Han shot first

The 1997 Special Edition of Star Wars depicts Greedo firing a shot at Han Solo shortly before Han responds in kind. In the original 1977 release, Han is the only one to fire. This slow-motion clip shows the 2004 version.

"Han shot first" refers to a controversial change made to a scene in the film Star Wars (1977), in which Han Solo (Harrison Ford) is confronted by the bounty hunter Greedo (Paul Blake) in the Mos Eisley cantina. The change was made for the 1997 Special Edition re-release of Star Wars, and has since been altered twice more. The phrase "Han shot first" is meant to express that "Han was the only one who shot", and is a colloquial retort to series creator George Lucas's decision to alter the scene.

The controversy has been referenced in-universe in the 2018 film Solo: A Star Wars Story.

Scene

Han Solo and Greedo both independently work for Jabba the Hutt, a crime lord based on the planet Tatooine. Before the events of the film, Solo, a smuggler for Jabba, jettisons cargo to avoid capture by an Imperial search party. As a result, Jabba offers a bounty on Solo. In the Mos Eisley cantina, Greedo corners Solo and forces him at gunpoint to sit down in a booth. Solo tells Greedo that he has the money to compensate Jabba, but Greedo demands the money for himself. Solo says he does not have the money at the moment, quietly readying his own blaster under the table. Greedo tells him that Jabba has run out of patience with Solo and that Greedo has been "waiting for a long time" to capture Solo. Solo replies, "Yes, I'll bet you have." The scene's conclusion varies depending on the version of the film.

History

In the original 1977 theatrical release of the scene, the film cuts to a closeup of Greedo's face, followed quickly by flash sparks, a cloud of smoke, and the sound effect of a blaster firing. This is followed by a reverse angle of Greedo from behind, slumping over the table. In 2012, director George Lucas expressed his dissatisfaction with this climax, believing that it depicts Solo, the film's supporting protagonist, as a "cold-blooded killer".^[1] But Greedo had pointed a gun at Solo and bragged that he had been "looking forward" to seeing Solo's "dead body", constituting—according to at least one legal expert—a direct threat on Solo's life that would clearly warrant preemptive action on Solo's part in self-defense in the United States.^[2]

In the 1997 special edition of the film, a few frames are inserted in which Greedo shoots first at Solo and misses, and then Solo returns fire, killing Greedo.^[3][4]

For the film's 2004 DVD release, the scene was altered again, with new timing so that the shots are fired at nearly the same time and so that Solo dodges Greedo's shot. In an article titled "The Star Wars George Lucas Doesn't Want You To See", The Atlantic summarized that "[i]n the original versions ... it's clear that Han Solo pulled out his gun and shot the bounty hunter Greedo. In the 1997 version, Greedo shoots first. In the 2004 version, they shoot at the same time."^[5]

For the 2011 Blu-ray release, the scene of Solo and Greedo firing at each other was shortened by several frames.^[6]

Controversy

This alteration is disagreeable to some longtime fans of the series, provoking some to create an online petition demanding that the changes be retracted.^[7] The primary objection to the revision is that it alters Han's initially morally ambiguous character, making his later transition from anti-hero to hero less meaningful.^[8] Film students have labored for years to issue their own entire custom-edited re-releases of the Star Wars films in an effort to redact Lucas's changes, especially this scene with Solo and Greedo.^[5][9]

In a 2004 interview, Lucas explained, "to me, [the original movie] doesn't really exist anymore. ... I'm sorry you saw half a completed film and fell in love with it. But I want it to be the way I want it to be."^[10] In a 2012 interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Lucas stated that a combination of poor-quality close-up shots and the audience's inaccurate perception of the Han Solo character was what actually caused all the confusion. Lucas explained:

The controversy over who shot first, Greedo or Han Solo, in Episode IV, what I did was try to clean up the confusion, but obviously it upset people because they wanted Solo to be a cold-blooded killer, but he actually isn't. It had been done in all close-ups and it was confusing about who did what to whom. I put a little wider shot in there that made it clear that Greedo is the one who shot first, but everyone wanted to think that Han shot first, because they wanted to think that he actually just gunned him down.^[1]

Regardless of this claim from Lucas, one draft of the original film's script makes no mention of Greedo shooting at all—only Solo.^[11] In 2015, a fan made copy of an early script was discovered in the archives of the University of New Brunswick library by Kristian Brown. The script, dated March 15, 1976, was based on a revised fourth draft. Brown was quoted as suggesting it confirms "100 percent, Han shot first."^[12]

Prior to Lucas's long history of retroactive edits of Star Wars films and withholding the originals even for archival purposes, he had in 1988 protested to Congress (in opposition to Ted Turner colorizing classic black and white films) against that very process even on a purely cosmetic basis. At that time, Lucas originally argued that the public has a right to retain classic cinematic originals as a matter of cultural heritage, saying that "people who alter or destroy works of art and our cultural heritage for profit or as an exercise of power are barbarians".^[5]

In a 2014 Reddit interview with fans, when asked who shot first, actor Harrison Ford's reply was simply, "I don't know and I don't care."^[13][14] However, Paul Blake, who played Greedo, said in a 2016 interview with the New York Daily News,

Of course, it said it all in the original script, we played in the scene in English and at the end of the scene, it reads, 'Han shoots the alien.' It's all it says and that's what happened. It was very painful.^[15]

Blake also indicated that Greedo shooting first made the character appear inept (in that he would have missed Solo from very short range), and that "it does give Greedo a little more glory if he's just blown away."^[15]

In a 2015 interview for The Washington Post Lucas gave his reason for changing the scene:

"Han Solo was going to marry (Princess) Leia, and you look back and say, 'Should he be a cold-blooded killer?'" Lucas asks. "Because I was thinking mythologically—should he be a cowboy, should he be John Wayne? And I said, 'Yeah, he should be John Wayne.' And when you're John Wayne, you don't shoot people [first]—you let them have the first shot. It's a mythological reality that we hope our society pays attention to."^[16]

References in other films

The 2018 spin-off film Solo: A Star Wars Story references the controversy in its climax by having Han Solo shoot the antagonist Tobias Beckett in the chest mid-sentence, killing him.^[17][18][19] Some journalists interpreted the scene as confirmation by the writers, Lawrence and Jonathan Kasdan, that Solo had indeed shot first in the original film.^[17][18] The decision was a deliberate move by the Kasdans, who wrote in the script, "There can be no question that Han shoots first."^[17][19]

References