There are many reasons to fear "The
Star Wars Holiday Special." This obscure television special that only aired once on Thanksgiving, 1978 features Harvey Korman in drag, Art Carney with a plunging neckline, Bea Arthur leading a raucous mob of alien barflies in a torchlight song, and a dirty ol' Wookiee watching naughty videos. Most of these transgressions fade into distant, disbelieved memories yet the image of Krelman, a love-struck cantina patron, imbibing by pouring a beverage into his cranial cavity stubbornly persists with disturbing clarity. What is it about Krelman's quaff that won't leave the mind? Is it the off-the-shelf Tupperware that roots the image in our world? Is it the hollow sound of water splashing down his cerebral gullet with the echo-y resonance of a garden hose left to run in a school hallway, prompting speculation as to what his internal anatomy must look like? Is it that somebody thought this was a good idea? We're simply not qualified to say.
