Transcript

Selects: Star Wars Holiday Spectacular | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

From Stuff You Should Know · Episode page · Watch on YouTube

· 54 min · 10,541 words · 300 timestamped sections

This is the full, timestamped transcript of "Selects: Star Wars Holiday Spectacular | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW", an episode of Stuff You Should Know published December 15, 2025 (54 min, about 10,541 words). It mentions 281 people, works and ideas, including Star Wars, Star Wars Holiday Special, Star Wars Holiday Special, Star Wars Holiday Special, Charles W. Chuck Bryant.

What this episode is about

The main topic centers around the Star Wars Holiday Special, with a humorous discussion about its peculiar features and legacy. The hosts also reflect on their excitement for the Star Wars franchise, share their holiday wishes, and acknowledge the unique celebration of Life Day.

Key takeaways

  • Star Wars Holiday Special: As captivating as a train wreck, mesmerizing in its absurdity.
  • Watching the Special feels like surviving a TV disaster—proof rich people make history unwatchably watchable.
  • Life Day: The Wookiee Christmas that's part absurd celebration, part surprisingly deep reflection.
  • Pay homage to the Special on YouTube; it's a timeless relic from a VCR-rich 1978.
  • An episode so bad it's mythical; the Star Wars Holiday Special redefines TV infamy.

Who speaks in this episode?

What is discussed, and when

  1. – 5:00: Star Wars, Star Wars, Star Wars, Star Wars Holiday Special
  2. – 10:00: Star Wars, Star Wars, Star Wars, George Lucas
  3. – 15:00: George Lucas, Wookie, Variety Show, Variety show
  4. – 20:00: Star Wars, Star Wars, Star Wars, Harrison Ford
  5. – 25:00: Chewbacca, Wookie, Chewbacca, Han Solo
  6. – 30:00: Variety Show, Variety show, George Lucas, Life Day
  7. – 35:00: Chewbacca, Chewbacca, The Empire, Chester A. Arthur
  8. – 40:00: Boba Fett, Star Wars, Chewbacca, George Lucas
  9. – 45:00: Han Solo, Star Wars, Star Wars Holiday Special, Star Wars Holiday Special
  10. – 50:00: Star Wars, Star Wars, Star Wars, Chewbacca
  11. – 54:25: Star Wars, Star Wars, Star Wars, San Diego

Notable quotes from "Selects: Star Wars Holiday Spectacular | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW"

  • Hey guys, it's that time again. Time to kick off the holidays in style with our traditional playing of our episode on the Star Wars Holiday Special. If you've never seen the actual special, I envy.
    about Star Wars Holiday Special · at
  • And then there's the Star Wars Holiday Special was the worst thing on television ever by someone we kind of know, Alex Pastern Neck of from Motherboard.
    about Star Wars Holiday Special · at
  • This is like basically swashbuckling on the screen, but in a galaxy far away, Star Wars just changed everything and it came on just like a hammer.
    about Star Wars · at
  • Those are the words that will haunt George Lucas to his grave. Yeah. So, Lucas said, Here's my idea. I want it to be based, on Wookies, and I want it to take place on their home planet of, Kazuk or Wookie Planet C.
    about Kazuk · at
  • Kazuk had not made the cut. even prior to this, apparently for a new hope, George Lucas had whipped up a 40page what's known as the Wookie Bible.
    about George Lucas · at
  • So, I feel like right about here, Jerry should insert a needle coming off of a record sound effect.
    about Jerry Jerome Roland · at
  • He also plays there's this one weird bit where Chewbacca's son tries to figure out a way to trick the stormtroopers. the empire had come and kind of because of the blockade raided the house and other properties.
    about Chewbacca · at
  • This holiday is yours. But we all share with you the hope that this day brings us closer to freedom and to harmony and to peace. No matter how different we appear, we're all the same in our.
    about Life Day · at

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

  • Charles W. Chuck Bryant — Person · Co-host · 2 mentions · first at
    Co-host of Stuff You Should Know; banters with Josh, adds commentary, and helps structure the recap of the Holiday Special.
    Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with Charles W. Chuckers Bryant and Jerry Jerome Roland.
  • Chewbacca — Person · Central character · 17 mentions · first at
    The Wookiee character whose journey home for Life Day forms the plot of the Holiday Special.
  • George Lucas — Person · Key figure · 16 mentions · first at
    Creator of Star Wars, involved in the Holiday Special's conception.
  • Jerry Jerome Roland — Person · 2 mentions · first at
  • Charles W. Chuckers Bryant — Person · Co-host · 1 mention · first at
    One of the hosts of the Stuff You Should Know podcast.
    Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with Charles W. Chuckers Bryant and Jerry Jerome Roland.
  • Josh Malcolm Clark — Person · Co-host · 1 mention · first at
    One of the hosts of the Stuff You Should Know podcast.
    Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with Charles W. Chuckers Bryant and Jerry Jerome Roland.
  • Jerry Jerome Roland — Person · 1 mention · first at
    Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with Charles W. Chuckers Bryant and Jerry Jerome Roland.
  • Mark Hamill — Person · Actor · 4 mentions · first at
    Played Luke Skywalker in the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    We should point out that Mark Hamill and Harrison Ford and Carrie Fischer Sure.
  • Carrie Fischer — Person · Actor · 4 mentions · first at
    Played Princess Leia in the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    The first three, right? But did not didn't. And apparently Carrie Fischer told Lucas that if you want me to do DVD extras, commentary.
  • Harrison Ford — Person · Actor · 4 mentions · first at
    Played Han Solo in the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    And you see Harrison Ford as if he's flying the Millennium Falcon, and you can just hear the guy off screen going, Now look at the camera and just give a nod. Just look at the camera and.
  • Detective Inspector Tony Carney — Person · Referenced performer / major Holiday Special role · 1 mention · first at
    Highlighted as a key Holiday Special performer with many lines, playing the trader who interacts with Chewbacca's family and the Empire.
    Probably the star of the whole thing.
  • Jerry Jerome Roland — Person · Producer / off-mic contributor (named in intro) · 3 mentions · first at
    Named alongside the hosts; referenced as someone who would insert sound effects and as a participant in the show’s production.
    Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with Charles W. Chuckers Bryant and Jerry Jerome Roland.
  • Jerry Jerome Roland — Person · Co-host / producer presence in conversation · 3 mentions · first at
    Introduced alongside the hosts; referenced as someone who would insert sound effects and as part of the show’s on-mic team for this episode.
    So, I feel like right about here, Jerry should insert a needle coming off of a record sound effect.
  • Bruce Valanche — Person · Writer · 3 mentions · first at
    Writer for the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    Bruce Valanche calls it her Joanie Mitchell period.
  • Lenny Rips — Person · Writer · 2 mentions · first at
    Writer for the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    The business. Yeah, like there was a quote from I think Lenny Rips who was saying like we had literally a dream team, a variety show dream team and everybody was good, but there were probably no bad welders on the Titanic.
  • Jerry Roland — Person · Producer / engineer (on-episode credit) · 2 mentions · first at
    Named in the opening as part of the show team; referenced as the person who would insert sound effects and as a behind-the-scenes contributor.
    So, I feel like right about here, Jerry should insert a needle coming off of a record sound effect.
  • Jerry Roland — Person · Producer (referenced on-mic) · 2 mentions · first at
    Named alongside the hosts; referenced as someone who could insert sound effects/production elements.
    Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with Charles W. Chuckers Bryant and Jerry Jerome Roland.
  • Harvey Corman — Person · Actor · 4 mentions · first at
    Featured in multiple roles in the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    Apparently, he too was like the only one on set that was bringing levity. He was joking around and kind of kept spirits up. Good for him.
  • Art Carney — Person · Actor · 4 mentions · first at
    Featured in the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    They do. to kill Mortime while the Imperial Guard is ransacking their house. Art Carney apparently I guess is trying to get one of the Imperial Guard, the leader, I think, or one of the leaders who looks like somebody from Space.
  • Jerry Jerome Roland — Person · Producer/engineer (on-mic mention) · 3 mentions · first at
    Named in the intro and referenced as the person who would insert sound effects; functions as the show’s production support in this episode’s framing.
    So, I feel like right about here, Jerry should insert a needle coming off of a record sound effect.
  • Boba Fett — Person · Character · 3 mentions · first at
    Bounty hunter character who made his first appearance in the animated segment of the Holiday Special.
    And it introduces Boba Fett. It's the first time Boba Fett ever makes an appearance in the Star Wars universe.
  • Jerry Roland — Person · Producer (introduced on-mic) · 2 mentions · first at
    Named alongside the hosts at the top of the episode; functions as the show’s producer/engineer presence (e.g., inserting sounds).
    Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with Charles W. Chuckers Bryant and Jerry Jerome Roland.
  • Jerry Roland — Person · Co-host · 2 mentions · first at
    One of the hosts of the Stuff You Should Know podcast.
    Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with Charles W. Chuckers Bryant and Jerry Jerome Roland.
  • Chester A. Arthur — Person · Actor · 2 mentions · first at
    Played the owner of the Mos Eisley cantina in the special; performed a musical number.
    Did we mention Be Arthur was in it?
  • Diane Carroll — Person · Referenced performer (guest star in the Holiday Special) · 2 mentions · first at
    Mentioned as appearing in a controversial VR/softcore-style segment in the Holiday Special, performing for Chewbacca’s father (Itchy).
    Apparently, the writers who were interviewed for this said that was totally the intent. They were trying to get what amounted to softcore porn that would pass the sensors.
  • Jefferson Starship — Person · Musical performer · 2 mentions · first at
    Band that performed a musical number in the special, which was presented as a hologram.
    It's okay. Here's five minutes of Jefferson Starship performing this song.
  • Frank Dejakamo — Person · Author · 1 mention · first at
    Wrote the Vanity Fair article about the Star Wars Holiday Special.
  • Alex Pastern Neck — Person · Author · 1 mention · first at
    Wrote the Motherboard article about the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    And then there's the Star Wars Holiday Special was the worst thing on television ever by someone we kind of know, Alex Pastern Neck of from Motherboard.
  • Alex Pasternack — Person · Referenced journalist / source author · 1 mention · first at
    Credited as author of a Motherboard (Vice) article used as a research source; hosts mention knowing him professionally.
    Holiday Special was the worst thing on television ever by someone we kind of know, Alex Pastern Neck of from Motherboard.
  • David Akcoma — Person · Director · 1 mention · first at
    Initial director of the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    The guy they hired to direct it initially was a dude named David Akcoma and he had made his name for Welcome to the Fillmore East. It was a concert documentary with Van Mortis, Van Morrison and the Birds in 1971. And.
  • Nathan Rabin — Person · Author · 1 mention · first at
    Wrote a review of the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    So Chuck, the whole thing finally does end. And actually, there's a guy his name's Nathan Rabin. He writes over at the AV Club. He had a great quote. He basically said that one…
  • Steve Binder — Person · Director · 1 mention · first at
    Replacement director for the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    So along the way the director, original director quit. a new director Steve Binder was hired to finish the job and bring it in. and he did over the original $1 million budget, of.
  • Patty Maloney — Person · Actor · 1 mention · first at
    Played Lumpy in the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    Something about it. And I figured out I think the thing that I like the most about it is Lumpy Chewbacca's son. Yeah.
  • Bill Corbett — Person · Commentator · 1 mention · first at
    Provided audio commentary for the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    It is. And in 2007, Rift Tracks, the great, Mystery Science Theater 3000 guys, Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett, and Kevin Murphy, provided audio commentary for the full version of the special.
  • Donald C. Murphy — Person · Commentator · 1 mention · first at
    Provided audio commentary for the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    It is. And in 2007, Rift Tracks, the great, Mystery Science Theater 3000 guys, Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett, and Kevin Murphy, provided audio commentary for the full version of the special.
  • Laura Anne Nelson — Person · Commentator · 1 mention · first at
    Provided audio commentary for the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    It is. And in 2007, Rift Tracks, the great, Mystery Science Theater 3000 guys, Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett, and Kevin Murphy, provided audio commentary for the full version of the special.
  • Jerry Jerome Roland — Person · Producer (referenced on-mic) · 3 mentions · first at
    Named in the intro as part of the show’s production team; referenced for inserting sound effects and noticing audio cues.
    So, I feel like right about here, Jerry should insert a needle coming off of a record sound effect.
  • Young Carol (Yan Carol) — Person · Actor · 2 mentions · first at
    Featured in the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    Instead. It's just it's just it's just gross. It's really gross. Diane Carol, who singer, yes, she is a Vegas staple, shows up and starts basically tanalyzing Grandpa Itchy, who again, this is Chewbacca's elderly.
  • Bill Murray — Person · Referenced pop-culture figure · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as evidence of Star Wars’ cultural saturation via his lounge-singer Star Wars bit/song.
    Yeah. It was everywhere. And if you just listen to the lyrics of it, he's really it's just Bill Murray singing about how much Star Wars is awesome. Yeah. Right. Yeah.
  • Dwight Himeion — Person · Referenced TV producer (CBS) · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned alongside Gary Smith as a CBS producer involved in making the Holiday Special happen.
    That's right. producers Gary Smith and Dwight Himeion were working over at CBS and they say this is a great way to keep the spirit alive while you're making your other movie,.

