I wish I could remember where in Lileks I saw that bit that he wrote about why Lucas did Return of the Jedi
But aside from what we see onscreen, the Ewoks are miserable little creatures for a completely different reason: they are the single clearest example of Lucas’ willingness to compromise the integrity of his Trilogy in favor of merchandising dollars. How intensely were the Ewoks marketed? Consider this: “Ewok” is a household word, despite the fact that it’s never once spoken in the film.
Of course, the advice that I got right afterward from a third party – which was to just get over the entire Lucas betrayed fanboy thing – was probably very sensible. At least, I bristled at it, which is usually diagnostic.
Some more disturbing Trilogy errors. In watching Empire and Jedi last nite I noticed that Obi Wan and Vader refer to Obi Wan’s training having been delivered by Yoda. Ummmm so Qui Gon was just chump change especially since he was the one who trained Yoda to convene through the Force from beyond the dead.
Yoda trained everyone back then. Remember him with the Younglings?
The one ‘error’ that makes me wince though is when Obi Wan calls vader “Darth” over and over again. Clearly it wasn’t a title yet. 🙂