Happy Star Wars Day (and Month)!
May the Fourth be with you! It’s a classic play on words that Star Wars fans worldwide can’t help but get giddy over, as they enjoy rewatching the movies that became such a fascination for a whole generation of Sci-Fi fans. In recent years, Disney made the May 4th holiday official, establishing Star Wars Day as a day to announce new franchise projects, unveil new toys and games, and generally celebrate anything and everything Star Wars. Although Disney and Star Wars embraced May 4th as part of their franchise’s culture, neither was the first to coin this nerdy pun. In fact, you have to go back further to first discover the existence of “May the Fourth be with you,” to shortly after the first Star Wars film came out.
As huge Star Wars fans at 309 Marketing, we’re always interested in Star Wars’ history and fun, nerdy traditions. However, we’re also just as interested in what seems like a huge “branding win” for one of the most influential franchises in history. But was that win intentional, or was it by pure happen-chance that May the Fourth came to be? Here’s the somewhat surprising origin behind the beginning of one of the most anticipated days of the year, and how the entirety of May is a month worthy of celebrating Star Wars.
An Unlikely Origin in the UK
The date was May 4th; the year was 1979. The Conservative Party for the United Kingdom was absolutely buzzing, having just elected Margaret Thatcher, England’s first female prime minister. As voters celebrated in the streets, newspapers around the country wrote announcement articles and congratulatory messages, getting the news out.
Now, you might be thinking, “What does any of this have to do with Star Wars?” Well, it just so happened that one of these newspapers announcing Margaret Thatcher’s victory featured a fun and pun-worthy congratulations. Thatcher’s party published an advertisement in the London Evening News that read, “May the Fourth be with you, Maggie. Congratulations.” This was one of the first recorded instances of this midi-chlorian-rich phrase, almost two years after the first Star Wars movie’s release. However, it would take longer before the phrase would catch on with wider swaths of the Star Wars’ fanbase.
Where Did it Go?
While it’s easy to point to the London Evening News ad as one of the first written uses of “May the Fourth be with you,” the progression of the phrase in subsequent years gets hazier. However, the fans who truly loved and enjoyed Star Wars continued to take delight in the phrase, wishing each other a happy May 4th whenever the date rolled around.
Sometimes, you might find the phrase used as a joke in television shows, fan magazines, or advertisements. Lucasfilm wasn’t averse to using the phrase, either. When Randy Thom (today the director of sound design at Skywalker Sound) first worked on sound for Return of the Jedi, he stumbled upon the fun phrase himself. During filming in California’s redwood forest (or the moon of Endor), one of the working days was May 4th. Thom discovered the fun relationship between the day and Star Wars, and began sharing the joke on set. Thom would continue to use the phrase in his annual messages to the company years later.
Dawning of the Digital Age
It wasn’t until the introduction of the internet and social media that May the Fourth began to take on a life of its own. More and more fans continued to embrace the phrase and day, posting on online forums and message boards, creating memes and fan art, and throwing movie watch parties. For a time, May the Fourth was truly a day made by Star Wars fans, for Star Wars fans, celebrating their love for everything in a galaxy far, far away.
The first organized (but unofficial) celebration of May 4th as Star Wars Day occurred in 2011 at the Toronto Underground Cinema in Toronto, Canada. Sean Ward and Alice Quinn, two Star Wars super fans, planned a day of fun and festivities, including screenings of the movies; an original trivia game show; costume contest with celebrity judges; and showings of fan-made parody movies, musical tributes, mash-ups and remixes. The day was a hit! It was so much so, in fact, that when Disney acquired the Star Wars franchise in 2012, they began officially celebrating the day the very next May.
Star Wars Day as We Know It
On May 4th, 2013, the first May the Fourth after Disney acquired Star Wars, the first official Star Wars Day was celebrated. It started at Disney’s American theme parks, where the parks were alight with green, blue, and red lightsabers, and flush with guests meeting with costumed characters across the Star Wars universe. The day’s celebration was capped off with a special fireworks show, featuring music and effects straight from the films. And the yearly celebrations of May the Fourth only grew from there.
Today, in addition to official celebrations thrown by Star Wars and Disney, nearly everyone celebrates May the Fourth! Star Wars Day has become a worldwide phenomenon, from video games adding “themed” content on the day to companies and governments posting on official social media accounts to acknowledge the endless battle between Jedi and Sith. However, May isn’t just a great month for Star Wars because of a single day.
Celebrating Star Wars All Month
In addition to the fan-made holiday, May marks an important month for many of Star Wars’ biggest movies. Every Star Wars movie, part of the original and prequel trilogies, was released in May. While this fact is mainly due to producers wanting to release their films in time for the summer movie season, it’s still a funny coincidence that all the Star Wars films were released in the same month. Now, you can celebrate Star Wars all month long:
- Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope (May 25, 1977)
- Star Wars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back (May 21, 1980)
- Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi (May 25, 1983)
- Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace (May 19, 1999)
- Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones (May 16, 2002)
- Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith (May 19, 2005)
Who Came First: The Jedi or the Padawan?
Looking back at the history of the pun “May the Fourth be with you,” it becomes apparent how it started as a simple joke that grew into an entire day (and month) of Star Wars celebration. However, what’s more apparent is the phrase and day’s origin being solely born from fans of the franchise. It was Star Wars fans who first coined the parody phrase, and it was also fans who organized the first celebration of May the Fourth.
While we have to admit it was pretty smart of Disney to listen to their fans and begin including the day as part of the Star Wars tradition, it’s not an idea any one entity can take credit for. If anything, the most credit for making the day a mainstay for Star Wars fans must be given to social media’s emergence. Thanks to social media channels and online chatrooms, fans’ genuine love of the Star Wars fanbase could be shared across the globe. There were enough people passionate about Star Wars to want to celebrate its existence yearly; May the Fourth just happened to be the day that made the most sense.
Nerd Out with the 309 Team
Do you want to work with a passionate team of marketers and web designers who have just as much excitement as you do for everything Star Wars, Sci-Fi, and nerd-culture related? You’ve come to the right place! 309 Marketing Group specializes in website design, SEO, digital advertising services, and various other marketing and branding strategies. We prioritize a culture of fun and collaboration, working with our clients to create ad campaigns and marketing pushes that perfectly capture a business’s style while netting plenty of leads. To learn more about 309 Marketing Group and our team of Jedi Masters, contact us today at 309-213-9398.