In 1977 George Lucas created a low-budget movie that would change cinema forever, of course, that movie was the original Star Wars and we all know that story, however, the popularity of Star Wars meant that the formula would be copied a number of times, most famously with the parody, Spaceballs starring Rick Moranis and John Candy, the Italian rip off, Star Crash with David Hasselhoff and Caroline Munro, and Battle Beyond the Stars, starring George Peppard and Robert Vaughn. Less well known is Hardware Wars, a 13-minute parody of Star Wars from 1978, directed by Ernie Fosselius, an actor/ director from California who is best known as the voice of the Rancor keeper in Return of the Jedi and who also worked on the sound for Spaceballs. 

Fosselius’ short was the first Star Wars parody and has been forgotten over the years, however, MVD has rediscovered the tapes and re-released it on Blu-ray for the first time. The story follows Fluke Starbucker (Scott Matthews), who discovers a message from Princess Anne Droid (Cinthia Freeling) requesting the help of Auggie ‘Ben’ Doggie (Jeff Hale). You all know the rest of the story, however, the character names may differ slightly, we get the evil Dark Nader, the droids 4-Q-2 and Artie Deco, space pirate, Ham Salad and his co-pilot Chew-Chilla, the Wookie Monster (a Sesame Street style puppet that evokes images of both Chewbacca and the Cookie monster). On top of all of this, Hardware Wars features household electrical appliances such as toasters and irons as spacecraft. George Lucas described it as his favourite Star Wars parody and I find it hard to disagree with him. Hardware Wars is a short but sweet cheapo that was shot in four days, but any Star Wars fan should enjoy this crazy but faithful adaption of the Star Wars story. It’s also worth noting that several members of the crew would go on to work on films such as The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Titanic, Man of Steel and Spaceballs.

As well as featuring the original version of Hardware Wars, the new disc from MVD features several different spoof versions of the film, including the director’s cut and the foreign version. As well as these extra versions of Hardware Wars we also get Ernie Fosselius’ other shorts movies, Porklips Now, a BBQ-themed spoof of Apocalypse Now, which has to be seen to be believed and Plan 9.1 from Outer Space, a puppet version of the Ed Wood Jr. classic, Plan 9 from Outer Space, which uses the original dialogue from Wood’s classic to great effect. The disc is rounded out with a Creature Feature interview with Fosselius and trailers for Hardware Wars, the first two Ghoulies films, Swamp Thing and The Man From Earth.

Overall, this is a very enjoyable set of short films, and while it may feel a little strange that there would be a full Blu-ray release for a 13-minute short film, the extra features including the various different versions of Hardware Wars and both Porklips Now and Plan 9.1 From Outer Space make it worthwhile owning for fans of cult cinema and Star Wars in particular.