in the prequels because the nature of those changes is so subtle compared to the changes made to the original trilogy for the special editions. I agree that artists should fulfill their artistic vision, and I also believe that there's no such thing as a "final" or "completed" film, yet I still take issue with the special editions because the nature of those changes really distracts from the groundbreaking work done back in the 1970s and 80s. I don't want to see CG creatures in a movie that was made decades before CG creatures were a thing. Star Wars was limited back then by the technology, but that allowed the story and visual effects team to get creative. Not that I prefer one trilogy over the other, they are both amazing in their own right using the technology of the time.

[BearfootBob]

The greatest thing about the Yoda puppet is the stories of him swearing and saying inappropriate things in between takes.

[michaelgates]

I think Phantom Menace played better in the shorter theatrical version, but the additions don't really bother me. The one thing that does bother me? The removal of the "vote now!" chant. I don't know why, but that bugs me every single time; I loved that bit! And the moment feels naked without it.

[PhantomSputnik]

I wonder what cut of TPM they are going to show for the re release in theaters in may

[StupidMarioBrosFan]

A little while ago I saw a video that compared each version of the Podrace scenes along with deleted scenes that still didn't make it into the later releases.

The most noteable cut thing was that one of the racer's wife & kid showed up with quite a few shots of them reacting to the race. The racer in question was the one who crashes inside the tunnel & explodes, so at some point George must've realized that it was pretty dark to have the guy's family on screen. I don't remember if there's a shot of the family crying but just knowing they're there changes how you perceive that moment.

With the recent announcement of the 25th Anniversary theatrical run happening this year, there is a none-zero chance of them restoring more deleted scenes and bringing back the guy's family.

[kthx]

Obsessive. Considering these are Lucas's finest crowning achievements, I can see why he likes to continually tinker with them rather than coming up with new movies.

[mattt]

The Phantom Menace Yoda puppet looked like he was on meth. I'm glad they changed it.

[NumberFast]

9:12 It actually may be so. There is a 35mm copy scan of TPM (theatrical version) in the net and when I checked that scan I noticed that the Coruscant landing pad (at least during the scene before departing for Naboo, can't say for the one with arrival on Coruscant) has different "textures" (like it has different coatings for it's floor) than in Blu-ray release where single texture is used (like the floor consists of one coating).

[АлексейМомот-що]

Now you need to make a whole video of naming unnamed buildings in the background and getting a strike if it's already named something else in the lore.

[xavevoncroy]

I like that you briefly mentioned the state of mind of Lucas when doing these changes. I think that we tend to judge them from our perspective of audience/consumer, unhappy with an alteration of something that we bought and that we think was ours. But it's misunderstanding the creative process of an artist. I can totally understand that a creator will always notice multiple details to change to his creation. And whether or not the product is already sold doesn't change the fact that it's his baby and he wants it to be perfect.

The minor decisions like replacing a medium shot with a wide one, or inverting the sequence of shots like in the Coruscant chase, or removing the transition between scenes, is the kind of seemingly insignificant decision that you have 50 times per day when editing a movie. And it's perfectly normal. You think that if you rearrange the shots, the scene will have a better rhythm, or a more logical progression, or that it will let the audience breathe more, or in the contrary it will add a bit more tension. Maybe you will come to think that removing the transition between Obi-Wan and Anakin's hand makes them emotionally closer from one another, as if Obi-Wan's thoughts were focused on him, since it will appear to be two connected parts of the same sequence, and not two separate sequences. But later in your process you realize that this suggested connection makes Obi-Wan seem aware of Anakin's survival and struggling to get off of the lava. Or maybe you consider that the immolation scene was supposed to be Obi-Wan's accepting that Anakin is no more, and you don't want him to show after-thoughts. So you revert it, to better illustrate the divergence between the two of them. That's normal filmmaking. The only difference between those few changes and the many many similar tiny adjustments that was made during the main editing phase before the original release, is that we as an audience know they occurred, since we can compare the versions. And it feels odd or gratuitous. But from a creator's point of view, there is no less reason to do those tiny changes, than there was to do the hundreds of hundreds others that they did before, and that you don't know about.

[Monkey_Boy]

What annoys me is that he went back and changed all sorts of things that didn't *need* to be, and somehow he never put Sebulba in his pod racer near the end of the race! Everytime I watch that scene, my eye trains on that empty seat! Why? Why?! Why couldn't you just put the bunny back in the box?!

I've actually never minded the changes made to any of the movies. In fact, my lifelong friend and I are apparently different than most fans because we were very excited for the Special Edition releases. We were even excited to see what was changed with each re-release of the trilogy! We didn't necessarily like every change (at least 1 in each of the OT movies makes us groan), but it just made it fun when they popped up unexpectedly on our first viewing each time. (The entire room jumped on Star Wars Day the first time we heard the newest version of the Kraytt Dragon roar come through our surround sound! 😂) It was an experience you never really got with other movies.

[grunions]

Surely we have to conclude that Lucas watches these movies all day every day.

[jamesriendeau]

Another change was that they added that thing around Padme's legs when she gives birth in Episode III to the DVD releases. I know for a fact that when I saw that in theaters her legs were exposed, and I've always thought that was an asinine change as it was not an explicit scene.

[Mpiewizard]

You just brought back memories I didn’t know I had cause I suddenly remember noticing some of these changes when I was younger.

[vanlllasky]

yes, the removal of the wipe transition in ROTS was indeed a mistake, which is why it was reverted back to how it was originally in the 2011 release.