Star Wars Star Wars is a film and television franchise . From the very inception of " " in 1977 , there has been a definite rivalry between the " Star Wars " and " Star Trek " franchises , which Rod Roddenberry – son of " Star Trek " creator Gene Roddenberry – learned of through first - hand experience , though he was a much bigger fan of " Star Wars " than " Star Trek " during his childhood . His father approved of " Star Wars " , considering it " fun " with " nothing wrong " about it . In , he commented , " " I like " Star Wars " . It was the young King Arthur growing up and . . . slaying the evil emperor , finally . " " Before devising the origins of " Star Wars " , attended a few " Star Trek " conventions . When interviewed by Rod Roddenberry in , Lucas recalled , " " I started writing " Star Wars " sort of in the heyday of the syndication part of " Star Trek " . I think the thing I was attracted to the most about " Star Trek " is that it completely got rid of all the mundane , boring angle of real space . And just said , ' Well , let ' s just go out and go where no one else dared to go ' [ . . . ] " Star Trek " and " Star Wars " are not reality shows ; they ' re imagination shows . The story is really the thing that makes it work . " " Lucas went on to point out that portraying the stories of both " Star Wars " and " Star Trek " was limited by resources such as the amount of budgets and technology available . Comparing " Star Wars " to " Star Trek " , he noted , " " What I was doing was more space opera than sort of science fiction . " Star Trek " was more sort of intellectual mystery . It wasn ' t action oriented . " Star Wars " was action oriented . " " Lucas also acknowledged that both " Star Wars " and " Star Trek " have affected many millions of people . He doesn ' t put much stock in the fan - based competitiveness between " Star Wars " and " Star Trek " , remarking , " " I couldn ' t even contemplate what would happen if you put the " Enterprise " up against the " " . You know , it ' s an intellectual exercise which , you know , could have any outcome you want . " " ( " Trek Nation " ) Having become the most successful science fiction franchise in media history ( " see : Paramount Pictures : Footnotes " ) , the Hollywood studios United Artists and Universal Studios declined the opportunity to become part of it when they were approached by Lucas in the mid - 1970s with the proposition for what was to become the first " Star Wars " movie installment of the same title . The studio that had picked up the project , 20th Century Fox , refused to buy the marketing and licensing rights when Lucas needed additional funding to finish his movie . United Artists was ended after its disastrous 1980 western " Heaven ' s Gate " ; Universal Studios did ultimately manage to produce the far less successful " Star Wars " - " inspired " science fiction franchise " Battlestar Galactica " of its own ; and 20th Century Fox , aside from missing out on any and all takes from the huge " Star Wars " merchandise sales , is now completely out of the loop after the sale of Lucasfilm to The Walt Disney Company in 2012 . Incidentally , adjusted for inflation , the first " Star Wars " movie has become the second all - time highest grossing movie in history , only surpassed by the 1939 movie " Gone with the Wind " . It has been joined by all the other " Star Wars " films , including the seventh one , in the top two hundred , whereas none of the " Star Trek " films have made the list . At the Star Trek convention in Las Vegas , William Shatner attributed the existence of " " and all subsequent projects to " Star Wars " popularity . Yet , Shatner ' s assertion has to be seen in a somewhat more nuanced light ; attempts to revitalize the live - action " Star Trek " franchise preceded the premiere of the original " Star Wars " movie in 1977 , eventually resulting in the " " television project . Nevertheless , Shatner has a point in his assessment in that the phenomenal success at the box - office of " Star Wars " , considered a fluke – and therefore disregarded at first – by Paramount , became instrumental in the studio ' s eventual decision to upgrade the television project into a major theatrical movie project . See " " for further particulars . " Star Trek " in " Star Wars " . In " " Season 1 Episode 2 " " from 2008 , at time index 02 : 37 a ship can be seen on a tactical monitor behind General . During development on , George Lucas took inspiration from " Star Trek " , recalling that , like Lucas himself , Gene Roddenberry initially hadn ' t been entirely comfortable with developing a series and refining or pulling together the vision of a fictional world . ( " The Making of Star Wars : The Definitive Story Behind the Original Film " , pp . 245 - 246 ) " Star Wars " in " Star Trek " . A scene in , involving the battling a Jem ' Hadar battleship , was intended to be evocative of the in " Star Wars " : Episode IV " A New Hope " . " " That whole sequence , that technical thing that they found , it ' s all a deliberate homage to " Star Wars " , " " said Ronald D . Moore . ( " Cinefantastique " , Vol . 30 , No . 9 / 10 , p . 61 ) Some aspects of " Star Trek " were deliberately not meant to have a " Star Wars " style . For instance , Makeup Supervisor Michael Westmore once described the background aliens in as being " basically within Gene Roddenberry ' s realm of not going into a " Star Wars " - type of creature . " ( ) Crossovers . Industrial Light & Magic . Industrial Light & Magic ( ILM ) , a and animation company , was formed in 1975 as part of Lucasfilm Ltd . for the express purpose of realizing the optical and miniature effects for the first " Star Wars " film , continuing to do so for all the subsequent ones . The company has contributed effects work to nine of the thirteen in addition to . Many of ILM ' s VFX staffers have worked on both franchises .