George Lucas Cut A Star Wars Scene That Would Have Completely Changed The Jawas

As all "Star Wars" fans can tell you, Jawas are a species of desert-dwelling humanoid scavengers that live on the desert world of Tatooine. They trawl around the planet in a massive metal tank used to house droids, which they scavenge and re-sell. Like so many species in "Star Wars" they chitter and mutter in their own language. Their faces are eternally hidden underneath thick brown hoods, their glowing eyes the only thing visible. A group of Jawas is murdered by the Empire during its search for two droids in particular. No one seems to mourn their passing, implying that Jawas are considered wicked or undesirable by the more human-looking denizens of Tattooine. 

Not much else was revealed about the Jawas in "Star Wars," although, like so many things from the "Star Wars" franchise, the Jawas would eventually be more deeply explored in prequels, TV shows, video games, and other expanded universe lore. I shan't get further into Jawa history here. 

Way back in 1977, when "Star Wars" was first becoming a hit, writer/director George Lucas was interviewed by Rolling Stone, and he offered a lot of early insight into the making of the movie. Something else that "Star Wars" fans can tell you is that Lucas had huge, ultra-ambitious ideas for his movie, and had to abandon most of them because of timing, budget, or just the caprices of traditional script development. Lucas' first draft of "Star Wars" was dramatically different from what he ended up with. 

In the Rolling Stone interview, Lucas noted that his initial idea for the Jawas was to spend a lot more time with them. He envisioned a scene wherein the audience would see the Jawa village where they lived, noting that they were relegated to a life of squalor. 

The desert scenes in "Star Wars" were filmed in Tunisia, and George Lucas said that he had the location of the Jawa village all picked out. The only issue was that it was too far afield to make filming tenable, so the scene was cut. About the village, Lucas said: 

"The Jawas are more like scavengers, junk dealers. We had a Jawa village scene in the film, but we didn't shoot it because the location was too far away, we just cut that out to keep on budget. We found these great things in Tunisia, little grain houses that were four stories high but with little tiny doors, little tiny windows, it was a hobbit village. So we had a whole sequence with these little hobbit-world slum dwellers but we had to cut it out." 

Lucas might be referring to Ksar Ouled Soltane, a fortified granary in the south of Tunisia, that might have been constructed as early as 1699. The granaries are so striking that tourists and photographers visit them often. One can find photography of Ksar Oules Soltane easily enough online, and the buildings do look weirdly alien. One might easily be able to picture Jawas scurrying about in such a place. Several online fan websites have pointed out that the Tatooine sequences in "Star Wars" were filmed in Onk Jmal, while Ksar Ouled Soltane is about a five-and-a-half-hour drive southwest. Yeah, that's too far, especially for just one cute scene of a few Jawas living in their hobbit-like slum. 

Had it been included, though, the scene would entirely have changed the "Star Wars" canon of Jawas being a nomadic people. In the original draft of the script, the Sandcrawler was just their work vehicle, not their home.

The Rolling Stone interviewer also asked George Lucas if the Jawas were extrapolated from any kind of real-world people, and Lucas stated categorically that they weren't. If anything, he said, they were taken from a previous movie of his, "THX 1138." The director admitted: 

"They didn't really have any basis. The Jawas really came from 'THX.' They were the shell dwellers, the little people that lived underground in the shells. And in a way, part of 'Star Wars' came out of me wanting to do a sequel to 'THX.' Wookiees came out of 'THX' too. One of the actors who was doing some voice-over for radio talk, Terry McGovern, came up with the word Wookiee."

Wookiees are, of course, the giant species of hairy space sasquatches from "Star Wars." Chewbacca (Peter Mayhew) was a Wookiee, and audiences got to know his species much better in the following year's "Star Wars Holiday Special." Lucas, it seemed, was more concerned with the aesthetics of his space adventure than he was with any kind of cultural authenticity. Lucas said later in the Rolling Stone interview that the Jawa language was constructed by his sound designer, Ben Burtt, and that it wasn't based in any sort of real-world syntax. "Star Wars" is a pure fantasy. 

Whatever Lucas did, he did it right. "Star Wars" was a massive success, and blossomed into a sub-culture unto itself. The most recent "Star Wars" movie, "The Mandalorian and Grogu," was released earlier this year. That film has no Jawas, but it has more than its share of chittering little homunculi.