'The Star Wars Holiday Special' 1978: The one piece of 'Star Wars' lore that we all pretend doesn't exist
A long time ago in a galaxy not-so-far away, CBS thought it would be a good idea to do a holiday special based on the characters of 'Star Wars'. The rest, as they say, is history.
Released in 1978, 'The Star Wars Holiday Special' was an unmitigated disaster. Practically nobody enjoyed the hour-and-a-half-long spinoff film and to this day, it is reviled by everyone from fans to critics to the very actors who appeared in it.
The 'Holiday Special' was centered around the family of Chewbacca (Peter Mayhew), including his father Itchy (Paul Gale), wife Malla (Mickey Morton), and son Lumpy (Patty Maloney). The plot was built around a fictional Wookie festival called Life Day and the things Chewie's family does while waiting for him to come home.
It's hard to say what exactly is wrong with the 'Holiday Special', quite simply because there are so many things that went wrong here, starting with the fact that most of the dialogue is just the Wookies grunting and roaring (without subtitles). It's hard to believe that anyone in their right mind would allow this mess of a TV movie, which also involved comedy and music sequences awkwardly thrown in, to ever see the light of day.
In all fairness, writer Bruce Vilanch claimed years later that he was heavily into cocaine at the time he was working on the special and that sort of explains why it was so bizarre. However, as terrible as the special may have been, it was the first time we were introduced to the Mandalorian bounty hunter Boba Fett and the design for the titular character of 'The Mandalorian' was at least partly based on Fett's appearance in the special. Plus, the special was the first 'Star Wars' project to acknowledge James Earl Jones as the iconic voice of Darth Vader.
Do those contributions justify 'The Star Wars Holiday Special'? Probably not, but at least it allows movies like 'Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker' avoid being called the worst 'Star Wars' movie ever and that's something.
'The Star Wars Holiday Special' aired on CBS on November 17, 1978, never to be seen on television again.