First Star Wars movie released

When The Force First Awakened

It’s hard to believe I know, but once upon a time there were no kids making a ‘Whhohhh-Whoohhhh’ light sabre sound. No dressing up in your dad’s dressing gown and pretending to be a Jawa. No use of ‘nerf herder’ as a common insult. But all that changed on this day in 1977 when Star Wars was released in the United States.

That’s right, just a simple Star Wars. It wasn’t yet Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope as it’s lovingly known these days. Children entered the cinema on that May day, not knowing that they would have their little minds blown and emerge a couple of hours later as fully formed sci-fi nerds.In George Lucas’ original treatment for the film, Luke was called Starkiller and Han Solo was a big green monster with gills, but these concepts were soon altered to the recognisable characters we know today. In my opinion, both these changes were enormous mistakes.