Looking Back at the Star Wars Holiday Special
Franchise Exploitation Gone Horribly Wrong
Christmas is right around the corner and Rogue One, the latest installment in the Star Wars saga, came out recently. As we revel in “the most wonderful time of the year” and the Star Wars-mania that follows a new movie, I want to look back at a certain moment in time where those two things collided.
That’s right: Christmas and Star Wars. A combination that has a worse outcome than Red Bull and vodka.
If you’re somewhat of a Star Wars fan, chances are high that you’ve heard of the infamous special that aired on November 17, 1978 — and never again. It has been unanimously panned and called “the worst two hours of television ever” (by David Hofstede in his book What Were They Thinking?: The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History).
Even George Lucas is so ashamed of it that he has said the following:
“If I had time and a sledgehammer, I would find every single copy of the Star Wars Holiday Special and destroy it.”
If you haven’t seen it, you might say: “It can’t be that bad, it’s Star Wars, after all!” But that’s the thing about the special: It really is that bad.
Looking back at the whole thing, it boggles the mind how bad it turned out. The special was released just a year after the first Star Wars movie — the highest-grossing film of all time (until E.T.). As the franchise was relatively new at this time, Bruce Vilanch, the writer of the special, must have had a few exciting ideas. Just imagine what you could do within the magical Star Wars universe. There must’ve been many ways to make this into 98 minutes of exciting television with what would become the biggest franchise in movie history.
But what do they do with this?
They turn it into a nonsensical variety show featuring Chewbacca’s family. Imagine the characteristic Wookie growl. Now imagine three different wookies doing that, without subtitles. And on top of all this is a bunch of meaningless musical segments, stale skits and horrendous acting.
Last Christmas, I challenged a group of my friends (all Star Wars fans) to endure it. They lasted about half an hour before they gave up on the atrocity. It’s hard to sit through, especially as a fan. A commenter on YouTube pointed out that this aired a day before the Jonestown Massacre. Coincidence? I think not.
What was the cause of this madness? Contractual obligations? Partially (Harrison Ford has said so). Financial greed? Sure, who wouldn’t want to cash in on the Star Wars hype? Or sincerely good intentions (which, as we all know, pave the way to hell)?
If there are any redeeming qualities to this what-the-heck-did-I-just-watch-fest, they are very few. The folks at Cracked tried hard to find something good about it. Among the highlights, if you can call it that, is a cartoon scene that introduces Bobba Fett. Plus, there’s always Harrison Ford, and… that’s about it.
To make things worse, the leading actors seem like they want to be anywhere but there, and Mark Hamill looks more like Ellen Degeneres in all the make-up he is wearing (to cover up damages that he sustained after a car accident).
That someone acutally put this together and thought it was good enough to air is crazily confounding. Though it may be aimed towards kids, the pacing is completely off and the tonal shifts are enough to discourage even the most diehard fans.
If you haven’t watched this piece of infamously bad TV or have absolutely nothing better to do, here it is in its entirety.
If anything, Star Wars Holiday Special is a prime example of how low a respected franchise can sink if left unchecked. There seemed to be no quality control here whatsoever. It’s a good thing that the special only aired once, otherwise it would’ve become an even larger taint on the Star Wars name. There will always be cheap cash grabs when it comes to successful pop cultural brands, but some are worse than others.
For all the terrible things that a spin-off can bring, it can also strengthen our love for what made us fall for the original in the first place. A bad spin-off generates discussions (certainly among Star Wars geeks). Fans realize when things go out of hand and will not only take spin-off creators to task, they might even make their own spin-offs. Just have a look at all the ambitious Star Wars shorts that are out there.
There can’t be good without bad, no light side without the dark side. Maybe, seeing trash like Star Wars Holiday Special can make us more aware of what makes something shine and help us appreciate the good stuff.
We at The Culture Point wish you a merry Christmas and a happy new year. Take care and see you in 2017.
