Original Star Wars On DVD Non-Anamorphic?

In a move that is sure to leave heads scratching and bring the "Lucas raped my childhood" fanboys out of the woodwork, The Digital Bits reported yesterday that the upcoming "Limited Edition" releases of the Star Wars Trilogy will NOT have the original movies in the 16x9 anamorphic format.

That's bad news for widescreen TV owners everywhere, since it basically means they'll need to either "zoom in" on the picture (and thus reduce picture quality) to have it fill their TV screens, or they'll simply have to settle for watching the originals "window boxed," with black bars on both the top and sides of the screens.

It is important to note that the "Special Edition" versions on these releases WILL be 16x9 anamoprhic...but those versions are already out on DVD - it was the inclusion of the original, unchanged versions of the movies that had Star Wars fans everywhere excited about these DVDs. Now one wonders if anyone out there will even bother to pick up these releases, since the original versions contained within are nothing more than dubs of the old laserdisc versions that most die-hard fans already have their hands on.

Keep in mind that we've heard nothing "official" from Lucasfilm yet on the anamorphic issue...but no news could be bad news in this case, since if the originals really are non-anamorphic, they probably won't be going out of their way to advertise it.

For the complete Digital Bits story on this rumor, click HERE.