Books & papers

  • Star Wars Holiday Special — Book · Core topic · 6 mentions · first at
    The main subject of the episode, a notorious television special in the Star Wars franchise.
    Hey guys, it's that time again. Time to kick off the holidays in style with our traditional playing of our episode on the Star Wars Holiday Special. If you've never seen the actual special, I envy.
  • Wookie Bible — Book · Referenced work · 2 mentions · first at
    Background material for the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    Kazuk had not made the cut. even prior to this, apparently for a new hope, George Lucas had whipped up a 40page what's known as the Wookie Bible.
  • Vanity Fair — Book · Referenced work · 4 mentions · first at
    A magazine that published an article about the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    There's great a great article in Vanity Fair called The Han Solo Comedy Hour exclamation point. Yes.
  • How Star Wars Conquered the Universe — Book · Referenced work · 1 mention · first at
    Book with a chapter about the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    There's a book called How Star Wars Conquered the Universe that has a very interesting chapter about this. That's where we found it asserted that George Lucas never said that he would smash.
  • The Han Solo Comedy Hour — Book · Referenced work · 2 mentions · first at
    Article about the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    There's great a great article in Vanity Fair called The Han Solo Comedy Hour exclamation point. Yes.
  • Voinich manuscript — Book · Referenced work · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned in listener mail.
    Hey guys, just finished listening to the Voinich manuscript podcast. Found it super interesting, especially the theories on its definition or origin.
  • The Empire Strikes Back — Book · 1 mention

Companies & orgs

  • iHeart Radio — Company · Producer · 2 mentions · first at
    Production company behind the Stuff You Should Know podcast.
    Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeart Radio.
  • CBS — Company · Broadcaster · 62 mentions
    Network that originally aired the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    Interview. He said the special from 1978 really didn't have much to do with us. that part is true. I can't remember what network it was even on, but it was a thing that they did.
  • YouTube — Company · Platform · 4 mentions · first at
    Platform where the Star Wars Holiday Special can be viewed.
    Yeah. There's a great over the years there have been many segments of it on YouTube from badly dubbed VHS tapes.
  • Vanity Fair — Company · Publisher · 4 mentions · first at
    Published an article about the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    There's great a great article in Vanity Fair called The Han Solo Comedy Hour exclamation point. Yes.
  • SYSK — Company · Host · 1 mention · first at
    The podcast production company hosting the episode discussing the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeart Radio.
  • WHIO — Company · Broadcaster · 1 mention · first at
    TV station that provided a high-quality version of the Star Wars Holiday Special.
  • Motherboard — Company · Publisher · 1 mention · first at
    Published an article about the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    Television ever by someone we kind of know, Alex Pastern Neck of from Motherboard.
  • AV Club — Company · 1 mention · first at
    So Chuck, the whole thing finally does end. And actually, there's a guy his name's Nathan Rabin. He writes over at the AV Club. He had a great quote. He basically said that one…
  • Starlo — Company · 1 mention · first at
    They definitely tried. and George Lucas is totally full of it because in 1987 he told Starlo magazine that the Christmas special would be out on video cassette very soon.
  • Star Wars Holiday Special.com — Company · Resource · 1 mention · first at
    Website dedicated to the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    And there's also an entire website dedicated to it. Star Wars holiday special.com.
  • Jefferson Starship — Company · Featured artist · 2 mentions · first at
    A musical group featured in the Holiday Special with a performance segment.
    And they decide that they're going to play Light the Sky on Fire, which apparently is about UFOs.
  • Vice — Company · Parent company · 1 mention · first at
    Media company that owns Motherboard, which published an article about the Holiday Special.
    Yeah. Which is not Wired, it's Vice.
  • Star Wars Corporation — Company · Historical entity · 1 mention · first at
    Early corporate entity associated with Star Wars.
    And the reason that they decided that there should be musical numbers is because the people who sold George Lucas and at the time it was Star the Star Wars Corporation was what it was called.
  • iHeartRadio — Company · 4 mentions
  • Stuff You Should Know — Company · 3 mentions · first at
    Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeart Radio.
  • Hee Haw — Company · 3 mentions
  • Shields and Yarnell — Company · 3 mentions
  • The Carol Burnett Show — Company · 3 mentions
  • GM (General Motors) — Company · 2 mentions
  • HowStuffWorks — Company · 2 mentions
  • Nielsen ratings — Company · 2 mentions
  • RiffTrax — Company · 2 mentions
  • Vice — Company · 2 mentions
  • Channel 7 — Company · 1 mention · first at
  • Robot Chicken — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Clearly, because he did appear on Robot Chicken in, I think, 2005 on the therapist's couch talking about how much he hated the special.
  • Hollywood Squares — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Behind it. Bruce Valanche, famous TV writer. You probably seen him on Hollywood Squares.
  • Solid Gold — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Solid Gold had yet to come on and take up the mantel.
  • CMA Awards — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Oh, because of that dude, the guy who won all the CMA awards. I don't know.
  • Fantasy Island — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Because this is the time when Fantasy Island had just started. Mor and Mindy was about to change things.
  • Charlie's Angels — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Charlie's Angels was getting huge. It basically television as we knew it from 1980 to whenever the real world came along.
  • The Real World — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Charlie's Angels was getting huge. It basically television as we knew it from 1980 to whenever the real world came along.
  • USC Film School — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Concert documentary with Van Mortis, Van Morrison and the Birds in 1971. And he actually was at USC film school the same time as Lucas, even though they didn't know each other.…
  • Golden Girls — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Be Arthur is the owner. Be Arthur of the Golden Girls. But in this case, Be Arthur of Ma because as one of the people who wrote one of the articles we based this on points out, she's just basically playing Ma as the owner of the.
  • The Honeymooners — Company · 1 mention · first at
  • He-Man — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Yeah. And it's it's very much reminiscent of like the cartoon style of the day, like a He-Man or something for sure. Even it's even a little more artsy than that.
  • AV Club — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Does end. And actually, there's a guy his name's Nathan Rabin. He writes over at the AV Club. He had a great quote. He basically said that one of the great redeeming values of this special is that it does eventually end.
  • Olan Mills — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Being celebrated which is celebrated by lots of Wookies assembling in what looks like a giant Olan Mills portrait.
  • Mystery Science Theater 3000 — Company · 1 mention · first at
    It is. And in 2007, Rift Tracks, the great, Mystery Science Theater 3000 guys, Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett, and Kevin Murphy, provided audio commentary for the full version of the special.
  • Stuff You Missed in History Class — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Sort of fun articles about the Death Star and lightsabers, videos with Holly Fry from stuff you missed in history class.
  • Donny & Marie — Company · 1 mention

