Star Wars Fun Facts

Some interesting facts about my all-time favorite movie:

Did you know that Star Wars almost didn't happen because Universal Studios turned it down? Or that Harrison Ford was an unknown actor working as a carpenter when George Lucas chose him to play Han Solo? Or that Luke Skywalker's original name was Luke Starkiller? Here are some fascinating facts about Star Wars, one of the highest grossing sci-fi film series in history.

THE CHARACTERS

Luke Skywalker. At first Lucas planned to portray him as an elderly general, but decided that making him a teenager gave him more potential for character development. Lucas originally named the character Luke Starkiller, but on the first day of shooting he changed it to the less violent Skywalker.

Han Solo. In the early stages of development, Han Solo was a green-skinned, gilled monster with a girlfriend named Boma who was a cross between a guinea pig and a brown bear. Solo was supposed to make only a few appearances in the film, but Lucas later made him into a swashbuckling, reckless human (allegedly modeled after the film director Francis Ford Coppola).

Chewbacca. Lucas got the idea for Chewbacca one morning in the early 1970s while watching his wife Marcia drive off in her car. She had their Alaskan malamute, Indiana (the namesake for Indiana Jones in Raiders of the Lost Ark), and Lucas liked the way the large, shaggy dog looked in the passenger seat. So he decided to create a character in the film that was a cross between Indiana, a bear, and a monkey.

R2-D2. Lucas got the name R2-D2 while filming American Graffiti. During a sound-mixing session for the film, editor Walter Murch asked him for R2, D2 (Reel 2, Dialogue 2) of the film. Lucas liked the name so much that he made a note of it, and eventually found the right character for it.

SPECIAL EFFECTS

- The spaceship battles were inspired by World War II films. Before filming the special effect began, Lucas watched dozens of war movies like Battle of Britain and The Bridges of Toko-Ri, taping his favorite air battle scenes as he went along. Later he edited them down to a 10-minute black-and-white film, and gave it to the special effects team - which reshot the scenes using X-wing and T.I.E. fighter models.

MISCELLANEOUS FACTS

The executives at 20th Century Fox hated the film the first time they saw it. Some of the company's board of directors fell asleep during the first screening; others didn't understand the film at all. One executive's wife even suggested that C-3PO be given a moving mouth, because no one would understand how he could talk without moving his lips.

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