maclunkey

From the Hollywood script writers’ podcast Story Break (previously here and here) who’ve imagined and pitched such properties as Jar-Jar: A Star Wars Story, we’re treated to their signature treatment of another subtitle re-mastering of the franchise and how such a directorial decision could have larger implications—including not in the least the opportunity (nay, duty) to explore what the change signifies. In the original edition of Star Wars: A New Hope, a pivotal, expository scene Greedo, a bounty-hunter from the planet Rodia commissioned by Jabba the Hutt, encounters his target, smuggler Hans Solo, at the cantina of Mos Eisley (“a wretched hive of scum and villany”) and girds himself to deliver Solo to Jabba dead or alive.
Originally, Solo is depicted as killing Greedo, a decision which the director later recants, fearing it portrays one of the Rebellion’s unwilling heroes as cold-blooded and alters footage to reform Solo’s moral ambiguity by initially in 1997 having Greedo fire his blaster first and then in another special edition, portraying both firing simultaneously in 2004, in 2012 owing that the original portrayal was canon and then just within the past week debuted another edit to mark the occasion of its intellectual heirs’ premiere of its streaming service, this time with the exchanged subtitled except on Greedo’s last words before dying which audiences transcribe as either the title or possibly a Huttese phrase “ma klounkee.” Those last words still a mystery one fun tangent that the storyboarding session explored early on was that the Bounty Hunter’s Tale was a Star Wars-Groundhog Day mash-up and Greedo was caught in a Force temporal loop—the only escape being to finally kill Han Solo and we’ll go through an infinite number of variations, the same day repeated over and over again, accompanied by the musical stylings of Figrin D’an and the Modal Nodes. Do check out the whole episode at the link above and find out where they ultimately took this idea.