Dear Mr. Lucas

George Lucas
Skywalker Ranch
California

Dear Mr. Lucas,

I recently purchased DVDs of "Star Wars," "The Empire Strikes Back" and "Return of the Jedi." Thank you for releasing the correct versions on DVD. I am returning the defective "Special" versions to you, as I won't be requiring them.

Sincerely,

Me

****

I really did have to think about buying these sets. On the one hand, it's the real movies, the DVDs generated from the LaserDisc masters. On the other hand...I just gave Lucasfilm money for the shoddy "new" movies.

I can't believe that people are complaining about these discs. I really can't. "It's not anamorphic widescreen," they whine, and "The video quality is poor!" For the first point, who cares? And for the second, no it's not. The DVDs are mastered from an analog source, yes, but the films look no worse than any other film from nearly thirty years ago. (If you have the LaserDiscs, you don't need these.) Complaining about having these discs is like ordering a steak and then complaining that it's made of cow.

These are the DVDs we're looking for, matte lines and bad landspeeder effects and all. And as a bonus: it really is Star Wars! The opening crawl contains no "Episode IV: A New Hope," which pleases me to no end. I'm going to watch these movies and enjoy them and just ignore the fact that Lucas hacked out three prequels.

(And a hack he is. Here's Obi-Wan, giving Luke a lightsaber: "Your father wanted you to have this, when you were old enough, but your uncle wouldn't allow it. He feared you might follow old Obi-Wan on some damn fool idealistic crusade like your father did." Tell me, what idealistic crusade did Anakin follow Obi-Wan on?)

Oh, and by the way:

Han.

Shot.

FIRST.