10 Biggest Star Wars Retcons
"Luke, I am your father... but not until the second draft."
Category
📺
TVTranscript
00:00So with a franchise as expansive and long-running as Star Wars, it was inevitable that its lore
00:05would become increasingly muddled as time went on. And that contradictory information is a common
00:11sight in pop culture's favorite galaxy. As I'm Jules, this is WhatCulture.com,
00:15and these are the 10 Biggest Star Wars Retcons.
00:1910. Anakin's Younger Force Ghost
00:22The numerous changes that George Lucas has made to his original trilogy over the years have been
00:27met with a controversial reception by many Star Wars fans. And though a bunch of them are fairly
00:32minor and inconsequential, like Darth Vader getting his eyebrows shaved off, others are a
00:37lot more questionable. Speaking of Vader's eyebrows, Return of the Jedi's original ending
00:42saw the owner of those bushy decorations, Sebastian Shaw, appear before Luke as a Force
00:47Ghost, a great moment that really solidified Vader's redemption. However, in the 2004 DVD
00:53release of the original trilogy, Lucas decided to swap out the old Anakin for his younger
00:57counterpart, replacing Shaw's sweet smile with Hayden Christensen's rather creepy stare,
01:02in a change that is not only a huge visual retcon, but seemingly contradicts everything
01:07we've learned about Force Ghosts throughout the franchise. Force Ghosts in other movies,
01:11like Luke in The Rise of Skywalker, Yoda in The Last Jedi, Obi-Wan in The Empire Strikes Back,
01:16look like the characters at the time of their deaths. So for Anakin to de-age a couple of
01:21decades felt like nothing more than a cheap way to hype Revenge of the Sith up,
01:24which was due in cinemas less than a year after the DVD's release.
01:299. The Age of the Republic
01:31Now this one may not be as noticeable as other entries on our list, but it's still a fairly
01:36big retcon that confuses the history of the Old Republic. In A New Hope, Alec Guinness's
01:41grizzled Ben Kenobi says that the Old Republic existed for over a thousand generations,
01:46which was interpreted by various expanded universe sources as meaning roughly 25,000 years.
01:52However, skip ahead to the release of Attack of the Clones, and here Palpatine mentions that the
01:56Republic has stood for over a thousand years, which, as you can tell, is pretty far removed
02:01from the 25,000 years suggested by Kenobi's line. While the expanded universe is no longer canon,
02:08the question of which version of events is true has been hotly debated by Star Wars fans.
02:132020's The Star Wars Book did clear the air somewhat by claiming that the Old Republic
02:17was founded over 25,000 years prior to A New Hope, but that only made Palpatine's
02:23Attack of the Clones retcon even more of a head-scratcher.
02:278. Darth Maul's Resurrection
02:29Now, as you might expect, not all retcons are bad. Some can actually shed new light
02:33on prior events, take a story in a more interesting direction, or, as is the case
02:37of Darth Maul's unlikely return to the land of the living, give fans far more time with
02:41a character that they loved. When George Lucas was crafting his grand return to the Star Wars
02:46universe in 1999's The Phantom Menace, this devilish character was intended to be killed
02:51off for good, something Lucas made very clear with the image of Maul's bisected body falling
02:56down one of those ridiculously long Star Wars shafts. However, after developing Maul's brother
03:01Savage Opress through the Clone Wars animated series, Lucas became much more interested in Maul,
03:06and, feeling that he was rather underutilized in his sole movie appearance, decided to resurrect
03:11him. Series lead Dave Filoni responded to this idea by saying,
03:14it's over, he's cut in half, how does that work? Only for Lucas to bluntly reply,
03:19I don't know, figure it out. Retconning Maul's death made him even more of a fan
03:23favorite than he already was, and with the villain even returning to the big screen in 2018's Solo,
03:28there's always a chance that he might appear in another Star Wars project down the line.
03:337. Leia's Memory of Her Mother
03:36Now, the prequels retroactively caused several problems with the original trilogy,
03:40with certain bits of information, like the fact that R2-D2 can apparently fly
03:44as a scene in Attack of the Clones, which works against the events of Lucas' first three movies.
