re: Those who saw the original Star Wars trilogy in the theaters..

1. Star Wars: I was born 3 weeks later, so I didn't see it in theaters until 1997. However, I saw it for the first time on accident, as I accidentally turned on HBO instead of kids programming at the age of 5 (March of 83). I sat down on the couch and quickly saw my mistake as the HBO logo spun across the screen. I went to change the channel before I got in trouble, but the 20th Century Fox drums and visual quickly caught my attention. The initial words then hit the screen: "A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away...."
I was hooked! My mom came into the room as C3PO and R2 were walking through the sands of Tatoine. I quickly apologized. She asked me what I was watching, so I told her. She responded, "Oh! Star Wars is really good! You'll love it!" I remember thinking that my mom was keeping things from me! I watched it on HBO countless times over the next month or two.

2. Return of the Jedi: Soon after I had watched Star Wars for a 10th or 15th time, a friend told me that a new Star Wars was coming to the theater! I was nearly 6 and ready! I was super excited to see what Luke, Han, Leia, Chewy, Vadar, and the droids were now doing! What new adventures! What have they gotten themselves into? I can remember standing in line at the San Jacinto, Tx Mall theater for what seemed like forever! My mom, my best friend, his mom, and hundreds of other people. Many dressed like jedi knights!

...And SHOW TIME!

WTF??? Why was Han frozen in carbonite? How'd that happen? Vader's Luke's father!!??? He seems fairly nonchalant about it. Luke's a well trained Jedi? Yoda died!!?? Where did this Emperor come from? I was somewhat baffled, but LOVED the film!!! I was in Heaven!!! I bought so many toys!!!

3. Empire Strikes Back: Many months (maybe a year) after seeing the "2nd installment" of my favorite movie series (only series I knew at the moment), my family and I found ourselves in a small video store. I was walking around by myself, admiring all the showcase movies set up on special tables. They had the VHS and Betamax versions of each, so consumers could choose between the battling platforms. It was all so fascinating...but wait! What did I see??? There was this film called "The Empire Strikes Back," and the characters on the Betamax box looked just like my beloved Star Wars and Return of the Jedi heroes! I quickly brought it to my dad to share my excitement. He waved me off, basically telling me it was simply a straight to video film that had nothing to do with my favorite movies. I turned over the box and read the description to him, which included excerpts about our brave rebels and the evil empire! Luke! Vader! Han! I said, "Dad! It is the same characters!" He shook his head and said to go ahead and rent the movie and that I'd be disappointed when I realized I was wrong...

I watched that movie twice...in a row! It was PG, so I was allowed to watch it late at night by myself. I then woke up early the next morning and watched it again, missing some of my Saturday morning favorite cartoons! I was blown away! I was confused at first, but I quickly realized that this was a MIDDLE FILM!!! When I explained this to my father, he still didn't believe me. He refused to watch it. It was weeks later at a party where other grownups were discussing the trilogy that my father admitted he misunderstood me... That SOB!
Empire became very special for me, especially since I saw it out of sequence!

I was 10 and those movies were my favorites. I had star wars figures and watches and that sort of crap. It really captured your imagine in a big way at that age.

I was 5 when I saw Star Wars. All I remember is I wanted a light saber and a millennium falcon. I wound up with a lot of toys and used to have light saber wars with my friends all the time. Broke a lot of stuff because some sabers were flashlights with plastic tubes and others were flashlights with inflatable tubes. It was awesome.

Empire Strikes Back - I’m older. Kinda get the story - Luke good Vader bad. Thought Yoda sounded too much like a Sesame Street character and was weird. I didn’t believe the reveal, I just figured Vader was lying to him.

ROTJ - great movie tied it all up into nice little bow. Explained everything. Must say the Ewoks got on my last nerve. They were pointless to the movie. I just couldn’t see how little teddy bears with spears take down the Galactic Empire who was fixing their second Death Star.

Prequels- don’t get me started. Jar Jar ruined it all. I suffered through until the last one.

New ones - meh. Last one was the best but that doesn’t say a lot.

I was born in 69 so I was 8 when Star Wars hit the theaters. I didn't get to see it there but I can remember my older sister talking about it. Then you began seeing marketing for it and I was hooked. Even that shitball Christmas special got my undivided attention (because it was at least something). (I even got the Death Star playset for Christmas even though I had very little context for it) Eventually my neighbors got it on Betamax (they had the cash to afford such a beast) right as it came out so I was able to watch it before Empire was released (saw Empire and Return in theaters, could not get enough of them).

At the time you didn't have spoilers. There may have been one or two out there but you would have had to scour every cinema-related or fan-related periodical put out each week to find it. Without the interconnectivity of the internet the only way something was spoiled was if someone saw it before you and told you about it.

But then we weren't as obsessed with things not getting spoiled back then. If Little Tommy had been able to go to the midnight showing and was in school the next day, Little Tommy was the center of attention as he told everyone everything about the movie. The other kids would marvel at his tale and all it did was increase their desire to see it too (remember, cable wasn't very well established in anything other than major metro areas at that time so entertainment options were limited).

So it was more understood back then (at least among kids) that when someone was telling you about a movie it was going to include as much as they could remember.

