With the very short arrival of the Star Wars franchise’s next episode, The Last Jedi, I decided to engorge myself on all things Star Wars; from the original trilogy, all the way to the latest tv shows being produced under the house of mouse. Now I am scraping the bottom of the barrel by taking a look at 1978 Star Wars Holiday Special. And if the death of all of my brain cells and the shattered remnants of my will to live are anything to go by; it sucked.

Sucked is a poor choice of wording. In essence, the show was an overly-drawn out spectacle of the proverbial horse being beaten to death in front of millions of Star Wars fans. And as much as you pray that it will be over soon; it won’t. The scars of this “feature” will fester and nullify into your bloodstream until you live with the pain of its existence every single day for the rest of your life. It is Banquo’s ghost haunting the one corner of your home; every bloody, ever painful, and forever mocking you for the poor choices you have made.

The show contains the golden trio of the original series; Luke, Leia, and Han as they race to get Chewbacca home to his family for a Wookie holiday known as “Life Day”.

Do we ever find out about what Life Day is?

No.

Do we get to see Han, Luke, and Leia for more than five minutes?

No.

Do we grow attached to the characters this special forces us to watch for an hour and a half? No!

I would have stopped watching the special after ten minutes if I had known that. Oh well, I’m already in the Fifth Circle of Hell. Why quit now? I’m so close to the sweet release of being chewed in the mouth of our Lord Lucifer; George Lucas. Might as well get it over with.

Not only does this special make us watch a group of Wookies, speaking in their native language without closed captions mind you, so you don’t know what they’re saying or what they’re doing. Their designs are terrifying and are just what I expected for a cheap television program.

While on the subject of cheap television, Bea Arthur and Harvey Korman make special guest appearances. Don’t know who those people are? That’s okay, I’m sure they would like you to forget that they were in this catastrophe. The rock band, Jefferson Starship also makes an appearance, ripping you from the so-called entertaining story and throwing you into an Every Breath You Take music video tinted purple.

I could forgive this special if it was just twenty minutes long; but no! It stretches out to the point of nearly being considered a Star Wars feature. I’ll backflip into my grave wearing a Morrissey halter top before I ever think about doing that. It lasts longer than should be physically possible, just when you think you will be relieved of the slow, boring gnawing of its dull fangs against your leg, you’re hit again with another scene. It’s jarring, the tone of it goes back and forth, writing is whatever label you want to give it. One of the Golden Girls and the first appearance of Boba Fett cannot save this special.

People view this…thing as God’s way of punishing mankind for its sins, but I disagree. This is the greatest modern example of Icarus flying too close to the sun. Much like his father, Daedalus, we remain to pick up the molten pieces of our ruined minds. You don’t realize how much this special has violated you until you go to try to sleep, only to be haunted by this program. You lie awake, staring up into the darkness, wondering It sucks part of your strength away, to the point that you just say, “Okay, I have literally watched the worst Star Wars piece of media, therefore I’m willing to dish out whatever money I have to so that I can see a good Star Wars movie.”

So do yourself a favor, and just accept that this special is not worthy of your time. Or else you’ll find yourself in a bit of an existential crisis much like myself.

This is the burden I must bear. And I must bear it alone.

Zero out of Five Stars.