Disney Plus is here and represents the biggest challenge to Netflix’s dominance of streaming services yet. It’s gotten off to a strong start with The Mandalorian, promises to bring a raft of exclusive MCU and Star Wars TV shows and features some deep dives into the Mouse House’s extensive back catalogue. One set of films in pride of place is the original Star Wars trilogy. The downside is that the versions available for streaming still include the regrettable CGI additions inserted in the mid-90s, but the upside is that they’re available in pixel-perfect 4K and with a selection of rare deleted scenes for each one.
These scenes aren’t exactly new, but all fans have seen of them to date are bootleg versions found online. On Disney Plus, though, the company has taken the trouble to smarten them up and provide an explanation for why they didn’t make the cut.
The two deleted scenes in A New Hope both come from the Tatooine portion of the movie. The first gives us a window into Luke’s life on Tatooine prior to meeting Obi-Wan, including his friendship with Biggs Darklighter. The second is a rough cut of the cantina sequence, showing an alternate take on what we see in the final movie. The Empire Strikes Back‘s deleted scenes, meanwhile, expand on the burgeoning romance between Luke and Leia on Hoth (in retrospect, ew).
We also get another version of Han and Leia’s kiss aboard the Millennium Falcon and finally, Return of the Jedi shows Commander JerJarrod expressing concern about firing the Death Star on the forest moon of Endor. We also see Luke building his green lightsaber.
It’s a pretty cool package all things considered and a nice encouragement for fans to check out the Original Trilogy again before Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. Hopefully Disney will continue on in his vein and use the service to release some more rare material like this.