Products & tech

  • Star Wars Holiday Special — Product · Core topic · 7 mentions · first at
    Main focus of the podcast episode, discussed in depth as a notorious piece of Star Wars media.
  • Star Wars — Product · Referenced work · 27 mentions · first at
    The franchise that the Holiday Special is a part of, providing context for the discussion.
    This is like basically swashbuckling on the screen, but in a galaxy far away, Star Wars just changed everything and it came on just like a hammer.
  • Empire Strikes Back — Product · Referenced work · 4 mentions · first at
    Mentioned as a sequel to Star Wars that was in development during the creation of the Holiday Special.
    The reason why it was lowhanging fruit was because they had just established the different scenes that would make the cut for Empire Strikes Back. Yeah. And what how did you pronounce it again?
  • Athletic Greens — Product · 2 mentions
  • DVD — Product · 2 mentions
    The first three, right? But did not didn't. And apparently Carrie Fischer told Lucas that if you want me to do DVD extras, commentary.
  • VCR — Product · 2 mentions
    It looks like someone painted something in on the wall and they just like put a camera in front of it pretty much.
  • Millennium Falcon — Product · 1 mention · first at
    And you see Harrison Ford as if he's flying the Millennium Falcon, and you can just hear the guy off screen going, Now look at the camera and just give a nod. Just look at the camera and.
  • AirPods — Product · 1 mention
  • All-American Road Show — Product · 1 mention
  • Allbirds — Product · 1 mention
  • Allstate — Product · 1 mention
  • Apple Watch — Product · 1 mention
  • Audible — Product · 1 mention
  • Calm — Product · 1 mention
  • ChatGPT — Product · 1 mention
  • Eight Sleep — Product · 1 mention
  • Figma — Product · 1 mention
  • Gibson guitar — Product · 1 mention
  • Headspace — Product · 1 mention
  • Hendrick's Gin — Product · 1 mention
  • iPhone — Product · 1 mention
  • Levels CGM — Product · 1 mention
  • LMNT — Product · 1 mention
  • Lululemon — Product · 1 mention
  • MacBook — Product · 1 mention
  • Martin guitar — Product · 1 mention
  • Masterclass — Product · 1 mention
  • Momentous — Product · 1 mention
  • Netflix — Product · 1 mention
  • Nike — Product · 1 mention
  • Notion — Product · 1 mention
  • Oura Ring — Product · 1 mention
  • Pappy Van Winkle — Product · 1 mention
  • Peloton — Product · 1 mention
  • Shopify — Product · 1 mention
  • SiriusXM — Product · 1 mention
  • Slack — Product · 1 mention
  • Spotify — Product · 1 mention
  • Stripe — Product · 1 mention
  • Tesla — Product · 1 mention

Concepts & topics

  • Star Wars — Concept · Core topic · 27 mentions · first at
    Central theme of the episode, discussing the franchise and its infamous holiday special.
    Establishing George Lucas as one of the brilliant young minds in film making. even though it wasn't his first movie, it was his first huge breakout hit.
  • Wookie — Concept · Key element · 12 mentions · first at
    Central to the Holiday Special's plot, representing the focus of the special's narrative.
    Yeah. Mala. that was the Wookie wife. Oh, and mother. Yeah, sure.
  • Life Day — Concept · Key argument · 7 mentions · first at
    A fictional holiday in the Star Wars universe, central to the plot of the Holiday Special.
    Yes. And if you have no idea what we're talking about, we are talking about life day, which is a celebration that Wookies in the Star Wars universe have every three years.
  • Variety Show — Concept · 9 mentions · first at
    And the reason that they decided that there should be musical numbers is because the people who sold George Lucas and at the time it was Star the Star Wars Corporation was what it was called.
  • Antifragility — Concept · Concept · 4 mentions
    Philosophical concept mentioned in passing.
  • Cognitive Biases — Concept · Concept · 4 mentions
    Psychological concept mentioned in passing.
  • Cold Exposure — Concept · Concept · 4 mentions
    Health concept mentioned in passing.
  • Compound Interest — Concept · Concept · 4 mentions
    Financial concept mentioned in passing.
  • Deep Work — Concept · Concept · 4 mentions
    Productivity concept mentioned in passing.
  • First Principles Thinking — Concept · Concept · 4 mentions
    Philosophical concept mentioned in passing.
  • Incentive Design — Concept · Concept · 4 mentions
    Economic concept mentioned in passing.
  • Intermittent Fasting — Concept · Concept · 4 mentions
    Health concept mentioned in passing.
  • Lindy Effect — Concept · Concept · 4 mentions
    Philosophical concept mentioned in passing.
  • Moore's Law — Concept · Concept · 4 mentions
    Technological concept mentioned in passing.
  • Network Effects — Concept · Concept · 4 mentions
    Economic concept mentioned in passing.
  • Pareto Principle — Concept · Concept · 4 mentions
    Economic concept mentioned in passing.
  • Power Law — Concept · Concept · 4 mentions
    Mathematical concept mentioned in passing.
  • Second-Order Thinking — Concept · Concept · 4 mentions
    Philosophical concept mentioned in passing.
  • Stoicism — Concept · Concept · 4 mentions
    Philosophical concept mentioned in passing.
  • Zone 2 Training — Concept · Concept · 4 mentions
    Fitness concept mentioned in passing.
  • Star Wars Holiday Special.com — Concept · Referenced work · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as a website dedicated to the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    And there's also an entire website dedicated to it. Star Wars holiday special.com.
  • Wookiee — Concept · 12 mentions
  • Variety show — Concept · 9 mentions · first at
    Idea that her parents, they were producers/ songwriters of the day. They were big on the variety show scene, which would turn out to be a really key cog in this whole experience.
  • Star Wars Holiday Special — Concept · 6 mentions · first at
    Kick off the holidays in style with our traditional playing of our episode on the Star Wars Holiday Special. If you've never seen the actual special, I envy you and I bet the…
  • The Empire — Concept · 4 mentions · first at
    Getting back to Kachuk because there's Kazuk because there's a blockade by the Empire and they're looking for rebels, specifically Chewbacca, who I didn't realize this. He's the most famous Wookie of all. Did you know that?
  • A New Hope — Concept · 3 mentions · first at
    Kazuk had not made the cut. even prior to this, apparently for a new hope, George Lucas had whipped up a 40page what's known as the Wookie Bible.
  • Imperial Guard — Concept · 3 mentions · first at
    Because you hear Oh, okay. Well, Han Solo and Chewbacca evading the Imperial Guard and all that stuff for 2 hours. I would watch that.
  • The Empire Strikes Back — Concept · 3 mentions
  • Dark Side — Concept · 2 mentions · first at
    You go to the dark side. I've been there a while now.
  • Virtual Reality — Concept · 2 mentions · first at
    The gifts he gives is a sort of like a little digital insert to a oh I guess you would call it a virtual reality haird dryer hair dryer like a beauty shop hairdryer,.
  • Wookiee Bible — Concept · 2 mentions
  • Titanic — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    Show dream team and everybody was good, but there were probably no bad welders on the Titanic either.
  • Welcome to the Fillmore East — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    Initially was a dude named David Akcoma and he had made his name for Welcome to the Fillmore East. It was a concert documentary with Van Mortis, Van Morrison and the Birds in…
  • Rebels — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    Kazuk because there's a blockade by the Empire and they're looking for rebels, specifically Chewbacca, who I didn't realize this. He's the most famous Wookie of all. Did you know that?
  • stormtroopers — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    Weird bit where Chewbacca's son tries to figure out a way to trick the stormtroopers. the empire had come and kind of because of the blockade raided the house and other properties.
  • Light the Sky on Fire — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    And they decide that they're going to play Light the Sky on Fire, which apparently is about UFOs.
  • Imperial forces — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    To the planet. They park on the far side of the planet because they know the Imperial forces are there and the exercise will do Chewy good.
  • Tree of Life — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    And more than anything else our love for one another. This is the promise of the tree of life.
  • Imperial cruisers — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    Well, and during the it looked like some of the they had some insert shots of like Imperial cruisers and TIE fighters and stuff that from the movie.
  • TIE fighters — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    Well, and during the it looked like some of the they had some insert shots of like Imperial cruisers and TIE fighters and stuff that from the movie.

Places & events

  • Star Wars Holiday Special — Event · 6 mentions · first at
  • Kazuk — Place · Setting · 60 mentions
    Wookie home planet where the Holiday Special is set.
  • Life Day — Event · Key concept · 7 mentions · first at
    Fictional holiday central to the Star Wars Holiday Special's plot.
  • San Diego — Place · Location · 2 mentions · first at
    City mentioned in listener mail.
    Nice. Thanks. big thanks for all you guys do. I found the podcast after moving to San Diego in the last few years for some noise around my apartment. So basically, we were blocking out noise. We do that, which I.
  • Canton, Ohio — Place · Location · 1 mention · first at
    City where WHIO is based.
  • Wookie Planet C — Place · Setting · 2 mentions · first at
    Alternative name for Kazuk, the Wookie home planet.
    George Lucas to his grave. Yeah. So, Lucas said, Here's my idea. I want it to be based, on Wookies, and I want it to take place on their home planet of, Kazuk or Wookie Planet C.
  • Mos Eisley — Place · Setting reference · 2 mentions · first at
    Spaceport on Tatooine featured in the Holiday Special's cantina scene.
    Be Arthur is the owner. Be Arthur of the Golden Girls. But in this case, Be Arthur of Ma because as one of the people who wrote one of the articles we based this on points out, she's just basically playing Ma as the owner of the.
  • Pearl Harbor — Event · Referenced event · 1 mention · first at
    Historical event mentioned in passing regarding TV ratings.
    It finished second to The Loveboat in the second or I'm sorry, from 8 to 9 and in the next hour actually finished behind part two of a miniseries about Pearl Harbor starring Angie Dickinson.
  • Tatooine — Place · Setting reference · 1 mention · first at
    Planet in the Star Wars universe mentioned in the context of the Holiday Special's cantina scene.
    Of a public service announcement basically. Yeah. broadcast by the Empire about how immoral life on Tatooine is.
  • Kashyyyk — Place · 8 mentions
  • Mos Eisley Cantina — Place · 2 mentions
  • Ohio — Place · 2 mentions
  • Dayton — Place · 1 mention · first at
  • Mid Rim — Place · 1 mention · first at
    Wookie planet C or Edon is a mid rim planet, right? So the whole reason apparently that George Lucas was interested in featuring the Wookies was it is what we.
  • Virginia — Place · 1 mention · first at
    Oh yeah. I knew they did like a Sunday singing thing like out in Virginia.
  • Pearl Harbor — Place · 1 mention · first at
    And in the next hour actually finished behind part two of a miniseries about Pearl Harbor starring Angie Dickinson.

