While our last entry may have seemed critical of the Star Wars saga, we can’t disregard its many technical innovations and narrative risk-taking. Keith Phipps (“Why Star Wars?,” thedissolve.com, November 14, 2014) gives a good example of these risks:

By opening with C-3PO and R2-D2, Star Wars thrusts viewers into its world and counts on them to be engaged enough to figure out what’s going on. Even if Star Wars’ title hadn’t been amended to add “Episode IV,” it would still feel like a story already in progress, complete with talk of a Galactic Senate, a never-seen Emperor, spice-smuggling (an homage to Frank Herbert’s Dune), and a past filled with Jedi. The action stops for the occasional explanation, but more goes unexplained. 

And when you think about it, the characters are introduced gradually, in large expository scenes that allow each one to position him- or herself. It’s fair to wonder whether, in the current screenwriting climate, this approach would even be used if the episode were remade.