The "Star Wars Gangsta Rap" is a

parody A parody, also known as a spoof, a satire, a send-up, a take-off, a lampoon, a play on (something), or a caricature, is a creative work designed to imitate, comment on, and/or mock its subject by means of satiric or ironic imitation. Often its sub ...

song based on the original ''

Star Wars ''Star Wars'' is an American epic space opera multimedia franchise created by George Lucas, which began with the eponymous 1977 film and quickly became a worldwide pop-culture phenomenon. The franchise has been expanded into various film ...

'' trilogy. The song was later popularized as a

Flash Flash, flashes, or FLASH may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Fictional aliases * Flash (DC Comics character), several DC Comics superheroes with super speed: ** Flash (Barry Allen) ** Flash (Jay Garrick) ** Wally West, the first Kid F ...

-animated

music video A music video is a video of variable duration, that integrates a music song or a music album with imagery that is produced for promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a music marketing devic ...

and was the first winner of the Audience Choice Award in the

Lucasfilm Lucasfilm Ltd. LLC is an American film and television production company and a subsidiary of Walt Disney Studios, which is a business segment of The Walt Disney Company. The studio is best known for creating and producing the '' Star Wars'' and ...

-sponsored Official Star Wars Fan Film Awards.

Version history

The "Star Wars Gangsta Rap" started out as a song, written by Jason Brannon and Chris Crawford, with vocals by Brannon, drum machine by Crawford and Leonard, and keyboard by Brian Leonard. The group billed themselves as Bentframe. Animator Thomas Lee discovered the rap in 2000 and used it as a basis to practice his developing

skills. This became the first (and most widely seen) version of the video. After showing the finished results to Bentframe, they together formed BentTV. Due to the project's success, BentTV later created an improved version, referred to as the Special Edition, which debuted at the 2004 Official Star Wars Fan Film Awards. The audio track was not changed, but the visuals were completely redrawn, with improved color and shading and more detailed motion, all while emulating the relevant scenes in the movies more closely and adding more. The improvement in animation is analogous to

Industrial Light & Magic Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) is an American motion picture visual effects company that was founded on May 26, 1975 by George Lucas. It is a division of the film production company Lucasfilm, which Lucas founded, and was created when he began pr ...

's 1997 Special Edition film touch-ups.

Synopsis

Employing some of the elements of

gangsta rap Gangsta rap or gangster rap, initially called reality rap, emerged in the mid- to late 1980s as a controversial hip-hop subgenre whose lyrics assert the culture and values typical of American street gangs and street hustlers. Many gangsta rappe ...

and hip hop music, stances and dancing, "Star Wars Gangsta Rap" loosely mixes plotlines from the first ''Star Wars'' feature its sequel ''

The Empire Strikes Back ''The Empire Strikes Back'' (also known as ''Star Wars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back'') is a 1980 American epic space opera film directed by Irvin Kershner from a screenplay by Leigh Brackett and Lawrence Kasdan, based on a stor ...

'' (and follow-up ''

Return of the Jedi ''Return of the Jedi'' (also known as ''Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi'' is a 1983 American epic space opera film directed by Richard Marquand. The screenplay is by Lawrence Kasdan and George Lucas from a story by Lucas, who ...

'' in the Special Edition), satirically recreating several of the more famous scenes and dialogue. The music video starts out on the back of the

Star Destroyer Star Destroyers are capital ships in the fictional ''Star Wars'' universe. Star Destroyers were produced by Kuat Drive Yards, later Kuat-Entralla Engineering, and serve as "the signature vessel of the fleet" for the Galactic Republic, Galactic Em ...

, then reveals the image of

Emperor Palpatine Sheev Palpatine, also known by his Sith name Darth Sidious, is a fictional Character (arts), character in the ''Star Wars'' franchise created by George Lucas. Initially credited as the Emperor in the original trilogy films, ''The Empire Strikes ...

who claims "it's not the east or the west side."