They ran a lot of promotions plus the fast food chains sold ESB glasses and such.

Everyone knew it was coming out. Didn't really need social media.

I was 8 years old and remember standing in line for what seemed like forever to get tickets with my brothers and my dad. I remember wondering what the big deal was. I was blown away by it all. I remember leaving the theater afterwards thinking I wanted to turn around and go back in to watch it again. I had never really had any desire to re-watch a movie until that time.

This is more for the OP than anyone else, so sorry if TLDR.

Prior to Star Wars, there was really just 'science fiction', which had spaceships and aliens and futuristic stuff, but it was always stuff that made you THINK, often with a weird twist or "message". Stuff like Forbidden Planet, Planet of the Apes (5 movies and a TV series), 2001: A Space Odyssey, Silent Running, Star Trek, and Logan's Run (movie AND a TV series). Some special effects were pretty good (2001; Silent Running with its drones which were predecessors to Star Wars's droids) , but some were BAD (notably, Logan's Run and Star Trek).

But then Star Wars came out in 1977, the summer I was 12, the perfect age for it. The first inkling I had of it was in February or January 1977, as a trailer for the Gene Wilder/Richard Pryor movie Silver Streak. This is the same trailer:

Star Wars original trailer


Notice that the music background/soundtrack is not there. nor is the iconic Star Wars font with connecting ST and RS. My friend and I saw that trailer and thought it was the coolest thing ever, and we said we would definitely see that movie. We had no context of what was going on in those rapid-fire scenes, who the characters were, etc. But it sure looked cool as all hell, especially to a 12 year-old.

And you have to remember, we saw all those snippets just ONCE before the film came out. None of these seeing multiple commercials on TV, or seeing trailers on the internet as much as you want

The movie was to come out in early summer, but Marvel got the jump on the movies by starting their comic book adaptation a couple of months early. In early May before the film was released , I picked up issue #2; this was the cover:



IIRC, that issue covered from when Luke awakens from being knocked out by the sand people, up to when the Millennium Falcon is being sucked into the Death Star by the tractor beam. I got to know the basics of the characters -- Luke, Ben, the droids, introduced to Han and Chewie. There may have been an aside scene of Vader and Leia. That was the only issue I read before the movie came out, so, I didn't go into the movie totally clueless.

Shortly after school let out in late May, as I always did, I went to spend the summer with my grandparents and extended family in Biloxi (summers back then were heaven, but that's another story). I think the first weekend there, we all went to see the movie at the old Surfside Cinema; it was pretty much right when it came out.

Let me tell you, the movie BLEW ME AWAY. Seeing a portion of the interesting story in a comic book was one thing, but seeing the grand landscapes of Tatooine, the totally neat sets/furnishings, the vehicles, the glowing eye Jawas and the cantina aliens, the Millennium Falcon zooming around, and finally the way a light saber looked and sounded (especially when it was activated and extended) was something I had never seen before. The special effects (including the sound effects and their use in a "space movie") and camera angles were amazing. And it was like that all movie long! Action, gunplay, escapes, light saber duels, hologram chess, shooting at TIE Fighters that were attacking, etc.. Then it got to the climax, the attack on the Death Star. What I really remember as an "OH WOW" moment was when the Rebel Fighters-- which are now iconic, but which I had never scene before-- got the command to "go to X-Wing formation" AND THEIR WINGS OPENED UP TO MAKE X'S!!! That was like the coolest thing in the world to me. And then the triumphant ending to an almost perfect movie.

That movie played all summer long and well into the fall, almost to Christmas time. It was almost all we ever talked about as 12 year old boys, we became immediately one with the whole mythology of Jedi Knights and the Force, we pretended broom sticks were light sabers, when I would give my baby sister a 'pony ride' on all fours it was now a "bantha ride"; and we picked up whatever merch we could (soundtrack album, posters, T-shirts, etc.). I had some cousins in at Thanksgiving time from their podunk Minnesota hometown; they had never seen it and weren't as familiar with it, so I took them and they were blown away as well and then got into the whole thing.

The funny thing is no one knew how big it was going to be and there was a big delay in terms of toys, They weren't ready for Christmas 1977.

The after effects of its success were rather quick. The toys and such finally came out and sold millions. The characters became an immediate addition to pop culture; everyone knew who Darth Vader and R2-D2 were. By fall 1978, ABC network had come up with their Star Wars rip-off show, Battlestar: Galactica. Disney put forth their rip-off movie The Black Hole. The first big budget Star Trek movie came out in 1979 as did Buck Rogers in the 25th Century (movie and subsequent TV series). Heck, at the time I was in the GT program in middle school and for one of our extra activities we spent the whole spring semester of 1978 making our own Star Wars type rip-off movie in super 8mm, with crazy costumes, some cheap sets, spaceship miniatures filmed against a black fabric backdrop with Christmas tree light stars, and even a droid made of fruit crates and paper-mache'

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What was that experience like? I was too young to be able to do that. Was also pre-internet..released every 3 years without the general public knowing what was coming next. I remember life like that, and how conversation was on schoolyard playgrounds, friends houses, etc about whatever was exciting at the time.

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Saw it in 1977. I was 8. What an incredible experience. My cousin and I sat through it twice (paid for one though )