Media & podcasts

  • Star Wars — Media · Core topic · 27 mentions · first at
    Central theme of the episode, discussing the franchise and its impact on pop culture.
  • Star Wars Holiday Special — Media · Main focus · 6 mentions · first at
    Primary subject of the episode, analyzed for its cultural impact and reception.
    Hey guys, it's that time again. Time to kick off the holidays in style with our traditional playing of our episode on the Star Wars Holiday Special. If you've never seen the actual special, I envy.
  • Stuff You Should Know — Media · Host podcast · 3 mentions · first at
    The podcast where this discussion is taking place.
    Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeart Radio.
  • Empire Strikes Back — Media · Related media · 4 mentions · first at
    The sequel to Star Wars that was in production during the making of the Holiday Special.
    The reason why it was lowhanging fruit was because they had just established the different scenes that would make the cut for Empire Strikes Back. Yeah. And what how did you pronounce it again?
  • A New Hope — Media · Related media · 3 mentions · first at
    The original Star Wars film that preceded the Holiday Special.
    There's one of my favorite sequences is when Grandpa Itchy goes over to Lumpy and basically sets up remember the hologram chess board that they played in A New Hope.
  • Vanity Fair — Media · Referenced work · 4 mentions · first at
    Mentioned as the publisher of an article critiquing the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    There's great a great article in Vanity Fair called The Han Solo Comedy Hour exclamation point. Yes.
  • Robot Chicken — Media · Reference · 1 mention · first at
    Show on which George Lucas later appeared to parody his dislike of the Holiday Special.
    Clearly, because he did appear on Robot Chicken in, I think, 2005 on the therapist's couch talking about how much he hated the special.
  • Breaking Bad — Media · 1 mention
  • Game of Thrones — Media · 1 mention
  • Inception — Media · 1 mention
  • Joe Rogan Experience — Media · 1 mention
  • Netflix documentaries — Media · 1 mention
  • Rick and Morty — Media · 1 mention
  • Stranger Things — Media · 1 mention
  • YouTube channels — Media · 1 mention
  • Pearl Harbor — Media · Referenced work · 1 mention · first at
    A miniseries that competed with the Star Wars Holiday Special in ratings.
    It finished second to The Loveboat in the second or I'm sorry, from 8 to 9 and in the next hour actually finished behind part two of a miniseries about Pearl Harbor starring Angie Dickinson.
  • The Love Boat — Media · Incidental · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as a competing show that outperformed the Star Wars Holiday Special in ratings
    It finished second to The Loveboat in the second or I'm sorry, from 8 to 9 and in the next hour actually finished behind part two of a miniseries about Pearl Harbor starring Angie Dickinson.
  • Mystery Science Theater 3000 — Media · Reference · 1 mention · first at
    Show whose cast members provided audio commentary for the Holiday Special.
    It is. And in 2007, Rift Tracks, the great, Mystery Science Theater 3000 guys, Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett, and Kevin Murphy, provided audio commentary for the.
  • Carol Bernett Show — Media · Contextual reference · 2 mentions · first at
    A variety show that had recently been cancelled, mentioned as context for the declining popularity of the variety format.
    Yeah. We're talking Carol Bernett show, one of my favorites, had just been cancelled after 11 seasons. That's a big red flag.
  • Jefferson Starship — Media · Featured performance · 2 mentions · first at
    A musical group featured in the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    So we said, Yeah, Chuck, I think though, there yet another segment like this is actually widely regarded as the high point of the whole thing.
  • Star Wars Holiday Special.com — Media · Referenced work · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as a dedicated website for the Star Wars Holiday Special.
    And there's also an entire website dedicated to it. Star Wars holiday special.com.

Full transcript with timestamps

Hey guys, it's that time again. Time to kick off the holidays in style with our traditional playing of our episode on the Star Wars Holiday Special. If you've never seen the actual special, I envy you and I bet the first time is the last time you watch it, too. We here at SYSK want to wish you a happy holiday season, and we hope you enjoy the annual tradition of our playing of the Star Wars Holiday Special episode. Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with Charles W. Chuckers Bryant and Jerry Jerome Roland.

Uh, who's the Wookie mother? Yeah. Mala. Uh, that was the Wookie wife. Oh, and mother. Yeah, sure. Chewbacca's mom is not with them any longer.

Yeah, she left. Yeah, she was not about to appear in that. She went out the window.

Mhm. I'm excited about this, I have to say. Uh, we should say happy Star Wars day.

Yeah, today is um December 17th. Um, I have my opening night tickets. Do you really?

Sure. Wow. You don't? I do. Are you into it? Oh, yeah. Well, I will definitely go see it in the theater, but um I won't be there opening night.

Sure. I've gotten really adept at like ignoring spoilers, people talking about stuff, all that. Like, so I can I could conceivably see this movie a month after it comes out

and it's all good and still going fresh. Yeah, that's good. I'm an ostrich. Yeah,

you you black yourself out. Yeah, you go dark. I I do. I make myself go to sleep, basically.

You go to the dark side. I've been there a while now. Uh well, happy Star Wars Day, though. I'm sure that I think this pairs nicely with Christmas, Star Wars Day. It's all come together.

Yes. Um we already missed Life Day, though. So, happy belated life day, Chuck. Are they celebrating it this year?

November 17th. Yeah, but it's every three years. Arcane. Yeah, man. Nice job. Okay, so it's every three years. Started in 1978. Let's do the math, shall we? Quick math break. I believe that LA 2014 was the last life day.

Man, we just missed it. And then again in 2017. Okay. So 2017 we'll celebrate life day. We'll put on our red robes.

Uh our ultra long straight ironed wigs. Sure. And we'll celebrate life day the way it was meant to be.

Yes. And if you have no idea what we're talking about, we are talking about life day, which is a celebration uh that Wookies in the Star Wars universe have every three years.

Yeah. It's like their Christmas. Yeah. They celebrate, too. They celebrate the diversity of their ecosystem and also remembrance of the dead. And they also give gifts.

They're like the fins, basically. Yeah. It's uh it's a very interesting part of the Star Wars cannon.

It is. And it's almost entirely made up, dashed off, you could possibly say, by um George Lucas in the 70s.

Yeah. Um and it it's the basis of what has become derided as like one of the worst things that ever happened to the Star Wars galaxy.

Well, not only that, one of the worst things ever aired on television. Yeah. In this galaxy.

Yeah. At first that sounds like hyperbole, like come on, it's because it was Star Wars and we had high expectations, but it's really that bad.

Yeah. The people who say that haven't seen even a second of it. Yeah. Yeah. However, I watched it uh when I was a kid.

Uhhuh. Then again this week. Yeah. And you watched it twice this week. Yeah. I watched it last night and this morning.

There's something about it. It's mesmerizing. It really is. It's one of those things that you start watching it and you want to turn it off,

but you want to see just how absurd it can get almost. Yeah. And it starts absurd, it stays absurd in the middle, gets increasingly more absurd. It gets a little less absurd, finishes super absurd.

Yeah. It's just a train wreck in every single sense of the word, top to bottom.

It's extraordinarily difficult to overstate how bad this is. Yeah. And some people I've, you know, in researching this, you read about it, you read descriptions of these things and it it it just can't possibly be gotten across until you see it. So luckily, as we will see, you can go on to YouTube and watch it. And you may even enjoy this episode more if you pause, go spend two hours Yeah.

watching this thing and then come back and laugh along with us. Yeah. There's a great uh over the years there have been many segments of it on YouTube from badly dubbed VHS tapes.

Yeah. But, uh, there is one really pretty good version of it in full. Um, brought to you by WHIO, Dayton, Ohio, Channel 7.

Woo! Ohio. Cuz that flashes up on the screen periodically. Yeah. Um, man, it is high quality.

Yeah, it looks good. It has to basically be the copy that the actual um affiliate broadcast.

Yeah, it's like that that quality compared to the other stuff floating around on YouTube. It's clearly recorded on a 1978 VCR.

Yeah. which were really expensive. Very expensive. I did some calculating on West Egg.

Okay. Um so the average VCR went for about $1,000. They were brand new. $1,000 in 1978 money. So they're about $3,800 in 2014 money.

Crazy. Luckily, there were some rich people out there recording this stuff. And the wealthy have saved us all again. Yes. Yet again, as they always do.

Yes. Uh we need to shout out some articles that we uh use for this. There's great a great article in Vanity Fair called The Han Solo Comedy Hour exclamation point. Yes.

By Frank Dejakamo. And then there's uh the the Star Wars Holiday Special was the worst thing on television ever by someone we kind of know, Alex Pastern Neck of uh

from Motherboard. Yeah. Which is uh not Wired, it's uh Vice Vice. Yeah. We wrote a little bit for Motherboard back then and we had a call with Alex.

We're like we're like old motherboard vets. Yeah. Basically. And wasn't there one more?

There was another one. And I don't know who wrote this one, Chuck. Uh, yeah. It's the the title's The Star Wars Holiday Special George Lucas wants to smash every copy of with a sledgehammer,

which was a famous quote uh supposedly at a convention by Lucas. Yes. Which is not correct.

He didn't ever say that. No. Okay. That that sounded like something that people made up.

Yes. But if you go on the internet, you will quickly believe that he did, but apparently didn't. So, let's

I'm sure he felt that way, though. Clearly, you know, because he did appear on Robot Chicken in, I think, 2005 on the therapist's couch talking about how much he hated the special.

All right, so let's set the background, shall we? Shall we go back to 1977? Yes. Summer getting the old wayback machine.

All right, let's do it. All right, here we are. There's Wooderson. Yeah, I'm just a little six-year-old excited about Star Wars. I am uh I've just turned one.

