Return of the Jedi 1984 Calendar

I received the 1984 Return of the Jedi wall calendar for my 15th birthday.

Return of the Jedi Premiere

I caught the theatrical release of Return of the Jedi on Friday 27 May 1983, its third day of release.

Here's the 27 May entry from my diary: "Today I saw Return of the Jedi, the third Star Wars movie but the last of the first trilogy. Dave Agulnik, Dave Albert and I left school right at 3:30 and got to Somerset Theatre at 4:10. We waited in line (with about 50 people ahead of us) until 5:30 when we were let in and the show started at 7:00. It was quite amazing to say the least. Special effects were super-superb, especially the size differential between the different ships -- fascinating. The story itself was gruesome, exciting, humorous, and thoroughly entertaining. It looks as if many critics think the to be the best of the series. Today in The Citizen Return of the Jedi was rated ***** which is as high as you can go."

Return of the Jedi Soundtrack

My sole Star Wars soundtrack is from Return of the Jedi. I bought it on 4 July 1983.


During the 80s, Star Wars always seemed to be one step cooler than Star Trek. Cooler FX, cooler toys, etc. Another example is this album which, in addition to an awesome gatefold, also contained a glossy insert four page insert (see below) with fantastic stills from the film.

My Star Wars Adaptation

When I was in grade five (Sept 1977 through June 1978) I tried my hand at an adaptation of Star Wars. Outside of school work, I believe this was the first piece of fiction that I had ever written. I'm unclear as to the extent to which I had been exposed to Star Wars at that point -- I may have seen the film once, I may have read the Lucas novelization and perhaps I had some trading cards, but that would have been about it. This could account for some of the astonishing discrepancies between my version and the original!

Oh, did I mention that I did the artwork as well? Saint Threepio was one of my creative additions. (Actually, I think that is supposed to be a shot from a blaster above his head.) I also love the "My best" tag, which I suppose was literally true since it was also my first.


My Mom asked the secretary at my school to type up the manuscript for me. I suspect the secretary may have originated some of the typos -- it looks like I made a pass through with Liquid Paper and a pen to correct some of the more flagrant offenders. Here are a couple of sample pages, including the spine-tingling climax.


Did I mention that my art skills leave a little to be desired?

After a year or so gap I re-launched my "writing career" in the latter half of 1979. Initially for my own enjoyment, I eventually submitted a few of my stories to Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine in the early 1980s. I didn't make a sale, but I do have fond memories of the experience.

The Star Wars Storybook

The Star Wars Storybook is an adaption of the first Star Wars movie (i.e. Episode 4) for kids, published by Scholastic Books in 1978. It is chock-full of stills from the movie including several that didn't make it into the final cut of the film. I ordered it through my school for $1.50 and it arrived in my eager little hands on 22 February 1979. About thirty years later I brought it out of storage for my son, who has become the resident Star Wars fan in the household.

Kid-friendly robot pals grace the cover.


A sample page showing text and stills.


A great shot of Darth Vader on the back cover.

Star Wars Trading Cards (1977, O-Pee-Chee Series 2)

The O-Pee-Chee Series 2 set of Star Wars cards was the Canadian equivalent of Topps Series 2. It consisted of 11 stickers (numbered 12 to 22) and 66 cards (numbered 67 to 132) .

My Series 2 collection isn't nearly as complete as Series 1. I have a couple of stickers and nineteen cards.



Eleven card backs featured profiles of the Star Wars actors.


Other card backs featured "Movie Facts". The remainder served as puzzle pieces.

70s Newspaper Ads

Round about 1978 I started clipping movie ads from newspapers and pasting them into scrapbooks. It seems that I lost interest after a few months, but I did end up with about two books full of ads for a healthy sprinkling of late 70s movies, including:

Star Wars! These ads are for the summer 1978 re-release. My parents weren't huge movie buffs, and my Mother in particular had an aversion to theaters, so movie night for our family was fairly rare and typically occurred at the drive-in. (Often at the Auto-Sky or Airport drive-in, which you'll see referenced in several of these ads.) Such was the case for Star Wars, which I saw for the first time in 1978 at the drive-in. Not exactly Dolby Digital IMAX, but for this particular 9-year old it didn't take away from the magic one bit.

I also remember seeing Battlestar Galactica at the drive-in. According to Professor Google, the film was released in Canada in July 1978, a few months before the premiere of the television series. The Canadian release was a 125-minute edit of the TV pilot; the full 148-minute pilot aired 17 September 1978 on TV. I started a diary in January 1979, and I see that I also watched the TV series pretty faithfully -- it aired at 8PM Sunday in Ottawa. I also caught the 2nd iteration of the show, re-titled Galactica 1980; for example my 3 February 1980 diary entry indicates that I watched Part 2 of the (3-part) premiere.


I'm fairly sure that I didn't see Close Encounters during its theatrical release, but that didn't stop me from snipping a few ads. The film was released in November 1977, but these ads are clearly from 1978 since they tout its Academy Award wins.


Here's a film that I definitely did not see at the time, and still have not seen to this day. Captain Internet tells me that I'm not missing much!

In addition to those above, I also saved ads from:

• Capricorn One
• The Swarm
• Damien Omen II
• Heaven Can Wait
• Jaws 2
• Coma
• The Cheap Detective
• Grease
• Saturday Night Fever
• The Norseman (starring Lee Majors)
• The Buddy Holly Story
• The Bad News Bears Go To Japan
• International Velvet
• The Goodbye Girl
• Revenge of the Pink Panther
• Corvette Summer (starring Mark Hamill)
• Foul Play
• Eyes of Laura Mars
  

Star Wars Trading Cards (1977, O-Pee-Chee Series 1)

I enjoyed Star Wars when I was a kid and have a few items that I picked up in my younger days. Chief among them is a nearly-complete set of O-Pee-Chee Series 1 Star Wars trading cards. This set is the Canadian counterpart to the Topps Series 1 set which came out in the U.S.A. Both sets were released in 1977.

Professor Google informs me that O-Pee-Chee did not actually manufacture the stickers which were included in Series 1; instead, they simply re-used the Topps stickers as-is. Eleven stickers were included with O-Pee-Chee Series 1, which means I'm missing one.


Series 1 includes 66 cards, 59 of which I managed to collect. These were all bought from individual packages, which means I have quite a few doubles and triples of certain cards as well.


Eleven card backs featured a summary of the storyline.


Several other cards backs featured "movie facts".


The remaining card backs formed two separate puzzles: one a still from within the Millenium Falcon, the other I assume to be an early movie poster concept from Ralph McQuarrie.