Chances are, unless you’re old enough or a big Star Wars fan, you might not have heard about the famous, or rather infamous, holiday special, which aired back in 1978. Simply titled Star Wars Holiday Special, this made for TV musical/sci-fi film featured the original cast from Episode IV: A New Hope, and focused on Chewbacca and Han Solo, who travel to the former’s home to visit his family on “Life Day.”
The special aired on November 17th, 1978, and was immediately met with a universal negative reception. It’s often considered the worst single piece of media within the franchise, and to date, Lucasfilm has never officially released it outside of its original broadcast.
Thankfully, over the years, it’s been made available online thanks to peer-to-peer file-sharing networks (torrenting) and video platforms such as YouTube – if you’re a glutton for punishment and have nothing better to do for the next hour and change, you can always give it a watch.
While it’s not even considered canon anymore, one writer still tried his darnedest to reference it in an official film. As ComicBook.com reports, Solo: A Star Wars Story scribe Jonathan Kasdan attempted to slip in a few winks and nods into the spinoff, but he wasn’t entirely successful. During one planned scene, Chewbacca would have introduced himself as the “son of Attichitcuk,” who made his debut in the Holiday Special.Â
It’s not entirely sure why these references got cut from the theatrical release, but seeing as how another nod to the ill-fated TV movie has popped up in The Mandalorian, it seems that Lucasfilm isn’t entirely against poking fun at itself. Of course, it’s not clear if we’ll ever see a sequel to the standalone Han Solo prequel, but we certainly wouldn’t mind more references to Star Wars‘ most egregious outing.