Yes. So, you don't know what's up yet. I Please forgive me if I urinate myself.

No problem. Okay. Uh so, what has happened is Star Wars has become a huge huge hit seemingly out of nowhere.

Yeah. Uh establishing George Lucas as one of the brilliant young minds in film making. Uh even though it wasn't his first movie, it was his first huge huge breakout hit.

Oh, yeah. For sure. Talk I mean talk about a breakout hit. Like no one had ever seen anything like it before.

No. 2001 had come out in the late60s, but it wasn't it still isn't accessible to all audiences. You know, it's a pretty cerebral film.

Yeah. It's not an adventure movie like Star Wars. This is like basically swashbuckling on the screen, but uh you know, in a galaxy far far away, Star Wars just changed everything and it came on just like a a hammer.

Yeah. Um this a new hope by the way. Yes. Yes. And I know we're going to get stuff wrong, nerds. So, just

just go ahead and get your little fingers ready to email us. Like, if it wasn't driven home that I'm not a nerd by the fact that I don't have opening night tickets or any tickets yet, give me a break.

Okay. And by Proxy Chuck, too. Okay. Yes. Thank you. So, um it's it's hard to state how great Star Wars was in everyone's mind. Yeah. Right. Bill Murray came out with that lounge singer Star Wars thing.

Yeah. It was everywhere. And if you if you just listen to the lyrics of it, he's really it's just Bill Murray singing about how much Star Wars is awesome. Yeah. Right. Yeah.

So, by the following year, um George Lucas was he wanted to figure out a way to keep audiences just engaged with the whole Star Wars franchise that he was just starting to build. But he knew that Empire Strikes Back was a couple more years out.

Sure. So, um, he I think he was approached by some TV executives who said, "Have you considered doing some sort of TV special? They're all the rage right now. We have a we have a graphic that's really awesome that we set aside just for TV specials here at CBS. Why don't you let us let's get together and do a Star Wars special?"

That's right. producers Gary Smith and uh Dwight Himeion uh were working over at CBS and they say this is a great way to keep the spirit alive while you're making your other movie,

maybe move some more toys. Yeah. Which George Lucas got a cut of all the toys. Sure. So, it was right before Thanksgiving and he said there'd be a lot of people watching TV um preh holiday season or I guess in the holiday season. Well, the weekend before Thanksgiving, it's like everybody's shopping, sitting around family, like waiting to actually do stuff. That's right. It's perfect time to broadcast something on TV.

So, Lucas says, "All right, let's do this. Uh, I don't have a ton of time, but how about this? I'll get I'll get a story together, and then you can go hire a whisbang team of of veteran writers and producers and directors, whatever genre you think is appropriate, and those are the words that will haunt George Lucas to his grave. Yeah. So, uh, Lucas said, "Here's my idea. I want it to be based, um, on Wookies, and I want it to take place on their home planet of, uh, Kazuk or Wookie Planet C."

Is that how you say it? Kazuk, that's how it's pronounced in the episode, the holiday special, but it's also pronounced different ways other times.

I would have pronounced it. Cash E. Go spell it. K A H Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Y K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K. Yeah,

which I mean I guess that sounds like Chewbacca's planet. Sure. Uh also called G5623. Wookie planet C or Edon is a mid rim planet,

right? So the whole reason apparently that George Lucas was interested in featuring the Wookies was it is what we in show business call lowhanging fruit. The reason why it was lowhanging fruit was because they had just established the different scenes that would make the cut for Empire Strikes Back. Yeah. And uh what how did you pronounce it again?

Kazuk. Kazuk had not made the cut. Uh even prior to this, apparently for a new hope, George Lucas had whipped up a 40page what's known as the Wookie Bible. It's like a 40page supplement that's all about Kazuk and Wookies and Chewbacca and his family and everything about Wookie. Right.

That's right. So he's like, I've got this thing already, you know, established. I love Wookies. Um, they didn't make the cut. I'm a little sad about that. They're not going to Kazuk is not going to show up in Empire Strikes Back. Let's Let's build the entire special around Wookies. It's basically the one demand me, George Lucas has.

Yeah, that's it. I'll be totally hands off from this point on, which he kind of was.

He totally was. And it was actually this experience that apparently taught him to be the very hands-on person that he is famous for being. It came out of this Christmas special.

Absolutely. He he was burned. and um had an iron grip after that on everything. So, uh here's some some of the folks behind it. Uh Bruce Valanche, famous uh TV writer. You probably seen him on Hollywood Squares.

Wasn't he suspected of being Thomas Pinchon for a while? Oh, I don't know. Or was Thomas Pinchon on Hollywood Squares?

I have no idea. I I may be confabulating some stuff, confounding. Yeah, there's some con of some sort going on.

Sounds like it. Yeah. So, uh Valanche was hired as a writer. Uh, a guy named uh, Lenny Rips was hired as a writer

who has some great quotes in that Vanity Fair article. He does. Uh, his first quote was, "We were really excited because this is Star Wars. How could it lose?"

Yeah. Famous last words. Uh, who else was hired? There was a a husband and wife team, uh, the Welches.

Yeah. Who are the parents of of folk singer Gileian Welch, who I'm a big fan of. Yeah. And I had no idea that her parents, they were producers/ songwriters of the day. They were big on the variety show scene, which would turn out to be a really key cog in this whole experience.

So, I feel like right about here, Jerry should insert a needle coming off of a record sound effect.

Yeah. Okay. Thanks, Jerry. So, Chuck, you just said singer songwriters. Yeah. What would that have to do with Star Wars?

Yeah. Well, actually in this Star Wars holiday special, for those of you who hadn't seen it, there are musical numbers. They decided from the outset that there should be musical numbers. And the reason that they decided that there should be musical numbers is because the people who sold George Lucas and at the time it was um Star the Star Wars Corporation was what it was called.

Yeah. Um on the idea of doing this TV special was that everyone would love a variety show.

Yeah. It was the 70s. Great idea. Let's do a variety show. The problem was this. Apparently, George Lucas didn't watch enough TV. Yeah.

And he also overly trusted people who talked to him. Sure. Because by 1978, yes, variety shows had dominated television for over 10 years.

But it had come to an end. It was getting stale. Yeah. We're talking Carol Bernett show, one of my favorites,

had just been cancelled after 11 seasons. That's a big red flag. Sunny and Share had just had its last season.

Yeah. Um I mean, what else? Like Heihaw was Heihaw was still going on probably.

They didn't know when to quit. Heihaw is still on. Solid Gold had yet to come on and take up the mantel.

That That wasn't a variety show. There was a little bit. There was talking in between the songs.

Yeah. Remember the Mandrel Sister show? I never watched that one. What was with that country chic thing that happened?

It was Yeah, it was a big deal in the 70s. It's kind of happening again, I think.

Oh, because of that dude, the guy who won all the CMA awards. Uh, I don't know.

He's like he's he came along. He's like actually country. His dad's like a coal miner for real from Kentucky.

I think I know who you mean. Chris. Yeah, he's he is good. He's come along and been like, "What are you guys doing?"

Well, there's a revival in like good country music again. That's great. Like in the tradition of Merl Haggard and Johnny Cash.

And I guess it's probably where the country chic came from cuz there was actually good country going on.

Yeah. Johnny Cash had a variety show. Did he really? Oh yeah. I knew they did like a a Sunday singing thing like out in Virginia. Yeah, he had his own variety show. It was actually pretty good. There were some like really great performances. Do you know how many nerds are like, "Get back to Star Wars."

I know. I'm so sorry. All right, so the variety show is is dying sort of. And so they figure what a great time to take the biggest movie property on the planet and and wedge it into the variety show uh Millu.

I don't know if wedge is the right word. I think maybe uh nestle it in there. Yeah.

And then start hitting it with the blunt edge of an axe until it mashes into that crevice. You know,

that's right. Because this is the time when Fantasy Island had just started. Um Mor and Mindy was about to change things. Charlie's Angels was getting huge. It basically television as we knew it from 1980 to whenever the real world came along.

Yeah. Just escapist television is what they called it. was was starting and it was the hip new thing. So basically, if they had turned Han Solo and Princess Leia and Luke Skywalker into maybe, you know, sexy detectives, it might have gone over even better. But they went the other way. They decided to latch on to this extraordinarily stale um genre of television and they hired the best in the business. Yeah,

like there was there was a quote from I think Lenny Rips who was saying like we had literally a dream team, a variety show dream team

and everybody was good, but there were probably no bad welders on the Titanic either.

That's a great quote. Yeah. Uh the guy they hired to direct it initially was a dude named David Akcoma and uh he had made his name uh for Welcome to the Fillmore East. It was a concert documentary with Van Mortis, uh, Van Morrison and the Birds in 1971. And he actually was at USC film school the same time as Lucas, even though they didn't know each other. And, um, he only ended up directing about three segments of the thing

before he quit. Yep. Before he walked off. Some say he was actually let go. Uh, but we'll get to him in a minute and who replaced him.

Okay. Uh, as as we get along down this uh, gross road. Well, let's let's take a little break because I'm I'm overly excited. All right.

Okay. Learning stuff with Joshua. All right. So, we've established most of the main players. We'll we'll get to a few more. Mhm.

Uh we should point out that um Mark Hamill and and Harrison Ford and Carrie Fischer

Sure. Uh Peter Mayhew, they had no grounds to refuse to be on this basically. Yeah, pretty much. They were not huge huge stars yet that could throw their weight around and say this is terrible and I'm not doing it.

They were they were big overnight because of Star Wars for sure, but they weren't to the adoring public.

Sure. back at the studio, they could still be bossed around. And and this was the result of it. And you can tell also um just from watching the actual special, like Harrison Ford is not happy to be there at any point.

Oh no. Um Princess Leia is clearly on drugs. Uh was she on drugs at this point?

She if you watch it, she's she's on drugs, especially the ending scene. Mark Hamill uh was

he looks like he's happy to be there. Actually, he was fine, but apparently he said, "No, I'm I'm not doing a musical number."

Yeah. And if you watch his part, wedging a musical number in there would have been even more painful.

