Star Wars Holiday Special: 25 WTF Moments

Creepy Luke is creepy.

By Jack Pooley /

Any Star Wars fan worth their salt is aware of 1978's Holiday Special, an infamously terrible Star Wars-themed variety show that, due to its overwhelmingly negative fan response, has never been rebroadcast or officially released on home video.

Advertisement

Thanks to something called VCRs and the beauty of the Internet, though, the 2-hour broadcast is immortalised online forever more, such that as much as George Lucas, Harrison Ford and co. would probably love to forget the show's existence, it's going to linger around forever more.

While the howlingly awful show is available to view in full on YouTube, you might want to save yourself some time and mental anguish by just blasting through our list of the most weird, hilarious and unforgettable moments instead.

Brace yourself. As a humble reminder that there are worse things in the Star Wars universe than the prequels, here are 25 WTF moments from the Star Wars Holiday Special...

25. Low-Budget Opening Titles

Kindly letting fans know the sort of low-budget production they'd be in store for from the outset, the special opens with the signature "A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away..." title...except it looks super low-rent, basically epitomising the design philosophy that defines this entire trainwreck.

Advertisement

Sure, the iconic Star Wars theme can't help but hype the viewer up at least a little bit, but that's merely the sheer brilliance of John Williams, and one of maybe two things this broadcast actually gets right.

Advertisement