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00:00 Each lightsaber stroke and screaming tie flyby, every line of dialogue and swell of John Williams'
00:06 score is etched into the minds of generations of devoted Star Wars fans. However, the Star Wars
00:11 the world knows today could so easily have been very, very different as it goes. In fact, in some
00:17 places George Lucas' initial treatments for the series show little relation to what ended up on
00:22 screen down the road. So I am Gareth from What Culture Star Wars, and here are 10 unused Star
00:27 Wars scenes that would have changed everything. Orson Krennic is one of the finest villains the
00:36 whole Star Wars series has to offer, an odious rear echelon bureaucrat who serves as Rogue One's
00:42 antagonist. His end is a fitting one too, when his is obliterated along with a sizable chunk of the
00:48 planet Scarif in a Death Star test-firing/scorched earth operation, authorised by Grand Moff Tarkin.
00:54 But that wasn't the original fate the filmmakers had in mind for director Krennic. In an unused
00:59 scene Krennic escaped the surface of Scarif and returned to the Death Star only to encounter
01:04 Darth Vader, who promptly throttled him with the power of the Force, for failing so spectacularly
01:09 to defend the secrets of the Empire's superweapon. In the end it was decided Krennic's escape from
01:14 the fiery apocalypse on Scarif was a bit unlikely, and robbed him of the ironic death via the
01:19 lasery Armageddon of the weapon he'd oversaw. But then, sadly, it also robbed the audience of another
01:24 iconic Vader moment. The Battle of Hoth is one of the finest set pieces you'll find in the entire
01:34 series, with its frantic surface battle and panicky claustrophobic scenes below ground as
01:39 the Rebels evacuate the icy tunnel system. The first iterations of the sequence, however,
01:43 added a whole subplot about a pack of Wampas held captive by the Rebels. During the build-up to the
01:48 battle they are seen stalking the Rebel soldiers, and C-3PO cheekily removes a warning sign so the
01:54 Imperial troopers blunder into the Wampa's holding pen. An Imperial snowtrooper walks obliviously
01:59 into the room and is then hilariously devoured offscreen to the bemusement of all, including a
02:04 certain Darth Vader. The scenes were justifiably cut for pacing, because they messed with the
02:09 urgency of the Imperial attack. The Wampa design in general is also arguably one of Star Wars'
02:14 least inspiring, being nothing more than a big angry yeti, and the costumes were particularly
02:19 ridiculous. With the scenes included, Hoth would have been a far less successful sequence, and the
02:24 Wampas would have likely attained further notoriety in some corners as one of the original trilogy's
02:29 worst ideas. Return of the Jedi features the character Grand Moff Jajerad, the hapless Death
02:39 Star commander whose primary purpose is to be utterly terrified by the knowledge the Emperor
02:43 is coming to the battle station to cast a jaundiced evil eye over his progress.
02:47 The original cuts of the movie featured an expanded role for Jajerad,
02:51 including the Emperor ordering him to blow up Endor when the Death Star II's shields go down.
02:56 The most significant loss, however, was a scene where he encounters Darth Vader for a second time.
03:01 Evidently having grown a bit of a spine since the opening scene, Jajerad refuses Darth Vader leave
03:06 to enter the Emperor's throne room. Vader responds with his customary force choke, almost killing
03:11 Jajerad until he explains the Emperor himself gave the order. The scene completely alters the power
03:16 dynamic of the Empire. Darth Vader is a commanding, unquestioned force in Return of the Jedi,
03:22 answering only to the Emperor. Jajerad's obstruction of Vader suggests the Imperial
03:26 officers are on par with Vader, a situation much more in keeping with what we saw of the
03:31 Death Star's commanders in A New Hope. Senator Amidala and the various assassination
03:40 attempts against her kick off the plot of Attack of the Clones. The reasons for wanting to kill her
03:45 are made a lot clearer in a deleted scene, however, where she argues in the Senate against
03:49 the proposal for a Grand Army of the Republic. Later revealed to be the clone army of the title,
03:54 Amidala rails against the use of violence against the separatist movement instead of diplomacy,
03:58 and argues in favour of democracy and freedom. The scene was probably again cut for pacing reasons
04:04 and because there was too much political nonsense in the prequels anyway, but it does help confirm
04:08 just what is going on during the overcomplicated sequence of events surrounding Palpatine's rise
04:13 to power. It also emphasises the issue of why nobody honestly suspected Palpatine as the origin
04:18 of the assassination attempts, since the scene confirms Amidala as a vocal opponent of Palpatine's
04:23 policies. A rather charming sequence cut from the Battle of Maz's Castle in The Force Awakens
04:33 was presumably once more snipped for pacing reasons, which is a bit of a shame because it
04:37 would have come equipped with everyone's favourite smuggler back to his quick thinking best.
