Tatooine has two moons. If you have a letterboxed copy of Star Wars you see it right in the opening shot. On the THX copies, the picture has been repositioned so that you can see the rather large moon.
Tantive IV
The Tantive IV is a Corellian Corvette CR90 multi-purpose vessel.
It is Princess Leia's personal consular ship, and bears the crest of the
Royal House of Alderaan. As a diplomatic vessel, the ship has certain immunity
to travel through otherwise restricted areas. Such immunity did not save
the craft from Imperial pursuit over Tatooine after being found in contact
with Rebel spies in the Toprawa system.
If you watch the killer turbolaser blast that cripples the blockade runner in slow motion, you’ll see that it misses the solar fin, hits the "shields," bounces down and then blows up the fin. Pretty cool.
On the new THX copies, the shots of the Rebel troopers waiting for the blast door to explode is accompanied by more grinding, clanging, and hissing.
The film print used to make the Hi Fi Letterboxed set of Star Wars has pronounced flaws in the film. Although they only last a few frames, it proves that different prints were used to make the various video releases.
U-3PO is an espionage droid planted on the Tantive IV by the Empire. This MerenData spy is oblivious to its espionage programming. U-3PO activated a homing signal that allowed the Devastator to follow the Tantive IV to Tatooine.
Scrambas is a veteran Alliance trooper. He has served the Royal House of Alderaan loyally for nearly 20 years as a guard.
A volunteer Rebel trooper from Alderaan, the young Chad Hilse is trained in ground and starship combat.
The plastic nature of stormtrooper armor becomes quite apparent when you watch the opening battle. When the troopers first breach the blockade runner, and the camera’s behind them, watch the backs of the troopers’ legs when they advance. The armor keeps splitting open. Also, watch when Vader arrives. Take a look at the trooper that’s checking on a fallen comrade. Again, that trooper’s leg armor shows its seams.
If you look past Threepio in this scene, you can see a Rebel trooper cut down in mid-stride.
Star Wars production designers kind of "cheat" when having Artoo change from two-legged to three-legged mode. In his three-legged mode, he has metal braces connecting his feet to his trunk. These braces have no corresponding version on the two-legged version. They just kind of "appear" when Artoo goes tripodal. That’s why when you see Artoo change from two to three legs, he never travels far before they cut and replace the Artoo unit.
In this particular scene, a jump cut hides a few frames of wobbling
on Artoo's behalf. If this scene were allowed to continue, Artoo would
have collided with a piece of the set, as seen in The Making of Star
Wars.
R4-M9 is an astromech droid used by the Empire to pull data from the Tantive IV's computer banks.
R2-Q2 served a similar role. This droid has served with an Imperial reconnaisance fleet in the Expansion Region for several decades.
When Vader’s choking Captain Antilles, the stormtrooper in the background, on the left of the screen, changes position as the shots change from a close up to a medium shot. His legs come apart and go together.
Watch Vader’s lenses. In Star Wars, a cheaper, red plastic was used for his eyes, not the pinhole screen black lenses used in Empire and Jedi. Although this meant David Prowse could see better, it also means that you can see his eyes from time to time. Marvel comics had a lot of fun overdoing the red in Vader’s eyes. Incidentally, there are apparently outakes of poor David Prowse banging his head on doorways and other overhangs. I guess that’s what happens when you take away a seven-foot tall bodybuilder’s sense of vision. Kind detracts for Vader’s fearful villain look if he keeps braining himself.
As Leia is hit by the blue stun blast, her entire body glows for a split-second, including her dress. However, there is a small flap, in front of her, that remains unlit. It is high-lighted in the picture to the left.
The grill-like vents on the "cheeks" of a stormtrooper's helmet are revealed to be little more than decals in this shot. The trooper that stuns Leia does not have these vents.
You can see the design of different Artoo-Detoo shells throughout the movie. As he’s getting into the escape pod, you see the correct one. Look at the back of Artoo’s head. See from left to right he’s got three small blue rectangles, a long blue rectangle, an empty small blue-outlined rectangle with a blue dash above it, a thin-outlined empty long rectangle, and then a blue rectangle with a yellow-green light in it. Two dots are above this lighted rectangle. Also note that on his legs, the "shoulder" part of it, he has two different patterns around the "joint". To the back of the joint, he has two silver squares. To the front, he has a long silver rectangle. Just take a note of this, ‘cause it’ll change.
Commander Daine Jir is a typical Imperial officer, trained to handle crisis situations expertly. Jir has a reputation for being bold and outspoken
Commander Praji was Darth Vader's aide aboard the Star Destroyer Devastator. He is an honors graduate from the Imperial Academy on Carida.
It would appear that holsters are not standard-issue, since only half of these stormtroopers carry them.