SNOKES: Han Shot First, Lucas Lied Second

C-3PO: Oh, my stars, Han shot first!

Han Solo: Of course. It was me or him. Why wouldn't I?

C-3PO: That is a subject of some debate.

-LEGO Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Out

It's the most famous movie alteration in history. For 20 years, Han and Greedo's confrontation in Chalmun's Cantina ended the same way: Greedo threatened to kill Han, so Han killed him first in self defense. As they were talking, Han tapped on the wall with the fingers on his left hand to keep Greedo distracted as he pulled his blaster out with his right hand and position it under the table. Then, at the right moment, Han took the opportunity to get the drop on Greedo. I was five years old when I watched A New Hope for the first time, sometime after Christmas 1995. My mom was watching with me, and she explained what was going on, so I was able to understand even at that young age that Han did what he needed to do.

Then, in 1997, the Special Edition of A New Hope opened in theaters. A new shot (no pun intended) was inserted in between Han's line "Yes, I'll bet you have." and Greedo being shot through the table. Now Greedo shoots at Han at point blank range and somehow misses, followed immediately by Han shooting through the table. Additional alterations have Han and Greedo shooting simultaneously, and Greedo getting the last word as he says "Ma klounkee!" (which translates to "It will be the end of you!" per The Phantom Menace.)

When addressing the controversy 15 years later in 2012 with The Hollywood Reporter, George Lucas said the following:

The controversy over who shot first, Greedo or Han Solo, in Episode IV, what I did was try to clean up the confusion, but obviously it upset people because they wanted Solo [who seemed to be the one who shot first in the original] to be a cold-blooded killer, but he actually isn’t. It had been done in all close-ups and it was confusing about who did what to whom. I put a little wider shot in there that made it clear that Greedo is the one who shot first, but everyone wanted to think that Han shot first, because they wanted to think that he actually just gunned him down.

Lucas saying, "it upset people because they wanted Solo to be a cold-blooded killer" is absolutely wrong. It was always obvious that Han was shooting in self defense, and he wasn't waiting for anything to happen past threating words. (Young Han does the same in Solo: A Star Wars Story.) The focus of this fact check is going to be on Lucas' assertion that, "It had been done in all close-ups and it was confusing about who did what to whom. I put a little wider shot in there that made it clear that Greedo is the one who shot first..." as if it had always been the intention of the scene since 1977.

According to the screenplay widely available online, Lucas wrote the following:

Suddenly the slimy alien disappears in a blinding flash of light. Han pulls his smoking gun from beneath the table as the other patron look on in bemused amazement. Han gets up and starts out of the cantina, flipping the bartender some coins as he leaves.

There was no mention of Greedo shooting first in Lucas' own words from 1976. This should be the end of the discussion right here, but since Lucas was the one directing the movie, maybe he felt he didn't need to mention that factoid. If he felt it was important to the story, he'd communicate it to the people adapting it into a novel, into comics, and into the National Public Radio drama, right?

In the novelization (credited to George Lucas) author Alan Dean Foster described the moment in one sentence:

Light and noise filled the little corner of the cantina, and when it had faded, all that remained of the unctuous alien was a smoking, slimy spot on the stone floor.

The Marvel comic depicts the moment in one wordless panel:

In the panel, Han shoots above the table and with his left hand, but he's still the only one shooting.

In adapting the movie into a radio drama, Brian Daley wrote the scene in the following way.

Sound: A loud report of a blaster. Customers cry out in surprise, and Greedo moans, gurgles, and slumps, thumping his head on the table.

HAN: Rest in peace, Greedo! I can shoot just as well under a table as across one. How's that for the old Solo cunning?

The episode audio omits the line about "the old Solo cunning", but other than that the moment is the same. Han admits to shooting from under the table, with no quip about Greedo having shot and missed.

In Star Wars Journal: Hero for Hire (1998) author Donna Tauscher wrote in character as Han:

It's not that I like eliminating unsavory characters in my free time, you know, but I'm not gonna let myself be had either. I chatted with him in a real friendly way. He wasn't as smart as he was greedy. I pulled a blaster out from under the table real easy and Greedo was no more.

The framing device for the journal is that a B'omarr monk historian is recording Han's history. On one hand, of course if Han was recounting what happened between him and Greedo, he would not admit to Greedo shooting at him first. On the other hand, since he is recounting the story to a monk, even if he wasn't religious, he would emphasize that he had no choice to shoot Greedo because Greedo shot at him first, if such a thing had actually happened.

Four different adaptations all depict Han being the only one to shoot in the scene. Han was still shooting in self defense, even if he hadn't been shot at first.

Despite the change that was made in that one scene in A New Hope, Han is still depicted as shooting first without provocation when the Cloud City door opens, revealing Darth Vader and Boba Fett are waiting for Han and Leia. And of course, another Harrison Ford character in a George Lucas story, Indiana Jones just pulls out a gun and shoots a man instead of sword fighting him in [Indiana Jones and the] Raiders of the Lost Ark. (A funny scene done out of necessity because Harrison Ford had food poisoning and couldn't shoot the sword fight as originally scripted.)