Darth Vader Darth Vader is a fictional character in the ''Star Wars'' franchise. The character is the central antagonist of the original trilogy and, as Anakin Skywalker, is one of the main protagonists in the prequel trilogy. ''Star Wars'' creator George ...

appears as a rapper sidekick or

hypeman A hype man, in hip hop music and rapping, is a backup rapper and/or singer who supports the primary rappers with exclamations and interjections and who attempts to increase the audience's excitement with call-and-response chants. The hype man's in ...

and replies "No, it's not." This continues until the Emperor says "it's the ''Dark'' Side", at which point Vader says "You are correct." The Emperor then threatens to blow up the planets of "all you Vader haters out there." Darth Vader and the Emperor alternate rapping during the first verse, until Vader proclaims, "He /nowiki>Luke_Skywalker.html" ;"title="Luke_Skywalker.html" ;"title="/nowiki>Luke Skywalker">/nowiki>Luke Skywalker">Luke_Skywalker.html" ;"title="/nowiki>Luke Skywalker">/nowiki>Luke Skywalker/nowiki> will join us or die. We've got Death Star". Images of the Death Star appear in the background, and the line is repeated by Vader, while Stormtrooper (Star Wars), Stormtroopers dance in the background. The next verse begins with Luke Skywalker's at his family's moisture farm on

Tatooine Tatooine () is a fictional desert planet that appears in the '' Star Wars'' franchise. It is a beige-colored, desolate world orbiting a pair of binary stars, and inhabited by human settlers and a variety of other life forms. The planet was fir ...

, with his uncle

Owen Lars This incomplete list of characters from the '' Star Wars'' franchise contains only those which are considered part of the official ''Star Wars'' canon, as of the changes made by Lucasfilm in April 2014. Following its acquisition by The Walt Di ...

issuing commands at him. Luke raps the second verse, with

C-3PO C-3PO () or See-Threepio is a humanoid robot character in the ''Star Wars'' franchise who appears in the original trilogy, the prequel trilogy and the sequel trilogy. Built by Anakin Skywalker, was designed as a protocol droid intended to assis ...

and

R2-D2 R2-D2 () or Artoo-Detoo is a fictional robot character in the ''Star Wars'' franchise created by George Lucas. He has appeared in ten of the eleven theatrical ''Star Wars'' films to date. At various points throughout the course of the films, R2, ...

appearing in the background. In the next verse,

Obi-Wan Kenobi Obi-Wan Kenobi () is a fictional character in the ''Star Wars'' franchise. Within the original trilogy, Obi-Wan is a Jedi Master as a supporting character and is portrayed by English actor Alec Guinness. In the later-released prequel trilogy, ...

tells Luke to "use the Force and run...", whereupon Luke takes his

X-wing fighter The X-wing starfighter is a name applied to a family of fictional spacecraft manufactured by the Incom Corporation from the ''Star Wars'' franchise. Named for the distinctive shape made when its s-foils (wings) are in attack position, the X-win ...

Dagobah Dagobah is a fictional planet and eponymous star system appearing in the ''Star Wars'' films ''The Empire Strikes Back'', ''Return of the Jedi'', and ''Revenge of the Sith'', and other media. It is depicted as a world of murky swamps, steaming ...

Yoda Yoda () is a fictional character in the ''Star Wars'' universe, first appearing in the 1980 film ''The Empire Strikes Back''. He is a small, green humanoid alien who is powerful with the Force and is a leading member of the Jedi Order until it ...

appears next, and he and Luke trade raps, until Luke gets back in his X-wing. During a brief intermission, he enjoys "a mighty good

gin and tonic A gin and tonic is a highball cocktail made with gin and tonic water poured over a large amount of ice. The ratio of gin to tonic varies according to taste, strength of the gin, other drink mixers being added, etc., with most recipes calling f ...

