You have to give George Lucas credit: Any filmmaker who starts his science fiction epic with the label "Episode IV" is thinking big. And when it debuted 30 years ago this week, Star Wars delivered on that outsized promise with bigger effects, bigger sound and a bigger fantasy world than the big screen had ever seen before.
The Star Wars franchise also meant big profits, an unstoppable Death-Star-sized money machine that has still never been matched in Hollywood history. Adjusting for ticket price inflation, Lucas' first Star Wars film grossed $1.17 billion at the box office, becoming the second-highest-grossing film of all time behind 1939's Gone With the Wind. At an original cost of only 13 million 1977 dollars, that makes Star Wars an incredible steal for studio 20th Century Fox.
Star Wars' initial release was followed by another five blockbuster films and a mini-industry of tapes and DVDs, toys, videogames and books. Taken together over its 30 years of cultural dominance, the Star Wars franchise has earned more than $22 billion.
In Pictures: Star Wars' Galactic Dollars
One key to the Star Wars phenomenon has been its never-ending cycle of releases and re-releases. In 1997, just as the original trilogy was fading from the collective consciousness, Lucas brought the three films back to theaters, punched up with new digital effects. The "Special Edition" films sparked a new round of Jedi- and Ewok-fueled mania. Three new films--the "prequels" to the original trilogy--debuted in 1999, and while each earned the ire of critics and the indifference of die-hard fans, they nonetheless broke box-office records.
Thanks to the incredible longevity of the Star Wars brand, kids today are nearly as hungry for plastic light sabers and X-wing flight simulators as they were in the 1980s. According to John Singh, a spokesman for Lucasfilm, Star Wars merchandise and videogames earned $1.5 billion in revenue last year, more than other high-profile movie franchises, including Superman, Spider-Man and Pirates of the Caribbean.
Sales of games and toys have made up the bulk of Star Wars revenue over the last three decades. Of its total revenue, only $6.68 billion has been generated at the box office. The largest chunk, more than $9 billion, has been shared by toy companies like Kenner and
Lucasfilm's success story has also helped boost the fortunes of companies like Parker Brothers, which created the first Star Wars-themed videogame, and Random House, which made $200 million in revenue from the first series of Star Wars novels. But the true emperor of the Star Wars galaxy is, of course, Lucas himself: Forbes estimates the Lucasfilm mogul's net worth at $3.6 billion.
In Pictures: Star Wars' Galactic Dollars
Arik Hesseldahl reported an earlier version of this story.
