Boba Fett Was Originally the Main Villain in STAR WARS: EPISODE VI
Wow! What a missed opportunity to do something awesome for one of the most iconic characters in the Star Wars universe. During the early development of Return of the Jedi, there were already plans for three more films that would focus on Luke Skywalker taking on Darth Vader and the Emperor. That was the original story arc for Episodes 7, 8, and 9. That means Return of the Jedi would have been something completely different.
During an interview with Inverse.com, former Lucasfilm fan relations officer Craig Miller revealed that Episode VI would have focused more on Boba Fett as the main villain and Han Solo as the hero. Miller explained:
"Originally Boba Fett was set up in Empire as a character, and the third movie’s plot was going to be more about Boba Fett, rescuing Han Solo and all of that. Boba was gonna be the main villain… That was set up, why he was taking Han Solo away, why there was a thing with him in the Christmas special."
When the second trilogy of films was canceled, the plans for Boba Fett's story arc were also scrapped. Miller goes on to say:
“When George decided not to make a third trilogy, he completely jettisoned that story line, which is why in the first ten minutes, Boba Fett gets bumped into and falls into the mouth of a giant monster. So he took what was planned for the third trilogy, which was the confrontation between Luke and Darth Vader, and the battle with the Emperor, and that got squished down from three movies to one movie. And that became the plot of Jedi.”
How crazy is it that Boba Fett went from having this epic storyline to stupidly getting killed off!? So why did George Lucas dump his plans for more Star Wars films at the time? He lost interest in it!
“At first there was one film, and then George originally announced that it was one of 12, and there were going to be 12, and then that changed to, oh there was never 12, there was only 9, and he was going to make 9. And then during all of it, George kind of lost interest in continuing it… While we were working on The Empire Strikes Back, George decided he was going to complete the first film trilogy and that would be it.”
Miller then recalls the day when Lucas told him he was going to make the Star Wars movie then retire from making big movies to make experimental films:
“And I remember sitting in a mixing room with George, working on Empire, and he told me he was just going to make the third movie, which didn’t have a title at that point, and then stop. He was going to retire from making big movies and make experimental movies. And that’s why the whole plot of the third movie, what became Return of the Jedi, completely changed.”
Sound familiar? That's because we've heard Lucas say the same thing several times before. Apparently, that's what Lucas is supposed to be doing now since he sold Lucasfilm to Disney. I guess we'll never know because he said he would never release any of these "experimental films."
I would have loved to see that original Boba Fett and Han Solo storyline for Episode VI, and a full trilogy dedicated to Luke Skywalker going up against the Emperor and Darth Vader could have been epic!