03:49And one of the most confusing of these revolves around Princess Leia's connection to her mother,
03:53Padme Amidala. In Return of the Jedi, Leia tells Luke that she remembers her real mother,
03:58proceeding to describe her as beautiful and kind, but sad, implying that she'd spent at least a
04:03little bit of time with her. However, in Revenge of the Sith, Padme dies immediately after giving
04:08birth, so how could Leia have spent any time with her at all? Though plenty of explanations for this
04:12have been bandied around for years, such as Leia's Force ability allowing her to sense Padme,
04:17the fact of the matter is that George Lucas didn't know Leia's mother was going to die in
04:21childbirth while writing Return of the Jedi, making Padme's untimely end a retcon of Leia's memories.
04:286. The Origin of the Death Star's Weakness
04:31The fact that the Rebel Alliance was able to discover and exploit the Death Star's weakness
04:36in A New Hope always felt a little improbable, as did the fact that the Empire's planet-killing
04:41battle station had such a catastrophic defect in the first place. It obviously wasn't a plot hole
04:45or anything like that, but it just felt a wee bit too convenient. Not that the Rebels would
04:50care, with Luke's precisely-aimed proton torpedoes granting them an unprecedented victory over a much
04:55stronger enemy. But in 2016's Rogue One A Star Wars Story, this particular plot point received
05:01a most welcome retcon, with the revelation that the Death Star's weakness wasn't as random as it
05:05seemed and had actually been put there by its architect. Is this what George Lucas had planned
05:10all the way back in 1977? Certainly not. But as with Maul's resurrection, this is another example
05:16of a good retcon, since the idea of the weakness being planted by Mads Mikkelsen's conflicted
05:21engineer is a way more compelling one than it being just an unintentional design flaw.
05:275. Somehow Palpatine Returned
05:30Now though The Last Jedi left audiences divided over the direction of Disney's Star Wars sequels,
05:35the revelation that Emperor Palpatine was set to return for the rise of Skywalker was exciting
05:39for fans of all ages. But unfortunately though, the explanation for how Palp survived his
05:44death in Return of the Jedi was lazy at best, with Poe Dameron's line of
05:48Somehow Palpatine Returned serving as the movie's only attempt to fill in the blanks.
05:53Clearly the writers found it difficult to come up with a decent explanation, and that's probably
05:57because Palpatine was never intended to return from the grave, despite what Kathleen Kennedy
06:02might tell you. George Lucas actually shot down the idea of a Palpatine return whilst making
06:07Episode VI, bluntly telling the actor, no, he's dead. In addition, Colin Trevorrow, who was
06:12originally attached to direct The Rise of Skywalker, has said that bringing back Palpatine was
06:16something, I never considered. Meaning that the Sith Lord's comeback wasn't added until the new
06:21team decided to board the project in 2017. Retconning Palpatine's death then forced The
06:26Rise of Skywalker to retcon Snoke's entire character. In the first two movies, he was
06:31clearly meant to be someone new with a mysterious agenda of his own, not just a puppet that was
06:36grown in a jar.
06:384. Luke and Leia are siblings
06:40With the hindsight of Episodes VI to IX, it's always a little odd to go back and watch that
06:45infamous kiss between Luke and Leia in Episode V, as well as their quick little peck before
06:50swinging over that shaft in Episode IV. With the pair being revealed as siblings in the final
06:54chapter of the original trilogy, it's a tad uncomfortable to see them playing tonsil tennis
06:59in the first two movies. But, to be fair to everyone involved, that familial bond was not
07:04on the cards when A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back were being written.
07:07In 1999, original Star Wars producer Gary Kurtz discussed George Lucas' initial plans for the
07:12Star Wars saga, which were outlined in the 1970s. As well as revealing that Han Solo was supposed
07:18to die in Return of the Jedi, a plot point that Harrison Ford would've definitely been chuffed to
07:22hear, Kurtz also noted that Leia was not to be Luke's sister. Instead, Luke's sister was going
07:27to be a completely different character who, interestingly, Lucas wasn't planning on
07:31introducing until Episode VIII. Clearly, though, things changed when Lucas was developing the
07:36original trilogy, and if nothing else, we should all be thankful that the extended,
07:40more intimate version of their Empire Strikes Back kissing scene did not make the final cut.
