Knowing how it all turned out, the Luke and Leia kiss is a bit cringeworthy. From the looks of this, maybe they were not supposed to be bro and sis.
In the original “Star Wars”, it seemed like a romance might be blossoming between Luke and Leia. It wasn’t until “Return of the Jedi” in 1983 that we found out they were SIBLINGS.
Well, there’s a TV ad for “Star Wars” that aired in 1977 that’s pretty weird in retrospect. Because it concentrates SOLELY on the supposed budding “love affair” between them.
It opens up with narrator saying, quote, “From the moment he saw her image, he had to find her.”
Then later it says, quote, “Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia . . . in danger, in love, in ‘Star Wars’. No legendary adventure of the past could be as exciting as this romance of the future.”
So the question is, did George Lucas even KNOW Luke and Leia were going to be brother and sister when he made “Star Wars”? Or was it just the marketing department that was in the dark?
Maybe the ad was meant to make the reveal even that more surprising? That would have been weird . . . but kind of brilliant.
(AV Club)
