Mandy Griffiths
Need more Yoda in your life? Previously unseen “Return of the Jedi” footage emerges from the abyss aka LaserDisc
Think you’ve seen all there is to see of the original Star Wars trilogy? You haven’t, and don’t worry, George Lucas hasn’t been tinkering away again with replacement scenes to whittle away his time in retirement…this is new footage, as in old new footage, as in…you know what I mean. It’s original.
While many wouldn’t be (and weren’t) interested in an old LaserDisc demo of EditDroid springing up on ebay earlier this month, there was one line in the description that one hawkeye buyer noticed – “Return of the Jedi outtakes”. Sold for $699 US, the buyer received a how to on the digital editing system (that ended up failing) and more than 30 minutes of raw and behind the scenes footage of “Return of the Jedi”. In the spirit of previously unseen Dr Who episodes also being found and shared, a Facebook page has been set up to share these gems one Yoda wisdom at a time.
So far 12 minutes of footage has been revealed with 18 more to go.
Most interesting revelation to date: In one version of the scene Yoda reveals that Obi Wan wanted to tell Luke who his father was from the beginning, but Yoda wouldn’t let him. Good one Yoda, much more dramatic the way he did find out, all screenwriters approve.
While this isn’t part of the laser disc being shared, our pick of the videos on the page so far would have to be Episode IV bloopers: granted there sometimes isn’t sound, but really, no sound is required to make someone falling over funny. Ever.
