The Star Wars Holiday Special

Plot synopsis:
On Life Day, Chewbacca, accompanied by Han Solo, is headed home to see his family. Along the way, the duo are chased by two Star Destroyers, but they escape into hyperspace.
Meanwhile, on Kashyyyk (referred to as Kazook), Chewbacca's family is preparing for his return. Hoping to find the Millennium Falcon, his wife, Malla, runs a computer scan for starships in the area, but is unsuccessful. Malla contacts Luke Skywalker, who, along with R2-D2, is working on his X-wing starfighter. Luke tells her that he does not know what happened. Malla contacts Saun Dann, a local human trader. He tells her through a carefully worded message that Han and Chewbacca are on their way and should be arriving soon. Malla then attempts (unsuccessfully) to prepare a meal, the instructions of which are being aired via a local cooking show by an eccentric four-armed alien cook, Chef Gormaanda (Harvey Korman).
Saun Dann arrives with Life Day gifts for everyone, including a virtual reality "fantasy" program (featuring Diahann Carroll) for Itchy. Back on the Falcon, Chewbacca and Han have just come out of hyperspace not far from Kashyyyk. Han notices an increased Imperial presence, so they decide to land in an unguarded area to the north. As they enter the atmosphere, Lumpy hears the roaring of the ship. Believing Han and Chewie might be arriving, Malla opens the door, but instead finds two stormtroopers and officers.
The Imperials force their way into the house. An officer orders a search for Chewbacca. As they search, Saun Dann and the others attempt to distract them with food and Malla's music video box (which features a video by Jefferson Starship). When the music finishes, the head officer orders the search to continue. The head officer tells Malla to keep Lumpy busy while they search his room, so Lumpy (and the viewing audience) watches a cartoon on a viewscreen of one of his father's many adventures.
The cartoon shows Luke, Han and Leia's first encounter with Boba Fett. During a search for a talisman, the Millennium Falcon crashes on a water planet known as Panna. Upon landing, they run into Fett, who claims to want to help them after saving Luke from a giant monster that attacks him from behind. They all board the Falcon, where Han has been infected by a mysterious sleeping virus caused by the talisman. Luke then contracts the virus as well.
Fett and Chewie go into Panna City to get the cure. Once they get into the Imperial-occupied city, Fett instructs Chewie to stay behind while he gets the cure. Once away from Chewie, Fett contacts Darth Vader. On the Falcon, as C-3PO is caring for Han and Luke, R2-D2 intercepts the call between Vader and Fett, causing worry for C-3PO. Evading the Imperials, Fett and Chewie return to the Falcon with the cure. After everyone recovers from the virus, they learn of Fett's true allegiances. Fett blasts away in his jet pack, promising that they'll meet again. Everyone then escapes from the planet and back to the rebel base on board the Falcon.
When the cartoon finishes, Lumpy works to create a translation device from his Amorphian machine that will fool the Imperials into returning to their base by faking their commander's voice. To do so, he first must watch the manual for the device, being presented by a malfunctioning, incompetent robot (Harvey Korman again).
While the Imperials are all searching downstairs, the living room viewscreen activates, announcing that Tatooine is now being put under curfew by the Empire, because of "subversive forces". The video is announced as required viewing for all Imperial forces and much of it features Ackmena (Bea Arthur) running the Mos Eisley Cantina. Part of the scene is shown in the bar. Ackmena is approached by an admirer: Krelman, an amorous alien, who misunderstood something she said to him the other night. When the Empire announces the curfew, Ackmena announces a "last drink" and when the creatures ignore her, she sings a fun song, "Good Night, But Not Goodbye" set to the "Cantina Band" theme. Lumpy uses this opportunity to put his plan into motion, faking a repeated call for the Imperials to "return to base". They leave, but the head officer instructs one of the stormtroopers to stay behind. After the other Imperials leave, the stormtrooper still hears the repeating signal and realizes they were tricked. He finds Lumpy and destroys the machine, then chases Lumpy outside.
