Who wants the original cuts of Star Wars? The ones free of CGI singers in Jabba's palace, have Han shooting first and feature a cat-eyed female Emperor? Everyone, right? Well, as gossip and hearsay stacks up, it's looking more and more likely we may get these unedited versions on Blu-Ray soon enough. The latest news comes from John Landis (at a Q&A for An American Werewolf In London), who said that Disney are planning to rerelease the original, untampered cuts. This has been rumoured a few times in the past couple of years (and has been anticipated ever since the Mouse House bought Lucasfilm in 2012), but these words is the most we've heard in the affirmative pretty much ever. But will it ever actually happen? It's pretty obvious why Disney would want to do this - it will not only make them a nice bit of money, but it'll greatly warm sceptical fans to their continuing of the Skywalker story. It also cleans up a pretty major plot hole caused by The Force Awakens and its new tie-in material. Star Wars: Aftermath, a new novel set just after the events of Return Of The Jedi, reveals that the destruction of the second Death Star and death of Palpatine wasn't the end of the Empire by a long shot, with the galaxy very still much at war. Author Chuck Wendig does try and work in the victory celebrations on Coruscant (added into the film for the 1997 Special Edition) into the story (albeit in a ret-conned manner), but it's clear the more localised party on Endor from the original cut better suits this idea. No, there's no reason why Disney wouldn't want to do this. The problem is whether they can. You see, while Disney owns Lucasfilm and have the rights to make as many films as they like based around anything even tangential to Star Wars, as well as more merchandise you can shake a pop-up lightsaber at, they don't have the actual distribution rights for any of the original six movies. Those remain with Fox, and will until 2020, except for Star Wars itself (now referred to as A New Hope) which they have in perpetuity. This is an issue that isn't going to just go away if they wait a few years, so a release these original, unedited versions is going to take some negotiation. We know Disney's perfectly happy to make a cross-studio deal that benefits both parties (see the surprise sharing of Spider-Man with Sony), but without knowing exactly how the licensing works it's not clear who's in the best bargaining postion, or whether Fox need Disney at all. Even if they don't, they certainly don't look to be planning on making the originals available solo at the moment - they're releasing the heavily tampered versions again on Blu-Ray (this time with steelbooks) next month, and while double-dipping is by-the-by nowadays, that doesn't really suggest we should expect any more releases any time soon. The idea of getting the original cuts of Star Wars, now pretty much the Holy Grail of cinema, is an extremely exciting thought, but also one riddled with problems. It'll probably happen one day (remember when Episode VII was an impossibility?), but the big, unanswered question is still when. Do you think we'll get the original cuts on Blu-Ray? Let us know what you think down in the comments.