", then flies to Cloud City and confronts Darth Vader. Vader and Luke engage in a

lightsaber A lightsaber is a fictional energy sword featured throughout the '' Star Wars'' franchise. A typical lightsaber is depicted as a luminescent plasma blade about in length emitted from a metal hilt around in length. First introduced in the ori ...

duel, whereupon Vader cuts off Luke's hand, then reveals that he is his father.

Han Solo Han Solo is a fictional character in the '' Star Wars'' franchise created by George Lucas. The character first appeared in the 1977 film '' Star Wars'' portrayed by Harrison Ford, who reprised his role in '' The Empire Strikes Back'' (1980) an ...

appears in the final verse repeating "Knock him out the box, Luke, knock him out..." This is an homage to the outro of the song "

Children's Story "Children's Story" is a song recorded by British-American hip hop artist Slick Rick. Taken as the second single from his album ''The Great Adventures of Slick Rick'', the song was a Top 5 hit on both the Hot R&B Singles and the Hot Rap Tracks ...

" by rapper

Slick Rick Richard Martin Lloyd Walters (born January 14, 1965), better known as Slick Rick, is an English-American rapper and record producer. He rose to prominence with Doug E. Fresh & the Get Fresh Crew in the mid-1980s. Their songs " The Show" and " ...

Awards legacies and sequels

"Star Wars Gangsta Rap" is one of the most popular flash videos of all time, with more than 20 million online views. Editors of ''

Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and event (philosophy), events that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various me ...

'' magazine listed it as the Best Online Comedy Movie of 2001. The film won the Audience Choice at the inaugural Official Star Wars Fan Film Awards in 2002, and it was broadcast on the

Sci Fi Channel Syfy (formerly Sci-Fi Channel, later shortened to Sci Fi; stylized as SYFY) is an American basic cable channel owned by the NBCUniversal Television and Streaming division of Comcast's NBCUniversal through NBCUniversal Cable Entertainment. Lau ...

special on the awards. Clips from "Star Wars Gangsta Rap Special Edition" appear in the VH1 special ''When Star Wars Ruled the World'' in 2004. It has inspired other similar works and imitations, notably ''The Lords Of The Rhymes'', done very much in the style of the ''Star Wars Gangsta Rap'' but instead parodying ''

The Lord of the Rings ''The Lord of the Rings'' is an epic high-fantasy novel by English author and scholar J. R. R. Tolkien. Set in Middle-earth, intended to be Earth at some time in the distant past, the story began as a sequel to Tolkien's 1937 children's bo ...

'' trilogy. Another BentTV ''Star Wars'' parody cartoon was created in 1999. It is a fake advertisement for a ''Star Wars Christmas'' CD hosted by Han Solo. Director Thomas Lee would later animate the video for

"Weird Al" Yankovic Alfred Matthew "Weird Al" Yankovic ( ; born October 23, 1959) is an American singer, musician, songwriter, record producer, actor and author. He is best known for creating comedy songs that make light of pop culture and often parody specific ...

's song "I'll Sue Ya" on his 2006 album "

Straight Outta Lynwood ''Straight Outta Lynwood'' is the twelfth studio album by "Weird Al" Yankovic, released on September 26, 2006, the title drawing inspiration from hip hop group N.W.A's ''Straight Outta Compton''. It was the sixth studio album self-produced by ...

". An unofficial sequel, "Star Wars Gangsta Rap 2", featuring far more explicit lyrics was made, followed by "Star Wars Gangsta Rap 3". Both were made incorporating references to the ''Star Wars'' prequel trilogy. In November 2009, an official sequel, "Star Wars Gangsta Rap: Chronicles", was released on Atom.com.

References

External links

"Star Wars Gangsta Rap" video
*
Interview with animator Thomas Lee
Newgrounds.com, August 2004 {{Non-canon Star Wars 2000 films 2000 independent films Fan films based on Star Wars Flash animated web series Star Wars parodies 2000s hip hop films 2000s English-language films 2000s American films