As they both run onto the deck, Han and Chewbacca arrive. He says good bye to Han and stays with his family. Chewie protects Lumpy as Han dispatches the stormtrooper. After reuniting with everyone, an Imperial officer appears on the viewscreen, giving a general alert for the missing stormtrooper. Saun Dann quickly says that the trooper stole food and supplies and deserted and the officer says he will send out a search party. The danger averted, the family prepares to go to the festival at the Tree of Life.
The family is seen in space, traveling toward a bright star. They walk into it, arriving at the great Tree of Life, where many Wookiees dressed in red robes are gathered. As Chewbacca takes the stage, C-3PO and R2-D2 suddenly appear, along with Luke, Leia and Han. Leia gives a short speech on the meaning of Life Day and sings a song in celebration, to the tune of the Star Wars theme. At the conclusion of the ceremony, Chewbacca remembers his adventures in the previous film and promises he will somehow come back to Luke, Han, Leia, R2-D2 and C-3PO.
That night, the Wookiee family sit around the feast table, celebrating the day and being back together again.

Tags: cult, psychedelic

Review:
The "Star Wars Holiday Special" took place in between the two movies, and is famous amongst Star Wars fans for featuring the first appearance of Boba Fett, and completely forgotten by everyone else.
Because, simply, the show is absolutely terrible.The "special" (and I use that term as loosely as possible) is about Chewbacca's family, who await his return for the celebration of the holiday "Life Day." Far as I can gather, the holiday involves Christmas ornament-like globes and wearing red robes and being Wookies.
The special is basically two hours of waiting, and along the way there are cameos by all the major stars of the original film (Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher, Harrison Ford, etc.)  It's shocking they appear at all, I have to believe the mob was involved for them to show up.
I know they got divorced sometime after this special aired but I'm guessing that is she had it in mind to ruin him, this was the perfect weapon.It's been 25 years since CBS hoisted this unholy nightmare on the American public and in that time I had never seen it until last night and oh my lord I could have gone another 25, 40, 50, 300 years without ever having it drilled into my brain a second time.This is without a doubt the most horrific thing I have ever witnessed on screen and I've seen Howard the Duck!
My friend assured me that the special was actually pretty good if you got past all the Wookie manure - BUT THE WOOKIES TAKE OVER THE WHOLE SHOW!!!!The story takes place sometime after Episode IV and finds Chewbacca's family waiting for him to come home for something called Life Day (I dunno, maybe it's a day where they worship board games).
All your favorite characters from the first movie is here - one worse than the other.The film isn't helped by the fact that much of the dialog is in Chewbaccas language.There are also many logical holes in the story, like when Chewbaccas wife calls the local tradesman on the video phone, she gets to watch a long sequence of what goes on in the shop before the tradesman suddenly notices that someone is calling.The core of the story - if you can call it a story - is that Chewbacca isn't home for Life Day in time - he is held up by fighting the Empire.
We see what goes on with the family while they wait, with occasional brief appearances by characters from the first Star Wars movie.This is truly a horrible movie - worth watching, just to see how bad it can be done!.
I am going to try to give a different take towards this one than the other reviewers, because of course they are all correct, this is an amazingly bad piece of garbage.First off, yep, I and no one else who is a Star Wars fan who has seen this will ever disagree it is complete and total crap.
Because as unbelievably horrible as it is, and as totally unfathomably bad every scene is, as a Star Wars fan you wanna see these characters in new scenes.It IS cool seeing "new" footage of Han and Chewie in the Falcon's cockpit.
Of course, as you watch you may say to yourself that you wish you had NEVER seen this, because it taints the memory of these great Star Wars characters.
If you can keep your feelings about Star Wars in check and dismiss this easily, sure it is.The Boba Fett appearance in the animated sequence is very cool, best thing about the show probably.
