A few months back this writer wrote a summary of what he thought the Star Wars movies were about when he’d, in fact, not seen any of them. Now he’s been better educated, he realized that he was way off.

I’ve finally got my hands on a few copies of Star Wars, and now I can go back and learn about how wrong I am/was about the series! This past week I sat down with a few friends and watched the original, unedited, 1977 copy of Star Wars: A New Hope and the other two in the first trilogy and while I did like it, I’m disappointed with a few things.

After 23 years of hype, Star Wars just didn’t seem to wow me. While these are definitely fantastic movies, I think because I didn’t grow up around the hype, and everyone (and their mothers, literally) have been egging me to watch, they were less amazing than I thought they were going to be.

But, there are definitely a lot of things I didn’t expect! Check out what I’ve learned now that I’ve watched the original trilogy.

The scrolling text is VITAL to the plot information.

When I saw the scrolling text in the past, I never read it because I didn’t care – but now I’ve realized how important that text is. Here I thought Star Wars took place in the future, when in reality it was in the past and in a different galaxy! I’m never glossing over that weird scrolling text ever again.

Also, as a note: Never tell a Star Wars fan you don’t care about the scrolling text. They’ll go ballistic.

The lightsabers still make no sense.

I’ve accepted the fact that lightsabers are just whatever the hell George Lucas decides he wants them to be. At one point, apparently, Luke made his own lightsaber, and I had no idea. I’m told this by the friends I watched the movie with, yet there’s no mention of him making his own. I didn’t even know you could build your own lightsaber, and figured there’d be the space equivalent of a blacksmith for those light beams of death. Now I know why Disney theme parks have stations where you can “build your own,” though.

George Lucas just made things up as he went along.

I like how in The Empire Strikes Back Luke and Leia kiss to piss Han off (who I kept referring to as Hans; [fuck you, Frozen]) but then in Return of the Jedi it’s revealed that Leia is his sister. It’s like someone just decided that this would be the case, because that kiss is now gross when before it was kinda sexy. Is this the only thing he just made up on a whim?

Darth Vader switches sides!?

Okay, so when Luke was getting attacked by the Emperor I thought that he was going to kill Darth Vader to defend himself and/or his sister, and that he was going to overcome the “dark side” in him. But Darth Vader gets all mushy at the end and saves him!? Say what? I did not see that coming. I thought Darth Vader was always going to be an ass, but then his character actually developed. Now I just wanna give him a hug, as long as he keeps that mask on because giiiirl, he ugly.

Chewbacca is a pansy.

I am so disappointed with this furry man-beast. For some reason, all my life, I thought that Chewbacca was the type of thing/dog/person/alien that would be your guard dog/person/alien. I imagined him having a mighty roar and kicking ass, when in reality he’s a scared little puppy that whines a lot more than I imagined.

Sure, he’s strong and has absolutely had his amazing kick-ass moments; that’s without a doubt. But in comparison with what I envisioned, I am incredibly disappointed that Chewbacca wasn’t as strong as I’d hoped. And now that Peter Mayhew is coming back, I’m worried he’s going to whine even more.

Star Tours now makes sense.

Having worked at both Disneyland and Disney World now, I’ve ridden the Star Tours ride a bunch. Now that I’ve seen these first three movies, everything makes so much more sense! Before I was just riding for the adventure of it, and now I’ll try to figure out all the rest of the references they have in the theme parks. Although, something tells me I’m going to have to watch the prequels to get all of them.

Opinions about ‘Star Wars’ get intense.

Having lived in San Francisco and worked at the hipster-filled Apple Store, I know a lot of people who are completely obsessed with this franchise. When I post about my adventures in watching Star Wars, people get into gigantic debates about whether or not you should watch these in chronological order, if you should bother with the prequels, and so on. I hadn’t realized that people were so particular about the order of these movies! I’m just glad I got to watch the original 1977 version of the film(s), because apparently the remakes are terrible.

Should I watch the prequels?

Now that I’ve finally watched the original trilogy, I’m going to leave it to the commenters on Hypable to tell me if the prequels are worth my time. While I really enjoyed these first three movies, they’re probably not something I’ll put on to watch again unless a friend asks. But, I still want to be educated when the new Star Wars movie comes out in a couple years. So tell me: What should I do next?