The 7 Most Baffling Moments in the Star Wars Holiday Special

During this season of giving, everyone is doing their part to spread holiday cheer. But the universe demands a balance. All the sadness and cruelty in the world has to go somewhere. And thanks to a holiday tradition at my house, all that negative energy goes into my VCR and comes out as the Star Wars Holiday Special. The Star Wars Holiday Special was broadcast on TV in 1978 as a fine-print stipulation to the fiddle contest that George Lucas lost to the devil. It was terrible in every possible direction. If Hitler forced aliens to put on a variety show at gunpoint, you'd feel more comfortable watching it. To this day, parts of George Lucas sizzle and fall off if you mention it near him. Famous little person Warwick Davis actually started as a section of George Lucas that screamed and detached itself when the special first aired. And since that day, it has never been shown or legally distributed. I'd like to take a look back at the different segments that came together to make this one of history's worst anythings ever. There are two things to look out for in each one. The first is

Actor Indifference. Nearly all of principle actors from the film are here, and none of them are good enough at their job to hide how much they hate that fact. Harrison Ford in particular will read the lines but you can kiss his ass if you think he's going to try. If Kanye West's agent booked him on Hee Haw, he'd perform with more enthusiasm. And for this reason, each segment's Actor Indifference will be measured in

Angry Han Solo Heads. The more you see, the less people cared. The other thing to look out for in each segment is Craziness. The plot that weaves all the musical and variety acts together is based around Chewbacca's family, and they live under space power lines. There's his sweetly retarded wife Malla, his crotchety dad Itchy, and his rapist-eyed son Lumpy, all of whom look like the aftermath of a raccoon fight. Nothing they do makes sense, even in the context of space apes. So each segment's

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Craziness will be measured in Leering Lumpy Heads. Each one represents approximately 5 diagnosable mental disorders or drug problems. Segment 1: Meeting Chewbacca's Family At Chewbacca's home, his family is expecting him home for Life Day, and they're starting to get worried. I think. The first ten minutes are spoken entirely in unsubtitled Wookiee and accompanied by meaningless gesturing. You'd think a race whose language is based on the sounds donkeys make during sex would learn some sign language. But they haven't. The actors in these fur suits are so terrible at pantomiming that if they tried to signal for a waiter to get their check, they'd end up with a regionally offensive gesture up their ass and a missing eye. They might as well have filmed this shit in Braille. Chewbacca's wife calls Luke Skywalker and R2D2 to see if they've heard from Chewbacca, but the two of them don't speak Wookiee any better than the viewer, and one of them can only beep, so it just adds to the confusion. And when she finally gets hold of someone who can understand her, it's a shopkeeper surrounded by Imperial spies who can only speak to her in code. If my grandmother and a dog had a conversation about checking their email, it would be less confusing than this.