Were there stipulations that said this HAD to air, and they couldn't even trim it down?I can't believe after creating such a masterpiece like "Star Wars" that George Lucas didn't have the eyes to see what a total hack job this Star Wars Holiday TV Special was.
(Even with "Episode 2" in existence I still have to give George the benefit on this one.)So c'mon....what is the REAL untold story behind this...this....this thing?Maybe the "E" network can help?THAT would make for a much better tale than anything on this special.But you gotta watch.One more interesting note -- at a sci-fi con in New Jersey in the later 90's, at the end when the place was clearing out, one dealer that was selling tapes still had his TV on and he had none other than the Star Wars Holiday Special playing, maybe hoping to sell a last copy or two.
But while the 1968 TV fiasco at least gave us hits like 'I am the Walrus' and 'Fool on the Hill', the 1978 special has Carrie Fisher singing 'The Life Day Song' to the tune of the John Williams theme music!
"A day that takes us through the darkness/A day that leads us to life/A day that leads us to celebrate/A lifeee/To live/To laugh/To dream/To grow/To know....!!!!" Anyone who thought 'Attack of the Clones' was a disappointment needs to check out this CBS 'family special' in which Han and Chewbacca are racing across the galaxy to get to Chewie's home planet in time for the Wookie's equivalent of Thanksgiving, Life Day. This being 'A Long Time Ago in a Galaxy Far, Far Away' there can't be a Christmas, you see.
Comic relief can be painful if not thought out properly (We're looking at you, Jar Jar Binks...)Lucas, who gave the go ahead to the Thanksgiving Special is reported to have said he'd like to smash every every bootlegged VHS tape of this excruciating show...serves you right George for such a cynical attempt to grab the pre-Christmas toy market..
I've always been a big fan of star wars and I thought I knew a lot about it until my boy friend and his best friend asked me if I have ever seen the holiday special.
I lost an hour and a half of my life and really nothing happened during that time other than losing any shred of respect I may have had for George Lucas.The effects are so bad they are hilarious and there seems to be some type of odd porn scene involving Chewbaca's father and some 70's Disco Queen.
When the Holiday Special aired, I was ready to be transported to that galaxy far, far away and be dazzled all over again...The opening was promising, what with Han and Chewie being chased down by Imperial Star Destroyers and so on, yet even this opening teaser had an omen of doom attached, that being when Han said something like "That's the spirit, you'll be celebrating Life Day before you know it!"  Han wasn't the only one beginning to get a bad feeling about this.
That even I, as a fan of both Star Wars and crappy movies, would not enjoy it and waste 2 hours of my life.Well, Its all true, of course.
But in this post-Jar Jar Binks world the 'Star Wars' feeling had already been severely cheapened by mister George Lucas himself, so I just had to find it, it was my new holy grail.Now I have finally found it, downloaded it and watched it.
The commercial breaks, which were supposed to be the good parts, were not included.The famous Boba Fett introducing animation looks nice, but it's hardly a story, more like the first segment of a longer piece.
Lets face it, many things have historical Star Wars significance like Splinter of the Mind's Eye and those crappy Ewok movies, but I won't subject myself to those (again) and this is by far worse than those.Imagine, for those of you who have seen Sonny and Cher or other variety shows, that this is a variety show starring the cast of Star Wars along with <shudder> late 70s icons.
Shocking as that may seem to those under 30, in those antediluvian days, there was no way to see a movie except in a theater or when it hit Network Movie of the Week night.Thus, you couldn't simply run out to a store and buy a copy of Star Wars to enjoy at home.
Or at least that was the intension I guess.What actually happens is that the special doesn't have the material or the budget to fill all this time and we get lots of filler and a glacial pace that makes things that are already not that good, just that bit more painful to sit through.
Then came the "Star Wars Holiday Special" Got all excited sat down with my snacks (it was chips & soda night) and watched the lamest piece of junk I ever saw.
Perhaps a little before its time, the Star Wars Holiday Special was George Lucas's brave leap away from the tired, Bible story re-hashing of Episode IV into the avant garde universe of variety television.