07:463. Rey's Parentage
07:48The fact that the sequel trilogy didn't have a plan from the get-go meant that the movies
07:52didn't feel like a connected trilogy, rather that it felt that each entry was trying to make
07:56things up on the fly, which is exactly what happened. Along with those aforementioned Palpatine
08:01and Snoke retcons, this lack of planning was at its most evident with Rey's parentage,
08:05which was not only retconned between movies, but was also being changed while those movies
08:10were in the midst of production. The identity of her parents was one of the biggest questions
08:14coming out of The Force Awakens, but all was revealed in The Last Jedi, where we learned
08:18that they were just filthy junk traders who had sold her for drinking money. However,
08:22The Rise of Skywalker flipped this script by claiming that she was actually Palpatine's
08:26granddaughter, but according to Daisy Ridley, even that wasn't set in stone until they were
08:30deep into production. It came to episode 9, and J.J. pitched me the film and was like,
08:35oh yeah, Palpatine is granddaddy. I was like, awesome, and then two weeks later he was like,
08:40oh actually we're not sure, so it kept changing. Even as we were filming,
08:43I wasn't sure what the answer was going to be.
08:45The actress also claims that the filmmakers were toying with an Obi-Wan connection at one point
08:50before ultimately settling on The Last Jedi's nobody angle and then changing their minds again
08:55whilst making The Rise of Skywalker. The entire sequel trilogy is about Rey and her journey of
09:00discovery, so the fact that Lucasfilm didn't have a plan for that journey is quite frankly ridiculous.
09:062. Han and Greedo's Shootout
09:09Now, Harrison Ford might not give a damn about this, but the Han and Greedo who shot First
09:13Debate has been one of the most contentious topics in the Star Wars fandom for the last
09:17several decades. The episode 4 scene in which our iconic smuggler is confronted by the bounty
09:28hunter has been subject to countless changes and re-edits over the years, each of them only adding
09:33more confusion to the situation than the last. In the original cut of the film, Han blasts Greedo
09:38away before the alien has a chance to react, emphasising the fact that Mr Solo is quite the
09:42scoundrel and will do whatever it takes to survive. George Lucas, however, didn't want
09:46people to think that this lovable rogue was a cold-blooded killer, so he added a quick shot
09:51of Greedo firing First to justify Han's actions as being in self-defence. Now, while having Greedo
09:56shoot First might seem like a small wreck on many fans feel that it weakened Han's turn from
10:01anti-hero to galactic saviour, and that Han shot First is the definitive version of this scene.
10:07The makers of Solo A Star Wars Story agree with that sentiment as well, with the final
10:11confrontation between Han and Beckett being described as, there can be no question that
10:16Han shoots First on the page.
10:19Vader Being Luke's Father
10:22It's impossible to imagine the Star Wars saga playing out in any other way, but yes, indeed,
10:27quite possibly the biggest plot twist in cinematic history was actually retconned into existence,
10:32rather than being just planned out from the very beginning. A young Jedi named Darth Vader
10:36betrayed and murdered your father, states Obi-Wan in A New Hope, alluding to the fact that Luke's
10:41old man and Anakin Skywalker were originally two separate characters. Even when George Lucas came
10:47to hash out the Empire Strikes Back, this was still the case, with Lee Brackett's 1978 draft
10:52of the script featuring a scene where Luke meets his father, who is named Skywalker,
10:56and crucially, is not Vader. Sadly, Brackett passed away shortly after handing that draft in,
11:02and Lucas soon continued developing the story. It was during this time that Vader being Luke's
11:06daddy was added to the script, a twist so shocking that Lucas went to great lengths
11:10to keep it a secret, including telling the man in the suit, David Prowse, that the line was
11:15actually, Obi-Wan killed your father, and only adding in the real line in a post-production dub.
11:20Very sneaky indeed.
11:23And there we go, my friends, those were the 10 biggest Star Wars retcons. I hope that you enjoyed
11:27that, and please let me know what you thought about it down in the comments section below.
11:30As always, I've been Jules, and you can go follow me over on Twitter at RetroJay but the O
11:34is a zero, or you can swing by Instagram where it's the same handle, RetroJay but the O is a zero.
11:40But before I go, I just want to say one thing, hope you're treating yourself well with love and
11:43respect, my friend, because you deserve all of the best things out there, and do not let anything or
11:47anyone else tell you otherwise, alright? You are a massive legend, you deserve love, happiness,
11:52and success, and I want you to go out there and absolutely smash your life goals today,
11:55I believe in ya. As always, I've been Jules, you have been awesome,
11:59never forget that, and I'll speak to you soon. Bye.