You’ve taken your first step into a larger world.
In the beginning there was Georges Méliès’s 1902 space fantasy/science fiction film Le Voyage dans la Lune. It would take another 65 years before we’d get a look at what a realistic outer space could look like in 2001: A Space Odyssey, but before that we’d get glimpses from film visionaries in the likes of Forbidden Planet, TV series like Lost in Space and Star Trek, and a final, old school vision of the future in the 1976 film Logan’s Run. Each of these has its place in the history of science fiction, but none can compare to the epic storytelling, characters, and special effects–the surprise rollercoaster ride–we walked into on May 25, 1977, as the opening crawl passed over our heads to reveal an enormous spaceship and our first breaths in a world with this phenomenon called Star Wars.
What would we be looking back on if not for the imagination and personal interests of George Lucas, the writer? What if Lucas hadn’t grown up a fan of Flash Gordon, classic sci-fi movies, classic fantasy lore, and Akira Kurosawa films? What would we be talking about in 2017 to escape the challenges of the real world if not the first images of an eighth follow-on film to Star Wars? From Star Wars sprouted changes across cinema. Cutting edge sound improvements thanks to THX. Cutting edge visuals thanks to Industrial Light and Magic. Mass marketed tie-ins of every sort throughout the creative arts as a new, multi-billion dollar, international industry.
Ten times. My brother, my sister, my mom and dad, and me, first at the old Southridge III Theater. We saw it ten times in the theater, and a few of those screenings we just sat through over and again all day on a Saturday, and then we saw it on the giant, wide screen downtown at the River Hills theater. I missed the premiere and opening days, but my schoolmates at the end of my first year of school couldn’t stop talking about it. My innate stubbornness and hesitation to join the crowd was already fixed: “But Star Wars is such a boring title!” And then I saw it. And everything changed. Hardly a year would go by that I, or my parents, weren’t contributing to what would be Lucas’s $4 billion dollar empire, buying tie-ins we’d never even heard of before May 1977. But what a fun ride he provided in return!
