George Lucas is the visionary mastermind behind the epic space opera saga Star Wars. The franchise was launched in 1977 with the commercial success of the original film. Despite its indispensable place in modern pop culture, the film faced some criticism when it was first released, primarily for its lack of sci-fi principles.
During an interview, Lucas addressed the criticisms surrounding the film, arguing that his vision was never to make a hardcore sci-fi film. Instead, Lucas shed light on his inspirations, which deviated from the core genre, proving that Star Wars was truly a unique cinematic experience. Here is what Lucas had to say about one common Star Wars criticism.
George Lucas admitted Star Wars wasn’t meant to make scientific sense
Filmmaker George Lucas directed 1977’s Star Wars, which emerged as a major commercial success and launched the epic space opera saga that is popular even today. However, the film was initially criticized for not making much scientific sense despite being a sci-fi movie.
During an interview with Originaltrilogy.com, Lucas addressed the criticism and admitted that he wasn’t striving for scientific accuracy with the movie. Instead, the filmmaker’s intention was to create a contemporary action adventure set in space.
It’s very surreal and bizarre and has nothing to do with science. I wanted it to be an adventure in space, like John Carter of Mars. That was before science fiction took over, and everything got very serious and science oriented.
Lucas made the above statement regarding the film’s subtext, adding that the film had more to do with disclaiming science than anything else.
Furthermore, Lucas admitted that the galaxy he created had an extremely different way of thinking and did not follow the usual rules of science fiction. Instead, the filmmaker wanted to tell a fantasy story and saw maintaining scientific accuracy as a hindrance to his goal.
George Lucas discussed his sci-fi inspirations behind Star Wars
In the same interview, Lucas also talked about drawing inspiration from the works of Alex Raymond, having been a fan of the latter’s Flash Gordon series. However, only after failing to get the rights to make a live-action adaptation of the series did Lucas realize he actually wanted to make a contemporary action fantasy.
Furthermore, the filmmaker explained that as a child, he read a lot of sci-fi novels. However, his interest wasn’t in the more technically hard sci-fi stories. Instead, Lucas admitted the fantastical and surreal aspects of some of the stories he read as a child.
Star Wars is a sort of compilation of this stuff, but it’s never been put in one story before, never put down on film.
Lucas made the above comment, explaining that he was more interested in the works of Harry Harrison instead of Isaac Asimov’s more hard sci-fi.
Moreover, Lucas also admitted to drawing inspiration from the Western genre, which was popular during the 1950s and 60s. The director was also inspired by mythology and samurai movies, describing his space opera saga as a very big ice cream sundae made from various influences.
Star Wars movies and shows are streaming on Disney+.
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