Which Star Wars movie does Harrison Ford wish he could erase from his memory? Even the creators of the saga hate him
Today it is difficult to imagine a person who has never heard of Han Solo. It was this role that made Harrison Ford a world star, and later Indiana Jones, Rick Deckard from Blade Runner and many other iconic characters were added to it.
But there is work in the actor’s filmography that he would prefer to erase from history forever.
When a journalist once asked Ford what he remembered about filming the StarWarsHolidaySpecial, the actor answered as succinctly as possible:
“Nothing. This doesn't exist."
This phrase has long become a legend among fans of the franchise.
The strangest project in the Star Wars universe
We are talking about the StarWarsHolidaySpecial - a two-hour television film that was first shown on the American television channel CBS on November 17, 1978.
It became the first Star Wars spin-off, appearing between the original 1977 film and The Empire Strikes Back, which came out two years later.
Almost the entire main cast returned to the project: Harrison Ford; Mark Hamill; Carrie Fisher; Anthony Daniels; Peter Mayhew; David Prowse and James Earl Jones (voice of Darth Vader).
In the story, Han Solo and Chewbacca fly to the Wookiee's home planet of Kashyyyk to celebrate the holiday Life Day with Chewbacca's family.
It was here that viewers first met his relatives: his wife Malla; son of Lumpy and father of Itchi.
Why is this film considered a disaster
On paper the idea looked good.After the incredible success of the first Star Wars, CBS offered to make a television special.
George Lucas himself was then completely busy preparing the sequel and developing his own company Lucasfilm. He only proposed the basic idea - to show the Chewbacca family and the Life Day holiday - after which production almost completely passed into the hands of television people.
This, according to many, was the main mistake.
Instead of a space adventure, viewers received a highly unusual mixture of 1970s variety shows: musical numbers, humorous skits, dancing, circus performances, drawn-out episodes of the Chewbacca family (with almost no translation from the Wookiee language), as well as performances by guest stars, including singer Diahann Carroll, comedian Harvey Korman, actress Bea Arthur and the rock band Jefferson Starship.
The film looked so strange that many fans are still arguing how such a project even got the green light.
But this is where Boba Fett first appeared
There is one reason why the Holiday Special still holds a special place in the history of the franchise.
It was in this TV movie that the first appearance of the bounty hunter Boba Fett took place.
True, not in a feature film, but in a short animated episode created by the Canadian studio Nelvana.
This cartoon turned out to be so successful that many fans consider it the only truly strong part of the entire project.Later, it was Boba Fett who became one of the most popular characters in the Star Wars universe and received his own series.
Even George Lucas wanted to forget this movie
Interestingly, George Lucas is not even officially listed in the credits as screenwriter or director.
Producer Gary Kurtz later said that the original script looked much more interesting, but due to work on the sequel to the film, the team had virtually no time left to supervise production.
Lucas himself subsequently spoke extremely harshly about the project. According to the recollections of people who worked with him, the director once even joked thatif he had enough time, he would personally smash all existing copies of the film with a hammer.
Why it cannot be found officially
Even though theStarWarsHolidaySpecialis considered part of the franchise's history, its fate turned out to be unique.
After its only television showing in November 1978, the film:
- never officially shown on television again;
- not released on VHS;
- not released on DVD or Blu-ray;
- not posted on streaming services.
An exception was made only for the animated episode with Boba Fett, which was later included in the official collector's editions.
As a result, the TV movie survived for decades solely on viewer home recordings made during the CBS broadcast.These recordings later circulated among collectors and then appeared in their entirety on YouTube, where they can still be found today.
The paradox of cult failure
Over almost half a century of existence,StarWarsHolidaySpecialhas become a real cultural phenomenon.
It is regularly included in lists of the worst television projects of all time, but it also remains one of the most discussed artifacts of early Star Wars history.
The irony is that it was precisely the attempts to forget this TV movie that made it a legend. Harrison Ford claims he didn't exist. George Lucas would rather erase him from fans' memories. But fans continue to seek it out, discuss it and revise it as a unique document of an era when even the world's greatest film franchise could afford to make a truly cosmic mistake.