Wow. Up until I saw this holiday special, I thought that perhaps the worst TV shows of the 1970s were the "Brady Bunch Hour" or perhaps "Pink Lady and Jeff", but "The Star Wars Holiday Special" is at least as bad...possibly worse.
However, given the amazingly good will of practically every person in America towards the Star Wars franchise and such great characters, the fact it came off so badly is amazing and apparent proof that George Lucas was not above whoring out his reputation (his later Episodes I, II, III and Jar-Jar further proved this).
Watch "The Star Wars Holiday Special." Laugh at it.
I was an early grade school kid (and quite a huge Star Wars fan) when this abomination was shown on national TV, and even at that age I remember seeing several much-hyped advertisements for the show weeks prior to its airing...and then being very disappointed to the point of nearly crying when it turned out it was actually airing past my bedtime, and happened to be a day my parents went out to dinner and told the sitter that I had to be in bed after the first half hour of the show was done, no exception (and of course, it never would be aired again after that day).I realize now they actually did me a really big favor, keeping me away from it, once I finally got the chance to see the whole thing several decades later.
Long and short though, this so-called special(Which is nothing of the kind by the way), is so bad because it's nothing but shameless and pointless cameos from people like Art Carney, Dihann Carrol, Bea Arthur, Harvey Korman and the band Jefferson Starship.
Yeah, the Star Wars holiday special is BAD...
WIthin the first five minutes is a Russian circus dance scene, which has no reason to be there, and is the only thing worth watching, unless you want to fast forward for brief bra-less shots of Leia, or watching her sing, in the last 5 min of the dare I say "film" See it, and kill you love of Star Wars forever.
To give you some idea, in the first half or so of the film all dialogue is in the Wookie language (like Chewbacca from Star Wars).
I'm a big Star Wars fan and I had often heard other fans talk about the infamous "Holiday Special" and how rubbish it was, but I wanted to see it for myselfI was expecting it to be bad but nothing could have prepared me for what was to come.
There are plenty of moments where you'll be forced to ask "What on God's good earth were these morons thinking?!?!": the constant wookie growls (with no translations), the completely pointless cantina scene, and unquestionably the worst part of the entire debacle, the songs (including a Carrier Fischer/Princess Leia number towards the end, which scientific testing has proved will cause permanent psychosis if listened to multiple times).
My favorite line in the whole thing is probably "Grrrgrgrbbbblll, Grrrrghggggrr." When they don't speak to each other, we get to watch them watch TV themselves (Malla watches a cooking show hosted by a cross-dressing Harvey Korman, Lumpy watches a Boba Fett cartoon in which R2-D2 seems to be made of rubber, and Itchy -- get this -- hops into a virtual reality sex machine featuring disco diva Diahann Carroll), and anything else NOT featuring the Wookies involves singing, either by Jefferson Starship, Carrie Fisher or Beatrice Arthur (as a barlady at the cantina).
It sure does seem like they just didn't take the Star Wars Holiday Special very seriously when they made it.
The story of the making of The Star Wars Holiday Special is a lesson portrayed like the lessons of great myth.
Even STAR TREK 5: THE FINAL FRONTIER isn't this bad.Then again I actually kind of liked it, not because it has anything to do with STAR WARS but because it wonderfully encapsulates a consumer oriented non-secular holiday who's sole reason to exist is to compel people to buy things they don't need.
Like a hologram projector featuring The Jefferson Starship playing what is obviously their worst song, a cartoon that introduced the Boba Fett action figure to legions of kids who needed something else to bug their parents into buying for them, and Imperial Stormtroopers trashing Chewie's house looking for that last box of Wookie-Ookies.The show is a great test of one's sense of humor, because you'll either get it or you won't, and quite frankly the STAR WARS content is a distraction to the relaxing stupidity of it all, which will be greatly enhanced by the ingestion of drugs, alcohol, or noxious fumes.