Sure. Um, but they they everybody who was part of the actual Star Wars franchise that wasn't wearing like a full body costume. Yeah.

Was like, I'm I really wish I wasn't here. And you can tell Oh, yeah. In fact, in the uh opening uh credit sequence, they're showing the picture the, you know, the faces of the people,

right? And uh you see Harrison Ford as if he's flying the Millennium Falcon, and you can you can just hear the guy off screen going, "Now look at the camera and just give a nod. Just look at the camera and give a nod." And he finally you can tell he's pissed off, and he looks up at the camera and just sort of smirks.

Yeah. And points at the camera like, "Okay, I'm looking at the camera." And then goes back to what he's doing.

Yeah. It's pretty awesome. I felt bad for him. So early on, uh, Valanche and others died.

Did you Did you feel bad for him, though? Really? I mean, like, come on. It's Harrison Ford. It's Han Solo. He has to go do this for like 5 days.

Yeah. I felt terrible for him. I think it's hilarious that they had to do this, especially now.

Well, early on, Valanche and others knew that they may be in trouble because uh they decided not to subtitle any of the Wookie dialogue,

right? And they literally started after a brief opening scene setting it up here. Here's the basic plot is Han Solo is trying to get Chewbacca back to Kazuk in time for Life Day so he can celebrate with his family.

That's the basis of the entire two hours. That's the basis of the entire two hours. They encounter a space battle and they're delayed and the next two hours are kind of what's going on while the delay is happening.

Back on Kazuk. Back on Kazuk because you hear like, "Oh, okay. Well, Han Solo and Chewbacca evading the Imperial Guard and all that stuff for 2 hours. I would watch that.

Sure, I would too. Yeah, that's not what they show. Killing time at the Wookie household.

That is what they show. Yeah, that's what they do. It's people hanging out, waiting for Chewbacca, worrying about him. Yeah.

And then killing time while they wait for him to come back. Yeah, literally. So, um

And so, hold on. So, you say there's a setup right? Yeah, that's the initial setup. And then Chuck, that's followed by this.

Yeah. It's followed by literally 10 minutes, 10 solid minutes of incomprehensible Wookie speak.

So, let's let's join it for a second, shall we? Yeah. Let's all enjoy it. Uh-oh. And again, you said

10 minutes, and you're not exaggerating. You're not being hyperbolic. You can time it. That's it's 10 minutes of Wookies talking to each other with no subtitles.

Fortunately, I couldn't follow it at first. Like, I didn't even know who it was. I thought it was might have been Chewbacca's mom and dad.

Oh, yeah. That's and little brother. And I don't find out until later when Mark Hamill shows up via a Skype call.

Yeah. And says he really explains everything that had just happened. Like you're Chewbacca's father. Itchy.

You're Chewbacca's son. Uh Lumpy. Lumpy. Yeah. And you were Chewbacca's wife. Oh, Mala.

Yeah. Thank you. So before everybody starts like freaking out, we know that that's actually their nicknames. Their real names are his father is uh a tichukich cook.

It's really hard to pronounce. Mulatto buck is his wife and his son is Lumpo Warump. But

as named by Lucas, but yeah, but Lucas also named him Lumpy, Itchy, and Mala. Yeah. So, um, they're all back there ringing their hands trying to figure out ways to pass the time, uh, until they get word from Chewbacca that he's made it to, uh, what is it? Ketchup.

Kazuk. Kazuk. Um, did you say ketchup? Ketchup or katsup if you're fancy. Yeah. Um, but Chewbacca is having trouble getting back to Kachuk because there's Kazuk

because there's a a blockade by the Empire and they're looking for rebels, specifically Chewbacca, who I didn't realize this. He's the most famous Wookie of all. Did you know that?

Yeah, of course. I didn't know that. Well, I mean, he's the only one that really appears in the movies.

I mean, to that degree, but we're seeing like, you know, these people's view of the universe. What about back on

Kazuk? Yeah. He might have just been a fly by night Wookie, right? Yeah. But not the case. Very famous Wookie.

Yeah. And he really loved to like soak in his fame. All right. So he realizes there's a problem. Valanche. He goes to Lucas and is like, I don't know, man. This is your world, but it may not be the strongest thing to do to set this in Wookie and have all this incomprehensible dialogue. And he says he was met with a glacial stare. Uh, and

he put it a little differently than that. Well, he said glacial stare. He did. The glacial stare that he got was for this quote. He said, "These people just talk in what sounds like fat people having an orgasm." Yeah.

He goes, "If you want, you can set up a tape recorder in my bedroom and I'll do all of the foleying it for it."

Yeah. He's a large guy. He is. So, uh, that's what got the glacial stair. But Valanche later said that from this there was one development meeting that Lucas attended and it was here's the Wookie Bible. Tell me what you got. And Valanche said he and the other writers and producers and director were just kind of throwing ideas and George Lucas would either say like, "No, that doesn't work. Give him a glacial stare." Or say, "Yes, that's exactly it. Yes, let's make this a variety show."

Yeah. And there was a little bit of um background there. the the cantina players in the band

had appeared on other variety shows at that point. Yeah. And I think it went over fairly well just as a short segment on like the Richard Prior uh variety show or uh Donnie Marie.

Yeah. Um man, there were a lot of variety shows that but that's what I'm saying. It was that was television. That's what you did. Like the Brady's um

the the the show had its course and then it became a variety show. It was just everybody loved variety shows. Yeah. Still do.

By this time though, everybody was sick of variety shows, right? And so it really was a terrible choice.

In fact, they even hired a couple of writers from uh Shields and Jarnell, which I hadn't heard of. Had you?

Oh, yeah. I watched it. It was these creepy this mime couple who had their own variety show

and uh they figured these two will be great because they are used to working without words,

right? So, and so there is a certain logic to the variety show. It's not just it's not just that variety shows were popular. Yeah. At the time it it somebody was like, well, Wookies, you don't understand what they're saying. So, this is all going to be very physical. So, these people who who did what is it? Shields and Jarnell.

Yeah, that that's a perfect choice. That that makes complete sense. You can see this whole this whole process of leading up to the point where it was produced and shot and everything. Yeah.

A series of like, oh, we have this problem. Well, here's a fix. Yeah, but that leads to another problem. Well, we'll fix it with this. And and no one's stepping back and being like, all we've done is create a series of problems that are going to come together and make one extraordinarily large problem that will become legendary. No one did that. And so, the whole thing was was made.

That's right. And it uh eventually airs on uh November 17th, 1978, a Friday at 8:00 p.m. Eastern time.

That's right. And uh according to uh Neielson ratings, it um attracted 13 million viewers. Uh lost the second hour

just in the US, it aired in six or seven countries total. Yeah, but no one cares about that.

I guess not cuz none of those are on the internet, you know. Uh it it finished second to The Loveboat in the second or I'm sorry, from 8 to 9 and in the next hour actually finished behind part two of a miniseries about Pearl Harbor starring Angie Dickinson. So, it didn't even win their respective hours.

No, 13 million. That's That's not bad. The thing is, apparently, if you look at the Neielson ratings graph for the first hour,

Yeah, we know about that graph. It's okay. Yeah, we do. And then after a very important part, which we'll talk about soon, um it just drops off at the end of the first hour. And that actually probably made the executives at CBS cringe for a number of reasons. Number one is this special was originally supposed to just be an hour, but so many advertisers wanted to sign on. Yeah.

That they extended it to two hours and it shines through. You can totally tell that this thing was never supposed to I think an hour might have been stretching it to tell you the truth.

Oh yeah. It's 30 minutes of content, 40 if you're generous. an hour and then two hours it becomes one of the worst things that was ever put on television.

All right. Well, let's take a break and then we'll talk a little bit more about the actual um uh I even don't want to call it content, but it is content in the strictest definition.

Sure. Right after this. Learning stuff with Joshua. Stuff you should know. All right. So, the show itself, we've given you the the main plot line, uh, which again is that Chewy is trying to get back to his home planet to celebrate Life Day with his family.

Right. That's it. And again, we almost barely see Chewy. Yeah. The rest is his family on

Kazuk waiting for him to come back for life day. Yeah. So, um, some of the various things they did, uh, there were guest stars. There was Harvey Corman from the Carol Bernett Show.

Okay. One of my all-time favorites. Him or Carol Carol Bernett Show? Both. He's great.

Yeah, he actually, if you watch what he's doing, you're like, "This guy's a comedy genius for sure."

Apparently, he too was like the only one on set that was bringing levity. He was joking around and kind of kept spirits up. Good for him.

That's what I say. And he had three different three different parts. Yeah. He played uh uh well, I don't even know the names actually. We could look him up. But he played a uh he played a Julia Childlike cook. There's an actual cooking segment,

a long one, a very long cooking segment where uh Chewbacca's wife um makes banana stew

to kill some time. to kill some time. Uh because they're waiting on her planet and in our living room.

Yeah. So Harvey Corman is in drag as a forarmed Julia Childlike uh TV chef, right?

And I think it's Gormanda is her name. Gormanda. That makes total sense. Yeah. Uh he also plays um there's this one weird bit where Chewbacca's son tries to figure out a way to trick the stormtroopers. the the empire had come and kind of because of the blockade raided the house and other properties.

So he tries to trick them uh by I think rigging a commlink uh to speak in a a different voice. So he has to watch the instruction manual.

He watches an instruction video which was Harvey Keitel as a robot. It Oh, it would have been wonderful if Harvey Keitel.

Oh say Harvey Kitel. Harvey Corman. Oh man. Harvey Kell murders someone in the middle of the instruction.

Great. Harvey Corman. And then the final role he had was as a uh a bar patron in the cantina uh that drinks. He has a hole in the top of his head like a volcano where he pours his drinks in. That's how he drinks.

And he he loves Be Arthur. Did we mention Be Arthur was in it? Be Arthur is not only in it, Chuck, she sings a song.

She does. She is the uh unbeknownst to everyone, she manages or maybe owns the cantina. She's the owner.

Yeah. The what's the ma what? Ma deaf cantina. Uh no Most Deaf is a rapper. Oh yeah.