04:41 Han, Finn and Maz are confronted by dastardly stormtroopers in the basements of Maz's Castle,
04:46 and Han, in classic lovable rogue form, tries to talk his way out of it. He even refers to Finn's
04:51 stormtrooper boots, filling in a missing plot point about how Han was able to guess Finn's
04:56 ex-stormtrooper origins. We see both Han's winning princess stealing smirk and his equally adorable
05:01 flummoxness when things inevitably go wrong. Sadly it all ended on the digital cutting room
05:06 floor though, so we're left to merely imagine how the veteran space dog Han had kept up with
05:10 his fast talking ways of old. Remember when Luke whinged about going to Tosche's station to pick
05:18 up some power converters? The station was the setting for a scene that kicked off an entire
05:22 deleted subplot in A New Hope. Luke encounters his friend Biggs Darklighter, who is joining the same
05:28 Imperial Flight Academy Luke envisages as his way off the dusty nowhere of Tatooine. Luke then
05:33 confides in Biggs that he intends to jump ship and join the Rebellion. Not only does this set up a
05:38 link between Luke and Biggs later on, but it also helps explain one of A New Hope's most baffling
05:42 gaps - how a teenage farm boy became a fighter pilot with apparently zero training. Biggs
05:48 emphasises here how Luke is the best bush pilot around, confirming the vague hints of Luke's
05:53 flying skills in the film's final cut. The fact the scene is just two guys talking for a couple
05:57 of minutes explains why it was cut out of an already sometimes sedate first portion of A New
06:02 Hope, but it does help fill in some notable blanks all the same.
06:05 The second slice of the Biggs subplot sees Luke encountering his old friend at Yavin 4,
06:13 prior to the Biggs showdown against the Death Star. It's a short scene that nevertheless
06:17 confirms Biggs joined the Rebel Alliance as he promised, and explains why he's given a featured
06:22 part in the final trench run assault. Perhaps most crucially, another pilot interrupts the
06:26 boy's love-in to say he fought with Luke's father, who was a great man. Of course, this little
06:31 nugget would have thrown a massive spanner in the works of the whole "no, I am your father" thing
06:36 in one movie's time, and suggests strongly that Luke and Vader's familial connection wasn't actually
06:41 on George Lucas' radar when he was crafting A New Hope. As minor as this scene is, it really could
06:46 have changed everything, by potentially forcing the filmmakers to come up with a new twist for
06:50 the final throwdown at Bespin, and changing the entire course of the movie series, Vader's
06:55 character and Luke's destiny.
06:58 3. Revenge of the Sith's Elevator Sequence
07:00 Revenge of the Sith has its share of cheesy, peculiar and illogical moments,
07:05 but it would have had a hell of a lot more if this bonkers sequence had been included.
07:09 The scenes in question focus on Anakin and Obi-Wan fighting, bumbling and wisecracking
07:14 their way through General Grievous' ship, and an eventual confrontation with the four-armed
07:18 asthmatic cyborg. Firstly, there's the all-round absurdity, which sees the two Jedi demonstrate
07:23 an ability to perfectly mimic R2-D2's blooping, beeping, machine-speak - a skill that makes no
07:29 sense and has never been referred to before. Also, on top of some more comedy mugging where they
07:33 ultimately get cornered by an elevator full of battle droids, the duo witness Grievous executing
07:38 Shark T, a Jedi we've barely seen before and have no reason to care about. The two then escape that
07:44 grievous encounter after the sequence's nadir, involving a bout of moustache-twiddling sign
07:48 language, to coordinate them running through the deck and fleeing. It's the absolute worst
07:53 of the prequel's non-comedy and makes the pair look like sophomoric idiots.
07:57 2. The Rebellion is Founded
08:00 The prequel series boasts an awful lot of politics, but you knew that already. And if
08:05 the original plotline had been followed, it would have included a whole mess more. Yay!
08:09 A whole subplot was cut out, involving Senator Amidala, Bail Organa and a young
08:14 Mon Mothma concocting an opposition to Palpatine's increasingly oppressive policies.
08:19 It's understandable why the scenes themselves ended up in the bin. They consist of characters
08:23 sitting around talking for a bit, while Amidala exhibits increasingly outlandish hairstyles.
08:28 Their absence, however, leaves out an important piece of Star Wars history never addressed
08:32 openly - the foundation of the rebellion that emerged to oppose Palpatine's new empire.
08:37 The scenes imply that Mon Mothma, Bail Organa and the other assorted figures founded the rebellion,
08:42 turning their political conspiracy into a military insurgency. If the cut scenes had
08:46 been a whole lot more, you know, interesting, that element of Star Wars might have survived intact,
08:51 too.
08:52 1. The Opening to Return of the Jedi
08:55 After its opening scene of Vader arriving at the Death Star II, Return of the Jedi kicks
09:00 off with R2-D2 and C-3PO trundling and waddling, respectively, towards the gates of Jabba's palace
09:06 on Tatooine. They proceed to bumble their way towards an audience with the malevolent Mafia
09:10 slug. In original cuts of the movie, though, this sequence was preceded by shots of Luke Skywalker
09:15 preparing for his mission to rescue Han and Chewie by building a new lightsaber to replace the one
09:20 he lost at Bespin, along with the Hand holding it. As he broods in a cave near the palace,
09:25 Darth Vader tries to contact him with the Force and convince him to join in overthrowing the
09:29 Emperor. The scene would have helped explain what Luke's been up to since Bespin, and shown him in
09:34 an even darker mode, hooded and grim. It also reiterates Vader's motivation to make Luke into
09:40 his apprentice, hinted at during his previous confrontation with Luke. The scene was fully
09:44 filmed but was still left out of the final cut, though.
09:48 And that's our list of any other unused Star Wars scenes that would have changed everything.
09:51 Let us know all about them in the comments section right down below and do not forget to like,
09:55 share and click on that subscribe button while you're at it. I've been Gareth from
09:58 War Culture Star Wars, may the Force be with you as always, thanks a lot for watching this
10:02 video today and hopefully I'll see you very, very soon. Bye!