The fourth disc in the “Star Wars Trilogy” four-disc box set is devoted to bonus materials. The major offering here is a two-and-a-half-hour (!) making-of documentary titled “Empire of Dreams: The Story of the ‘Star Wars’ Trilogy.” I found the documentary to be informative, but prosaic and corporate. But I think there’s some interesting insight near the end of the documentary when the voice-over narrator intones, “Like the Force itself, success also has its Dark Side,” and George Lucas says, “I was sort of fighting the corporate system, which I didn’t like… But now I find myself being the head of a corporation… I have become the very thing that I was trying to avoid.”

The bonus materials disc also provides three featurettes: “The Characters of ‘Star Wars’” (19 minutes), “The Birth of the Lightsaber” (15 minutes), and “The Force Is With Them: The Legacy of ‘Star Wars’” (13). The last named of these featurettes involves filmmakers like Peter Jackson, Ridley Scott, and James Cameron talking about what “Star Wars” has meant to them.

The bonus materials disc contains assorted other extras, including a gag reel Easter egg. Of these assorted extras, the one I found most interesting was the nine-minute preview of the movie “Star Wars III,” scheduled for theatrical release in May, 2005. The DVD menu providing access to the preview reads “Episode III Preview: The Return of Darth Vader,” but my understanding is that the film is expected to be released with the title “Star Wars III: Revenge of the Sith.”

The “Star Wars Trilogy” I have is in widescreen (2.35:1), but the DVD set is also available in full-screen (1.33:1). Everything is the same in the widescreen and full-screen DVD versions except the aspect ratio of the three feature films. I’ve listed below all the DVD set’s special features.

DVD Details:

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