I think you mean Mos Eisley. Yes. Yes. That cantina. She's the owner. Be Arthur is the owner. Be Arthur of the Golden Girls. But in this case, Be Arthur of Ma because as one of the people who wrote one of the articles we based this on points out, she's just basically playing Ma as the owner of the cantina.

Yeah. And her song comes because um they uh basically say there's a lockdown so you got to call last call.

Mhm. Um at your bar. So she calls last call by singing a song to everyone. Right. And again, we can't possibly have the script lead anywhere else but Chewbacca's house while his family waits for it. So all this takes place as part of a public service announcement basically. Yeah. broadcast by the Empire about how immoral life on Tatooine is. So, let's go see what's going on in the Ma Eisley cantina as it's being shut down for curfew.

Yeah. All right. This is incomprehensible, but uh it goes on. Um so they're in it. There's also Art Carney.

Yes. Of the honeymooners. Probably the star of the whole thing. Really? He has the most lines. I would say the most comprehensible line,

right? Yeah. So, he plays a uh a trader, a human trader um that is uh recently been with Han Solo and Chewy and actually gets to Kazuk and says, "They're on the way. It's all good."

Yeah. A trader, not traitor. Yeah. A trader is in trades humans for, you know, money.

No, he he sells goods. Yeah. A trader. He doesn't trade humans. Yeah. He's in the human trade. No, he isn't really.

Yeah, he trades humans. Like he sells humans. I looked it up in the in Star Wars encyclopedia. It said that he was in the human trade.

Huh. So, in this Christmas special, Yeah. apparently they sanitized his his background because he's basically just selling like gadgets and novelties and stuff like that to the Wookies and the Empire uh who were occupying the area.

Yes. He comes bearing gifts. Um Yeah. Because he's a friend of Chewbacca's family.

Yeah. So he comes bearing gifts. One of the gifts he gives is a uh um sort of like a little digital insert to a oh I guess you would call it a virtual reality

haird dryer hair dryer like a a beauty shop hairdryer, right? He gives it to Grandpa Itchy. Grandpa Itchy um sits under this hairdryer, pops in this uh digital cassette, and it can only be described as softcore porn.

Apparently, the writers who were interviewed for this said that was totally the intent. They were trying to get what amounted to softcore porn that would pass the sensors.

That's right. So, it's all You can't even say it's innuendo. It's too obvious and overt for innuendo. instead. It's just it's just it's just gross. It's really gross. Um Diane Carol, who singer, yes, she is um a Vegas staple, shows up and starts basically tanalyzing um Grandpa Itchy, who again, this is Chewbacca's elderly father who now engages in some sort of well, he's he's watching virtual reality pornography now. And this is a pretty lengthy segment in and of itself.

Well, yeah. And she literally says to him like, "Now I can see you're really excited."

Yeah. It It's pretty rough to watch. Yeah. So then you've got another musical number

because also again he he shuddters. Yeah. It's really strange. Uh All right. So there's also a uh I know it seems like we're jumping around, but it's it's so mind-blowing.

We're not like this is pretty much like blow forblow. Um, actually I forgot earlier on in in the in the special. Um, there's one of my favorite sequences is when uh Grandpa Itchy goes over to uh Lumpy and basically sets up remember the

the hologram chess board that they played in A New Hope. Yeah. Basically kind of sets that up and says, "Here, just play this." He pushes the button, which is clearly a 1970s cassette recorder. And another uh like it's like a cirto sole uh acid trip.

Yeah. Um gymnast routine happens in front of the kids' eyes. And again, this all just it's not like it shows a snippet. They show the entire segments like five, six, 10 minutes long. Sure.

Of all of these things. So you would think, okay, they've gone to this hologram well a couple of times. Why not go to it again? Well, they do. They do. to kill Mortime while the Imperial Guard is ransacking their house. Um, Art Carney apparently I guess is trying to get one of the Imperial Guard, the leader, I think, or one of the leaders

who looks like somebody from Space Balls, by the way. Very much so. Um, and the writer of the Vanity Fair article, by the way, said, um, this this is so incomprehensible. This special is George Lucas didn't even have the Schwarz with him at the time. So anyway, Art Carney's distracting this uh uh Imperial leader um while they're ransacking the Wookie's house, Chewbacca's house with a hologram. And this hologram, instead of being an acrobat or Diane Carol or any kind of porn or anything like that, is Jefferson starship.

And they decide that they're going to play Light the Sky on Fire, which apparently is about UFOs.

It's a little music video basically. It it's a Yeah, it's the predecessor to like um Video Kill the Radio Star. You can tell. Um

and again, it is the whole lengthy song. Yeah. The whole thing. So, every time that somebody's like, "We need to escape mentally from what's going on here in our house. Let's go into the video world." It's not just And they don't cut back and forth.

No. It's okay. Here's five minutes of Jefferson Starship performing this song. Yeah. And even the Jefferson Starship guys um were like, "Yeah, it was sort of a weird trip. Like we didn't get it, but we did it,

right? They gave us some money." Yeah. And some cocaine. Well, probably. So, so we said, "Yeah, Chuck, I think though, um there yet another segment like this is actually widely regarded as the high point of the whole thing."

Oh, sure. There is a cartoon actually. Yeah. That uh Lumpy watches. Yeah. Lumpy's like the Imperial Guard is still ransacking my house. I think I'll entertain myself by watching a cartoon on my little um I don't know what it I guess it was an iPad.

And uh he watches this cartoon and it's it's actually remarkable for a number of reasons. It's the best part of the whole special.

Yeah. Generally agreed upon as such, but not just us. And it introduces Boba Fett. It's the first time Boba Fett ever makes an appearance in the Star Wars universe.

Yeah. It's actually not a bad and you can't find it in the um the one version I told you to watch. They removed it for copyright, but you can watch a separate version,

right? You can find it on its own. Yeah. And it's um it's very much reminiscent of like the cartoon style of the day, like a He-Man or something

for sure. Even even it's even a little more artsy than that. Yeah. But it does have a plot that you can follow that makes sense as a Star Wars thing. Yeah.

And it introduces Boba Fett, like you said, and um it's actually not bad. Um, it's like Luke and R2 and C3PO.

Yeah. And they're like they crash on a planet or something like that. Yeah. And Han and Chewy are in it. And it's the first time we see and Darth Vader, it's the first time we see

Boba Fett and that he is uh that he is just doing whatever he can do for money, right?

Like Luke trusts him at first. C3PO's like, "You sure you should trust him this quick?" And he's like, "Oh, 3PO,

you and your non-rusting ways." And then it turns out he's selling them out to the dark side. So it's it's basically Boba Fett is an allegory for George Lucas himself. Um so the cartoon comes and goes and that was the thing that came at about the end of the first hour mark and after that everybody just turned off their television sets.

Yeah. I don't remember. Did you watch this when it came on? Yeah, I remember watching it but I don't remember much about it like if I made it through it all. I mean it was I was seven and it was on till 10 so I probably didn't make it through it all. Yeah.

Um, plus you're probably disturbed. Who knows? I just remember that. I have to ask my brother. He might have a memory of this.

I'll bet he does. I'm sure he met everybody afterward or something like that. You know, has a picture.

Well, he was 10 at that point, so cynicism had, you know, become a thing in his life probably.

All by then. Sure. Didn't that when cynicism kicks in? I I could see Scott holding out to 14, 15.

Yeah, maybe. So, so um Chuck, the whole thing finally does end. And actually, there's a guy uh his name's Nathan Rabin. He he writes over at the AV Club. He had a great quote. He basically said that one of the great redeeming values of this um this special is that it does eventually end.

Yeah. You know what the first part of the quote is? Uh I'm not convinced the special wasn't ultimately written and directed by a censient bag of cocaine.

Yeah. And like go read his his review of the Star Wars Holiday Special cuz he goes on to describe exactly what that must have been like. development where the bag of cocaine is pacing back and forth talking about what should happen.

That's what it feels like. But it doesn't and it ends even more. It takes this bizarre two hours and wraps it up in just a nice bizarre bow.

Yeah. So, what happens is eventually Han Solo, should we say spoiler alert? Uh eventually Han Solo and Chewy make it to the planet. They park on the far side of the planet because they know the uh the Imperial forces are there

and the exercise will do uh Chewy good. Yeah. So, they have to hike over there. They eventually make it back home. Uh they find a storm the storm troopers at their house,

right? Um uh their tree hut. Yeah. Which by the way, the the paintings that set this up, I don't think we mentioned,

I don't even call them matte paintings. It looks like someone painted something in on the wall and they just like put a camera in front of it

pretty much. Yeah. Yeah. So they get back and um uh Chewbacca Han Solo hides around the corner. Chewbacca steps in front of his son to protect him.

Han Solo jumps out and the stormtrooper trips over a pile of logs and falls over the balcony

and dies in a holiday special. So they wouldn't even not only could he not shoot first with Greo, but they uh couldn't even have him like wrestle the Stormtrooper and throw him off. He trips over a log,

right? in Han Solo has his hands thrown up like wasn't me. It might as well been a banana peel, you know, but again, uh this is basically produced by Vaudevilians, starring Vaude Villians. Why not have the one death take place from basically what amounts to somebody slipping on a banana peel?

Exactly. It's a It's a perfect way to end it. So, that's uh that that guy basically represents the end of the Imperial threat for the rest of life day.

Yeah. And um we we then see Life Day being celebrated which is celebrated by lots of Wookies assembling in what looks like a giant Olan Mills portrait.

Yeah. Um and all of them are wearing red robes. Sure. And I know I'm uptalking and it's because my mind is still having trouble like wrapping around this.

And then um Princess Leia comes out with C3PO. Is Mark Hamill there? The whole gang is there if I'm not.

Okay. The whole gang's there. And then they all gather around to hear a great quote from Princess Leia, which we will read um verbatim. This holiday is yours. But we all share with you the hope that this day brings us closer to freedom and to harmony and to peace. No matter how different we appear, we're all the same in our struggle against the powers of evil and darkness. I hope that this day will always be a day of joy in which we can reconfirm our dedication and our courage and more than anything else our love for one another. This is the promise of the tree of life.

