This week in 1982, Star Wars finally arrived on Home Video

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Forty-three years ago this month in June 1982, Episode IV A New Hope finally arrived on Home Video, a time that saw the then recently renamed 1977 original arrive in a new format designed to bring the galaxy to what just 5 million US based video recorder owners. Released to be rented rather than sold, the video broke all manner of records, changing the landscape just as it had half a decade before when it revolutionised cinema, but there’s plenty about this story you probably don’t know.

Mark Newbold
Mark Newbold
Exploring the galaxy since 1978, Mark wrote his first fan fiction in '81 and has been a presence online since webpage Fanta War in 1996. He is the EiC and Daily Content Manager of Fantha Tracks and currently contributes to ILM.com, SkywalkerSound.com, Star Wars – Das Offizielle Magazin, Journal of the Whills and Starburst Magazine, having previously contributed to magazines Star Wars Insider, Geeky Monkey, TV Film Memorabilia, Model and Collectors Mart, partworks Build Darth Vader, Star Wars Encyclopedia, and Build The Millennium Falcon, and websites Jedi.net, Jedi News, StarWars.com, Lightsabre.co.uk, and Wirezone. He is the only podcaster to have appeared on every Celebration podcast stage since it began in 2015 (hosting it four times), and is the co-host of Making Tracks, Canon Fodder and Start Your Engines on Fantha Tracks Radio.
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Forty-three years ago this month in June 1982, Episode IV A New Hope finally arrived on Home Video, a time that saw the then recently renamed 1977 original arrive in a new format designed to bring the galaxy to what just 5 million US based video recorder owners. Released to be rented rather than sold, the video broke all manner of records, changing the landscape just as it had half a decade before when it revolutionised cinema, but there’s plenty about this story you probably don’t know.

Mark Newbold
Mark Newbold
Exploring the galaxy since 1978, Mark wrote his first fan fiction in '81 and has been a presence online since webpage Fanta War in 1996. He is the EiC and Daily Content Manager of Fantha Tracks and currently contributes to ILM.com, SkywalkerSound.com, Star Wars – Das Offizielle Magazin, Journal of the Whills and Starburst Magazine, having previously contributed to magazines Star Wars Insider, Geeky Monkey, TV Film Memorabilia, Model and Collectors Mart, partworks Build Darth Vader, Star Wars Encyclopedia, and Build The Millennium Falcon, and websites Jedi.net, Jedi News, StarWars.com, Lightsabre.co.uk, and Wirezone. He is the only podcaster to have appeared on every Celebration podcast stage since it began in 2015 (hosting it four times), and is the co-host of Making Tracks, Canon Fodder and Start Your Engines on Fantha Tracks Radio.
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