It's not often that you hear George Lucas discussing the intersection of politics and the entertainment industry, but The Hollywood Reporter discussed that and more with The Maker in a new interview posted today. The brief conversation ranged from the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) to the 3D re-release of The Phantom Menace. Here's what Lucas had to say about changes to his movies, specifically the Han-shoots-first moment:
THR: People can get fanatical about the movies ? how does that make you feel? The puppet vs. CGI Yoda ruckus, and the who-shot-first, Han Solo or Greedo furor come to mind.
Lucas: Well, it?s not a religious event. I hate to tell people that. It?s a movie, just a movie. 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 [who seemed to be the one who shot first in the original] 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.