Mistakes often get made, and after looking at the card on the top, it would appear that Topps made quite a boner. It turns out that isn't the case. Often attributed to the airbrushing skills of a disgruntled or pranksterish artist, Lucasfilm has officially killed these rumors saying that they examined the untouched archive photo, and it appears exactly the same as it does on the card. Their theory is that a piece fell off the C-3PO costume as the photo was being taken and just happened to line up in such a way as make the image seem more exciting.
As to what part that might be, I'm uncertain. My first guess was that it was one of the rods that appear on Threepio's elbows, but they are visible in the photo, and not much large (unless of course the piece is actually much farther in front of Threepio than it appears).
In any case, retouching eventually did come into play, as Topps later replaced the card with a version less likely to raise any eyebrows, as can be seen in the bottom image.
Lucasfilm has a habit of rewriting history, so whatever they claim happened should be taken with a grain of salt. I love this card, and was atually there when someone asked Anthony Daniels to sign one. To say the least, he let the fan know how he felt about it.
ReplyDeleteMan, the gum that came with those cards was pretty terrible...no wonder i have so much bridgework! Swingin' post, man.
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