SNOKES: Luke Skywalker Gets Carrie-d Away

We all know the moment. Having triumphantly landed back on Yavin IV after blowing up the Death Star, Luke climbs out of his X-Wing. Leia runs over shouting Luke, and as Luke embraces her, it sounds like Mark Hamill, caught up in the moment, flubs and calls her by the actress' first name "Carrie!", instead of the character's name, Leia.

It's believable, after all, because this is also the movie that includes a blooper where a stormtrooper accidentally hits his head going through a doorway. That error has since been highlighted with a sound effect being added to the hit in all post-1997 versions of the movie, a purposely added moment of Jango Fett hitting his head while boarding his ship in Attack of the Clones (even though stormtroopers are not clones of Jango), a short story in the anthology novel From a Certain Point of View that gives an in-universe explanation, and a short documentary examining the claims of three actors who all say they were the stormtrooper who hit their head on set.

Hamill himself has weighed in on the alleged "Carrie!" flub on Twitter, in October 2015 and again in July 2019. He claims that Luke was saying "There she is!", only saying "There she..." before being cut off. He further claims that the line was not on-set recorded audio, but instead recorded in post-production and added into the movie's audio. If that's the case, why wasn't a clearer take used than what is featured in the movie? After all, three different audio mixes were created for Star Wars's original theatrical run. First a Dolby Stereo mix was created, then a six-channel mix was created for 70mm screenings, and then a mono mix was created for the majority of movie theaters. According to Ben Burtt in the audio commentary for A New Hope, slight changes were made during the creation of the six-channel mix and the mono mix. There was plenty of opportunity to use a better take of Luke exclaiming "There she..." if indeed it was from the ADR process.

The DVDs, Blu-rays, and most digital copies did not make any attempt to subtitle what Luke says, until Disney+ in November 2019 which claims he says "Leia!". Since Hamill had already gone on record before Disney+ launched, Disney+ (or DVDs/Blu-rays) could have added "There she..." if that was Luke's intended line, but they didn't.

Like with George Lucas' claim that Greedo always shot at Han, that it just wasn't clear because of the way the scene was edited, if it was always the intention for Luke to shout "There she...", it didn't appear anywhere else outside of the movie. In the 1976 novelization by Alan Dean Foster (credited to George Lucas), Luke does not say anything to Leia when she runs to him and embraces him.

As they laughed, a lithe figure, robes flowing, rushed up to Luke in a very unsenatorial fashion. “You did it, Luke, you did it!” Leia was shouting.

She fell into his arms and hugged him as he spun her around. Then she moved to Solo and repeated the embrace. Expectantly, the Corellian was not quite as embarrassed.

In the 1977 Marvel comic book adaptation, the scene plays out in a very similar way to how it does in the novelization.

But the novel and comic book were both written and published while the movie was in production, and wouldn't reflect any script changes made during shooting or post-production.

So what about adaptations post-1977? In the National Public Radio dramatization, the published script has the following lines:

LEIA: (COMING ON) Luke! Oh Luke, we won! We won!

LUKE: We never would have if Han hadn't changed his mind.

The audio recording plays out the same way, but includes Luke responding "Leia!" after she first exclaims his name.

Ryder Windham's 2004 junior novelization, which transcribes all of the lines from the movie verbatim, records the scene like this:

After landing in the main hangar at the Rebel base on Yavin 4, Luke climbed out of his battered X-wing to be greeted by a throng of cheering Rebels. As he descended the ladder beside his ship, he searched the crowd for one face in particular, and then he saw her.  

“Luke!” Leia shouted as she rushed to him. She threw her arms around his neck and they danced around in a circle. As Luke spun, he saw C-3PO make his way through the crowd to stand beside the X-wing, then saw Han and Chewbacca come running toward them.

If Luke's intended line was supposed to be "There she is!", it would make sense to be included here, where it specifically states he was searching the crowd for her. Instead, Windham does not, like the DVD and Blu-ray subtitles, attempt to attribute any exclamation to Luke.

Alexandra Bracken's 2015 junior novelization, The Princess, The Scoundrel, and the Farm Boy, describes the scene in the following way:

    “Luke!” Leia ran toward him, a blur of white pushing through the crowd. “Luke!”
    He somehow managed to catch her as she slammed into him, laughing. He swung her around in a huge hug, setting her down just as Han came up behind them, grinning from ear to ear.

Once again, no attempt is made to give Luke an exclamation. (The book was published 20 days before Hamill first tweeted alleging the line was "There she is!")

None of the sources from outside of the movie contradict Hamill's assertion, but neither do they support his claim either. You'd think if it had been known since 1977 what Luke was supposed to say, it could have been included in a secondary source. Also, the movie has famously had alterations given to it in 1997, 2004, 2011,  and 2019. At any point, an alternate take of Luke saying "There she..." could have been added to the audio mix if one existed.

The sources would support the idea that Luke was supposed to respond with "Leia!" as he does in the NPR drama and which the Disney+ version now claims he does. But, in an on-set error that wasn't caught, like with the stormtrooper's bonk, Hamill accidentally said the wrong name, and it's been preserved for nearly 50 years in the movie, but ignored in the subtitles, novelizations, and comics.

Edited on January 19, 2024 to include information about the multiple theatrical audio mixes.