Return of the Jedi (1983) follows Luke Skywalker and the rebels taking down Darth Vader, Emperor Palpatine, and The Empire once and for all and the epic conclusion of Luke's journey to restore balance to the force. This is also the epic conclusion to the Star Wars segment of my movie series than spans from #8 to #13. The first seven can be found here. This is the physical bonus to the AL (Adventure Lab) and can only be found after doing the adventure lab. The adventure lab is #8-#12. BYOP. I love Star Wars and Return of the Jedi is my favorite of all of them so this is pretty big. Idk how to fully express my love for this franchise so just take my word for it. Return of the Jedi was originally called Revenge of the Jedi, but George Lucas thought revenge was not the Jedi way, hence revenge of the sith. There's still trailers out there for "Revenge of the Sith" where Luke still had a blue lightsaber. It was switched to green so it could be seen better on film. Jabba's palace was an anamatronic masterpiece with their full skill on display with all the wacky characters. In a take that made it into the film, C3P0's actor Anthony Daniel had a panic attack. The filming was hidden from the outside world under the name "Blue Harvest" After the first act, Luke goes back to Dagobah to see Yoda, and he’s there when Yoda dies. Yoda wasn’t in the script originally but Lucas thought it was best to include him as Yoda could be used to remove any doubt that Vader was Luke’s dad by having Luke ask him if it was true. Luke and Leia are revealed as brother and sister in Return of the Jedi, but that wasn’t always the case. At one point, Lucas was planning a sequel trilogy to Star Wars where Luke’s long-lost sister would be a major character. He was exhausted by this point, though, so decided he wanted to tie everything up. It's fairly well know that Harrison Ford wanted Han Solo to die in The Empire Strikes Back, but he actually tried the same thing this time around, and was backed. Lucas overrode that idea though. Some of the film’s most striking shots are the point of view shots from the Speeder Bikes as they’re racing through the forest. ILM pulled this off by having a camera operator with a Steadicam walk through the forest at normal speed with the camera filming at about 5 miles per hour. And the camera was set to film one frame per second. Then, when the footage was played back at the normal 24 frames per second, it looked like they were moving at about 100 miles per hour through the trees. The name ‘Ewok’ came from a Native American tribe called the Miwok (it wasn’t an anagram of ‘Wookie’, as is often reported). The Miwok were indigenous to Northern California, which is where the Endor scenes were filmed. Also, Endor appeared in the Bible. The Witch of Endor was used by King Saul to channel a dead prophet and defeat the Philistines. The Endor scenes were filmed in Crescent City in California, and the actors playing the Ewoks had to permanently wear hot, heavy suits, and hated the location. The production assistant called Ian Bryce turned up one day to find a note from the Ewok actors saying they’d had enough and were going to the airport. He raced to his car and was about to leave for the airport when a bus turned up and all the Ewoks climbed off wearing t-shirts saying “Revenge of the Ewoks” – it had all been a joke. Warwick Davis is Wicket in the film and he said he auditioned after his grandmother heard a casting call advert on London Radio. Kenny Baker (the man inside R2-D2) was supposed to play Wicket but, on the day they were due to film his scenes, Baker had food poisoning. So they got Warwick Davis to play Wicket instead. Kenny Baker ended up playing Paploo, the Ewok who pinches a Speeder Bike. Lucas’ original idea for Endor was that it wouldn’t be populated by Ewoks, it would be populated by Wookies. And the Wookies would fight alongside the rebels to defeat the Empire. It was, apparently, changed as Lucas saw more profitability in Ewoks merchandise. Lucas was concerned about script leaks so had some fake screenplays created for the cast members he didn’t trust as much. Some of the fake scripts did end up getting leaked to the press. There was one where the last hope Yoda talks about in The Empire Strikes Back turned out to not be Leia, but Lando Calrissian. The script did go through some changes too. The first idea for the final battle was that it would take place on the Imperial home world called Had Abbadon. Ralph McQuarrie did some design concepts but the idea was scrapped for a bigger Death Star. Also, originally, the plan was that Obi-Wan would turn from being a force ghost and come back to life. John Williams returned to write the score for Return of the Jedi, but this was the first time he had a collaborator on a Star Wars film. It was his son, Joseph Williams. Joseph wrote the lyrics to the Ewok song – ‘Yub Nub’ – we hear at the end of the film. And, Joseph Williams had a musical career of his own. He was the lead singer in rock band Toto. He didn’t sing Africa, though, unfortunately. Wicket, the first ewok we see, is played by an 11 year old. One of the most famous lines in the movie comes from Admiral Ackbar. During the attack on the Death Star, the rebels find out they’ve been ambushed and Ackbar shouts, “It’s A Trap!” In the script the line was actually, “It’s A Trick” It was changed in post-production The briefing to the Death Star attack is delivered by Mon Mothma, and in that scene, we see a few women rebel pilots. We don’t see much more of them in the film but scenes were shot with them. There was a French actress called Vivienne Chandler who had over a page of dialogue in the script. It was filmed but she was removed from the final cut completely. Reportedly, the filmmakers though the audience wouldn’t like to see women killed in battle. Ben Kingsley, David Suchet and Lindsay Anderson were all considered by Lucas to play the Emperor. And Alan Webb was the first person cast but he had to pull out due to ill health. Ian McDiarmid was then cast to just be the physical performance of the Emperor, the idea being that his dialogue would be dubbed over. Apparently though, Spielberg heard McDiarmid’s voice as the Emperor and said to Lucas, “He sounds perfect, you’ve got to go with him.” Apparently, McDiarmid used an old Japanese acting technique used to give your voice a guttural sound. And that’s where the Emperor’s voice came from. As an aside, when Darth Vader actor David Prowse read the script, he was excited because he thought we’d finally get to see his face when Luke takes Vader’s helmet off. However, Lucas told him he was planning to get an older actor in. Lucas originally thought about somebody well known like Laurence Olivier or John Gielgud but eventually went for Sebastian Shaw, who was an RSC veteran. George Lucas often paves over his original films to make them look better. Return of the Jedi is no different. The version you probably watch is updated and not the original that premiered in theaters in 1983. We get a happy ending of course with the death of the Emperor and destruction of the Death Star but it was going to be very different. Lawrence Kasdan said he pitched Lucas an idea where, after Luke takes Vader’s mask off and Vader dies, Luke puts the mask on and says, in Vader’s voice, “Now I am Vader.” And according to Gary Kurtz, the original treatment ended with Luke going off alone and wandering into seclusion in the Tatooine desert. I like happy ending way more than bad endings, so that would've sucked. Also sorry I didn't give my opinions on these fun facts thoughout but I didn't want this description to be any more Sarlacc sized as is. Good luck as this is hard and Star Wars as a whole has taken me a long time to set up! Thanks and congrats to SquatchBall for FTF!