Lucas does it again and again and again

“Star Wars.”

They were the movies that started it all. The stand-alone trilogy would mark cinema forever. The special effects, masterful musical score and diversity of characters and movie stars would lay its hand on an entire generation of moviegoers.

That is, it would until the early 1990s, when a sleek set of the clean, crisp theatrical releases would be released on Laserdisc and VHS. The color of the older stills were brightened, the ships were shined up and Jedi and Sith alike hit the stores to pick up what would allegedly be the last release of the original trilogy.

Seven years later, to mark the 20th anniversary of this breakthrough in science fiction adventure, romance and drama, the trilogy was brought once more to the big screen. However, rather than sharing the original trilogy in all its wonder, director George Lucas decided to give his beloved set of movies a facelift. CGI and new scenes decorated the people and planets of an already vivid storyscape.

Fans were tolerant, but with the advent of the DVD, people wondered when they would see the release of their favorite films of all time.

Patience won out with a box set of the re-released versions of “A New Hope,” “The Empire Strikes Back” and “Return of the Jedi” in September 2004. Not only did they include the additions previously mentioned, but they were changed yet again to reflect the plots of the three prequels. However, it brought mixed emotions in fans, most of which were angry, betrayed and disappointed. Now, “Star Wars” fans do have a tendency to act like jilted lovers, but this was definitely justifiable.

Lucas thereafter swore that he would never release the unaltered trilogy again.

On that note, individual copies of the original 1970s and 1980s movies can be found on the new release shelves. Unaltered and pristine, each movie is about $20. According to reports from Lucas, they will only be on sale until the end of the year, at which point LucasArts will recall them from the market. Will this be a bluff like all the other times the films were supposedly never to be released or available?

Not only is this a blatant commercialist ploy for more money, but the visual quality of the DVDs, pulled from those ’90s Laserdiscs, is sub-par next to that of the “mangled” special editions. Does Lucas just need someone to hug him and tell him that the original trilogy wasn’t as bad as he likes to think?

With rumors of a new 3-D format for movies on the horizon, “Star Wars” fans just keep getting more reasons to worry.