In 2027, Star Wars: A New Hope, the movie that ushered in the massively popular space franchise set in a galaxy far, far away, will celebrate its 50th anniversary. Today, it’s been announced that a rerelease of A New Hope in theaters will happen that year, making for a nice bonus along with getting the Ryan Gosling-led upcoming Star Wars movie Starfighter. However, this rerelease will be extra special for fans because it will give fans something they’ve been wanting for a long time: the original theatrical version of A New Hope.
Lucasfilm announced that “a newly restored version of the classic Star Wars (1977) theatrical release” will play for a limited time in theaters starting February 19, 2027. This rerelease was previously set for April 30 of that same year, so this is one of those rare instances of something arriving earlier to the big screen rather than delayed. The bigger deal, of course, is that this will mark the first time in years that the original version of A New Hope is officially made available to watch after years of being kept locked up, so to speak.
Since 1997, the “Special Edition” versions of A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi are the only ones that have been available to purchase on home media. The sole exception was the DVD versions that were first released in 2006 as separate purchases, then again in 2008 as a box set. Those releases included the original, unaltered versions of the Original Trilogy movies as bonus features, but there were various issues with the image quality. Otherwise, if you’ve ever wanted to watch A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi the exact way they were screened in theaters the first time around, you’d need to get ahold of VHS copies from the 1980s or early 1990s.
So with roughly three decades having passed since quality versions of the Original Trilogy were officially released, now Star Wars fans can see A New Hope back on the big screen just like it was presented in 1977. This is definitely a great way to celebrate the movie’s 50th anniversary, and I hope the same is done for The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi in 2030 and 2033, respectively. More importantly, I’m crossing my fingers that we’ll get to continue watching this restored version of A New Hope even after its limited theatrical run is done.
Meaning, Disney should make the unaltered version of A New Hope available to buy on home media again. This doesn’t mean that the Special Editions can’t continue to be sold, but at least give fans the option of choosing which one they want to own. At the very least, it’d be great if the theatrical A New Hope could be streamed with a Disney+ subscription, much like how you can screen IMAX-enhanced versions of movies on the streaming service.
Regardless, it’s excellent to hear that Star Wars: A New Hope in its original form will play in theaters a little over two years from now. But you don’t have to wait that long to see a Star Wars movie play on the big screen, as The Mandalorian & Grogu comes out on May 22 on the 2026 release schedule.