If you have the inspiration to ask yourself such questions you should not bother with this, but if you have a taste for surrealist 1970s television like "The Hollywood Squares", "Pink Lady & Jeff", "H.R. Puffinstuff" or classic PBS educational programming, "The STAR WARS Holiday Special" is nothing short of a masterpiece, and a great example of what George Lucas' brainchild had in store for humanity once it ran amok in 1999.
it's only good-bye, I have to say to you ..."), and the animated segment that introduced the Boba Fett action figure looks like it was designed by Mobius.Much fuss is made amongst the STAR WARS intelligentsia as to whether or not Carrie Fisher was on drugs when she sings her Life Day ode during the special's showstopper finale, and my estimation is a combination of alcohol, cocaine, some form of tranquilizer such as Quaalude or Valium, and some additional marijuana to keep the crap eating smile on her face.
2. The animated feature is quirky but admittedly enjoyable since it features the first glance at Boba Fett, the infamous bounty hunter loved by most fans of the sci-fi saga.Don't let these little parts fool you though, the Holiday Special will make you eternally grateful that the series was continued after this.I fully advise you not to watch this if you are a Star Wars fan.
However, if you are interested in: -Holographic circus acts, with normal-sized Oompa Loompas!-Multi-armed transvestite cooking show hosts -The worst stormtrooper actors EVER -The worst performances from Hamill, Ford, Fisher, and Anthony Daniels -A Wookie family gunning to replace the seven dwarfs in Snow White (I'm not kidding, Chewie's father is "Itchy" and his son is "Lumpy") -Musical numbers from people that are completely unrelated to Star Wars -A Wookie receiving a happy ending machine for a family holiday -The most pointless story ever devised for the torture of television-viewersthen watch this special!A solid 2/10 from Spiden.
Or even better, chop our ears off with crooked swords so we won't have to listen to it.In closing, if you looking for a mind-numbing good time, check out "The Star Wars Holiday Special".
Time-slowing sequences include Wookies watching cooking shows; Wookies having growl-conversations(no subtitles); Wookies having virtual sex with Dianne Carroll(!?!);and Musical numbers by future-Golden Girl Bea Arthur and Jefferson Starship(Star Wars...Starship.
Possibly the best holiday special ever and quite possibly the best Star Wars project ever (though Episode 1 looks like it might be better...NOT!).
I've always thought that Chewy was the best thing in Star Wars...this special proves it!
The answer is 'The Star Wars Holiday Special', a two-hour long mistake that actually manages to be worse than its legendary reputation.Awful skits and musical numbers make up half of the show, while the framing device—Chewie's family dealing with everything from Art Carney to Imperial officers—make up the rest.
So bad it makes Starship Troopers Hero of the Federation look as good as the original Star Wars.
I had the pleasure or pain of watching the Star Wars Holiday special.
you turn on the TV, you watch about 10 minutes, then....you change the channel.That's What most of us feel about the star wars holiday special.
I first watched this as a child when it was broadcast in 1978, like just about everybody in my class I'd seen Star Wars and loved it so was over joyed to learn that there was to be a television special.
Imagine my shock when it finally aired and instead of exciting action with the characters I'd seen in the film we got a bunch of grunting Wookies that weren't even subtitled.The basic plot is that Han and Chewbacca are trying to get to Chewie's family for Life Day, which is sort of like a Wookie version of US Thanks Giving.
Save for brief appearances by Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher and Mark Hamill (sporting a horribly-lit mole looking like a monstrous sebaceous cyst above his chin), most of this special is padded out by pompous Imperial personnel, a neither-here-nor-there appearance by Art Carney, a cabaret number belted out by Beatrice Arthur in the Mos Eisley bar, and a has-nothing-to-do-with-anything-Star-Wars (but admittedly amusing) turn by Harvey Korman playing three different roles.Yes, the animated short with Boba Fett is worth seeing at least once (it actually does a better job of establishing Boba's persona than Episode 5), though some of the characters are a bit rubbery, particularly Han Solo.