Q song, right? And we should also point out the tree of life has never been mentioned up to this point.

I had no idea what that was. Makes a sudden appearance at the end. And when you said Qong by qong you mean Princess Leia starts singing.

Yeah. And apparently that was one of the big contingencies on Carrie Fischer being involved. Yeah.

She was going through a phase where she was like, I kind of like singing. Bruce Valanche calls it her Joanie Mitchell period.

Yeah. And she somehow convinced them to let her sing as Princess Leia. And she does. And again, I've said that she looks like she's on drugs. This is the point where she really does look like she's on drugs. And it's not just me. um other writers who've written reviews of this, it's really obvious that she possibly smoked a decent amount of pot before she shot this shot this scene. But she sings okay, it's fine. It's just the the fact that um Princess Leia is singing and actually Bruce Valanche had a really great quote too.

He says that um she very much wanted to show this side of her talent and there was general dismay because this was not what we wanted Princess Leia to be doing.

Yeah. Did it anyway. So the whole thing ends with her singing this song about life day. Oh yeah. Which is set loosely to the John Williams Star Wars theme.

Yeah. Uh so along the way the director, original director quit. Uh a new director Steve Binder was hired to finish the job and bring it in. Uh,

and he did over the original $1 million budget, of course. Always. Uh, he did bring it in. And, um, at this point, uh, George Lucas had, uh, he was he was working on Empire Strikes Back. He didn't know what was going on. He wasn't around for the shoot.

No, it wasn't until it aired, I think, that he actually saw it. Yes. And it was a travesty, obviously, if you haven't noticed that by now. Uh, critics hated it. Uh, Star Wars fans really hated it. Everybody hat the people who were in it hated it.

Lucas hated it. Um, even Harvey Corman secretly hated it. Yeah, even Harvey Keitel hated it.

Actually, he loved it. But, uh, Lucas has been asked over the years about it a lot. And he doesn't talk about it much. Uh, but in 2005, and I don't buy this for a second, he says, um, it was an interview. He said the special from 1978

uh, really didn't have much to do with us. You know, that part is true. I can't remember what network it was even on, but uh it was a thing that they did. That's a lie. There's no way he doesn't know that was CBS.

Yeah. Uh we kind of just let them do it. I believe that. Uh it was done by I can't even remember who the group was, but they were variety TV guys. I'm sure he remembers a few of them.

Uh we let them use the characters and stuff and that probably wasn't the smartest thing to do, but you learn from those experiences.

Yeah. I think they even use some of the footage from the movie at the end. It looks like some of the space stuff,

like a highlight reel of the gang. Well, and during the um it looked like some of the they had some insert shots of like Imperial cruisers and TIE fighters and stuff that from the movie.

Remember when uh when Chewbacca like leans back and puts his hands behind his head? That's in there. It's It's like a just a highlight reel from the movie saying like, "Feel like this. Go see the movie."

Well, and also that means it doesn't match the look of the rest of it at all. Yeah, that's true.

It's just sort of inserted. They tried. They definitely tried. Um, and George Lucas is totally full of it because in 1987 he told Starlo magazine that the Christmas special would be out on video cassette very soon.

Yes. And in 2007, two years after that quote you just read where he's like, I don't even know what you're talking about. Basically, um, he apparently uh considered releasing the Christmas special as a bonus on the um the DVDs of the first three,

right? But did not didn't. And apparently Carrie Fischer told Lucas that if you want me to do um DVD extras,

commentary. Yeah. Commentary, then I want a a clean original copy of the holiday special.

Yes. So why you go ahead? So I can play at parties when I want people to leave.

It's pretty great. It is. So uh and there is one of those clean copies is floating around out there. So you can watch this in it in its entirety. Some of it, like the cartoon was removed due to copyright infringement and that kind of stuff, but as as the case with the rest of the internet, you can just go find it elsewhere and and piece it together. There's also the original ads that aired in Baltimore.

Yeah. That are just fascinating. Yeah, those are always fun. GM ads where one of the guys who's in quality control is he says, did you watch it?

I don't think I saw that one. He goes, um, we really care about these cars. That's no jive, man. on a GM ad serious.

Oh, they were trying to be hip. Yeah. Um, it's pretty good stuff. Uh, here's my final thought on it. I love it. It does not taint my Star Wars experience or my love for the franchise.

Okay. And I'm glad it is out there because it it's a it's a fun little stain that shouldn't be taken too seriously. Mhm.

Uh I think it adds to it actually because it's campy and awful. Yeah. And I don't know. Somehow that enriches the rest of it.

I'm with you. You like it? Oh yeah. I mean I watched it twice. I wouldn't have watched it a second. I wouldn't have made it through the first time. I Let me take that back. I as I'm a pro. Yeah.

So I would have made it through the first time. I wouldn't have watched it a second time if I wasn't There wasn't something about it. And I figured out I think the thing that I like the most about it is Lumpy Chewbacca's son. Yeah. played by an actress named Patty Maloney who frankly is hands down the best actor in the entire thing. She like her responses and everything is just awesome.

I think my favorite parts are uh well there's a great Wilhelm scream trooper trips over the log.

Jerry would not have noticed it. Uh, and then there's a part where all the Wookie dialogue you can't understand, but there's clearly one part where where Itchy and Lumpy are having an exchange where Lumpy, you can make it out, goes, "I love you."

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I noticed that, but it's covered up. But someone was like, "We have to have at least one exchange where you sort of know what they're saying."

Sure. Or they were like, "I think she said, "I love you. Should we have them redo it?" And the director's like, "No, I want to go." And Chuck, there's one other thing that I figured out from watching this.

What's that? It's not readily apparent. The whole thing is made all the more odd and that there's situation after situation after situation where we as normal audiences were trained to expect a laugh track, but there's not a laugh track.

Had there been a laugh track, yeah, it would it might have been less bizarre, but the fact that it's missing just makes your it agitates the mind. So, it's this whole additional element that

it is weird. I never thought about that. There's just weird moments of silence all throughout it.

Yeah. Like when Art Carney is doing his thing. Yeah. Telling jokes. Yeah. Uh, okay. I agree with you, Chuck. Don't take things too seriously. I think that's the great lesson in this.

Yeah. And it's the lesson of life day. It is. And in 2007, uh, Rift Tracks, the great, uh, Mystery Science Theater 3000 guys, Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett, and Kevin Murphy,

uh, provided audio commentary for the full version of the special. So, uh, try and go grab that if you can as well.

Oh, you can. It's on their site cuz it's great. I think it's like eight bucks. And those guys are awesome. And, um,

they are at least. Uh, I think Corbett listens to us. So, hey, Corbett, you got anything else?

No. No, I think we did this. There's some good stuff. Go read the Vanity Fair article, uh, Han Solo Comedy Hour. There's a book called How Star Wars Conquered the Universe that has a very interesting chapter about this. That's where we found it asserted that George Lucas never said that he would smash this thing with a sledgehammer.

Right. Um, and there's also an entire website dedicated to it. Star Wars holiday special.com.

Yeah. And, uh, if you want to know more about the Star Wars Holiday Special, we have a ton of Star Wars stuff on how stuff works, by the way. Yeah, we have cool um sort of fun articles about the Death Star and lightsabers,

videos with Holly Fry from stuff you missed in history class. Yeah, who she knows her stuff.

She does. Um so you can just type Star Wars in the search bar at houseuffworks.com and it'll bring up some cool stuff for you. Since I said search bar, it's time for listener mail. Uh hey guys, just finished listening to the Voinich manuscript podcast. Found it super interesting, especially the theories on its definition or origin. Uh, I know Josh mentioned Chuck's theory of it being drug induced is somewhat surprising or even unlikely given the language in the manuscript follows linguistic laws uh only founded in the past 100 years. But if you think about it, it's a tough it's tough to stray away from familiar structures, especially for something like language.

I think back to when I was younger and friends invented their own languages or even in writing a song or poetry, creativity can sometimes be limited by what we know. Uh, so just thought I'd contribute that to the conversation.

Nice. Thanks. Uh big thanks for all you guys do. I found the podcast after moving to San Diego in the last few years for some noise uh around my apartment. So basically, we were blocking out noise. We do that, which I love. Uh and then as a way to get through traffic on my commute home from work, you guys are far more interesting and enjoyable than television and YouTube videos. Sure, I've listened to hundreds and will continue to listen to hundreds more. Keep on keeping on. That is from Amy J. Muffet.

Thanks a lot, Amy in San Diego. Doesn't that mean like place of the whales in German or something like that? Yeah. Uh yeah, if you want to get in touch with us, you can send us an email, the stuff podcast at houseofworks.com. As always, join us at our home on the web, stuffyou know.com.

Stuff You Should Know is a production of iHeart Radio. For more podcasts, iHeart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

Questions about this episode

Who speaks in "Selects: Star Wars Holiday Spectacular | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW"?

Charles W. Chuck Bryant (Host), Jerry Jerome Roland (Producer / off-mic contributor (named in intro)), Harvey Corman (Actor), Jerry Roland (Host), Chester A. Arthur (Actor), Diane Carroll (Guest).

What is "Selects: Star Wars Holiday Spectacular | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW" about?

The main topic centers around the Star Wars Holiday Special, with a humorous discussion about its peculiar features and legacy. The hosts also reflect on their excitement for the Star Wars franchise, share their holiday wishes, and acknowledge the unique celebration of Life Day.

What is mentioned in this Stuff You Should Know episode?

281 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including Star Wars, Star Wars Holiday Special, Star Wars Holiday Special, Star Wars Holiday Special, Charles W. Chuck Bryant, Star Wars. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "Selects: Star Wars Holiday Spectacular | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW"?

The episode runs 54 min; the transcript is about 10,541 words in 300 timestamped sections.

More from Stuff You Should Know

About this transcript: the episode's spoken words as captioned on YouTube, split into timestamped sections. Reclip.Me locates every person, work and idea in the text, keeps the time it is first named, and quotes the words around it verbatim. Last updated February 24, 2026.