3. The Special Edition of the Original Trilogy
Speaking of keeping interest in the franchise alive isn't it almost too convenient that Star Wars: The Special Edition was released just as people were moving on to other things and the prequels just as that was about to happen again? Come on, George, what gives? Overall the Special Edition was a better improvement on the original films. The picture quality was much better and there were some new scenes that hadn't been there before. Really neat stuff that crowded Lucas' imagination years ago, but couldn't be brought to cinematic life yet because the technology didn't exist. Then there's the rest of it. The tons of overstuffed CGI images into the old frames of the films cluttering up the screen with more and more garbage that looks like an unrendered Pixar movie. Some of it is only barely passable and then there's that one scene when Greedo shoots first... So Greedo, an alien bounty hunter from a race of people known for their hunting skills, sits two feet away from Han Solo in the cantina with a gun on his face. Pulls the trigger and misses giving Han the heroic chance to fire back in self defense and blow him away. Logically, it's awful, but the greatest crime it commits is cheapening the character of Solo who blew Greedo away in the original film without waiting for the shot to come. It was Lucas' way of making Han Solo a character more for the kids... God, I wish that argument would stop cropping up.