We picked up the new Star Wars Trilogy (widescreen, of course) last night. I watched the bonus DVD and thought it was really cool. It contains the documentary “Empire of Dreams” which I skipped last night, but I am pretty sure it has been on TV and I’ve tried to watch it, but I go to bed early and it seems that every time it has been on I’ve wound up sleeping through it. I’m looking forward to seeing the whole thing, but didn’t want to take the time last night because I wanted to watch at least one of the movies.

It also includes a few featurettes that were pretty cool. The featurettes include one on the characters of Star Wars, the making of the light saber, and the Legacy of Star Wars, in which they talk about the effect the movie had on film makers such as James Cameron, Ridley Scott and Peter Jackson.

Finally, after finishing the bonus CD stuff, sans the Empire of Dreams, we watched the first movie. This was the first time that I had seen Star Wars in its rerelease version, with all of the extra footage that they had added. I didn’t like the new scenes. They seemed completely out of place. The scene with Jabba the Hut and Han Solo kind of ruins the mystique of Jabba the Hut to me, since seeing him in Jedi was one of the highlights of the movie (you were always wondering who the hell Jabba was). I wish that they had thought of releasing the DVD with the choice to include these new scenes or to watch the movies as they had been originally released. The new additions just didn’t “feel right”, but would have been interesting if they were optional.

That said though, I am curious as to what else was added to the other two movies. Just because I didn’t like what they added to Episode IV doesn’t mean that I’m not curious about the other footage. That’s why the “option” to view them would have been nice.

Rerelease footage complaints aside though, I’m glad the the movies were finally released on DVD. Its been a long time coming and, quite frankly, should have been done years ago. I like the fact that I can pick up these movies and watch them whenever I feel like it.