Earlier this yr, we realized that 1977’s Star Wars will likely be returning to theaters in 2027 as a part of an enormous fiftieth anniversary celebration. At the moment, although, we had no concept which model of that film was going to be proven in theaters. There are fairly a couple of, you see, and the arguments over which model is greatest and which needs to be thought-about the “commonplace” are so long as they’re annoying.

Nevertheless, in opposition to appreciable odds, it seems that the model of Star Wars that’s returning to theaters is the authentic, authentic model of the film. Sure, the model of the film that has been softly buried for fairly a couple of years and stays the topic of a lot discourse in a fandom that hasn’t precisely shied away from discourse.

In accordance to StarWars.com, a “newly restored model of the traditional Star Wars (1977) theatrical launch” will “play in theaters for a restricted time” beginning on February 19, 2027. The wording of their replace was pretty obscure, although it actually appeared to counsel that they had been referring to the unique model of the 1977 film somewhat than any of the current remasters of that movie that function fairly a couple of updates and modifications. Properly, io9 has since confirmed with Lucasfilm that the model of the film that will likely be launched in theaters in 2027 is certainly the unique theatrical reduce of the movie.

Once more, Lucasfilm has mentioned that this will likely be a “newly restored model of the traditional Star Wars (1977) theatrical launch,” which implies which you could probably count on there to be some visible and audio upgrades to the unique print. There may be additionally a rumor that the unique film will likely be up to date for a restricted IMAX launch, which might clearly embody fairly a couple of format particular alterations. For now, although, it looks as if the thought is to maintain the core of the unique theatrical model of the movie intact.

Whether or not or not that’s a very good or unhealthy factor is determined by the extent of the updates and your preferences. To play satan’s advocate, lots of the modifications made to Star Wars through the years had been performed to repair continuity errors, technical points, and different such issues. A fast look at a listing of these modifications reveals that a lot of them make sense and actually exist to protect the expertise and intent of the unique film somewhat than the film precisely because it was when it was launched.

However that’s not what we’re speaking about, is it? For a lot of, the enjoyment of this expertise will come from attending to see Star Wars because it was earlier than a few of the extra important and controversial modifications to the movie had been made. No extra further Stormtroopers dealing with off in opposition to Han Solo, no extra CGI lizards awkwardly dropped onto Tatooine, and, although it pains me to nonetheless be saying this in 2025, Han will certainly shoot first on this model of the film.

It’s going to be fascinating to see how this model of the film really performs. Studies from a current, extremely uncommon screening of an authentic print of Star Wars advised that model of the film was in far rougher form than folks keep in mind, although some will definitely argue that the tough edges needs to be a part of this expertise. Maybe this new model of the film will discover a blissful center floor that may enable folks to expertise the largest “lacking” beats of the unique movie with out having to decrease their technical expectations fairly a lot. Then once more, one shouldn’t maintain out an excessive amount of hope for the sudden silencing of the debates within the Star Wars group.

For now, although, let’s all take a second to contemplate that it’ll be good to easily have this feature somewhat than continuously having to ask why some of the culturally important motion pictures ever made has been so rattling onerous to observe in its (roughly) authentic kind for therefore lengthy.