W(isolea)TF?

I was in a department store the other day, and I took a moment to wander through their toy section. There's this big display of Star Wars action figures. Including a figure Wisolea, who looks like this:

The action figure looked a little less ridiculous than that photo - but not much. You got this bizarre alien head with eyes all over the place, and these two long limp tentacles that just hang there - atop a perfectly human-looking body.

I had to gawk. I flip over the back of the package, to find out what part of the "expanded universe" this awful monstrosity came from.

It tells me this character is from Episode IV? Supposedly it's the merchant that bought Luke's Landspeeder for 2,000 credits.

I couldn't completely believe that. I don't remember seeing it on film, and the only image of the thing I can find online is clearly a bad pre-photoshop paste job. Someone took a colorized poster featuring b-movie horror monster, and just glued it over Obi-Wan's face. It's an illustrated head on a photographed body!

But it gets worse. The box claimed (and Wookiepedia confirms) that the critter only paid the 2000 credits it did because Obi-Wan used a Jedi Mind Trick on it to fool it into paying more than the speeder was worth.

God dammit, George Lucas! What the hell is wrong with you (and your merchandising Empire)? When Qui-Gon abuses the force to fleece Watto, the viewer can almost justify that, seeing as how Watto is a low-life and a slave-owner. Almost justified. At least the scene is kinda funny. It's still sad to see a Jedi behaving like a con-man, but it's not like anyone with any taste or intelligence considers Phantom Menace to be cannonical. We all just kinda try to pretend it doesn't exist. It communicates volumes about Lucas's takes on philosophy, morality, personal profit, and storytelling.

But, dammit, to retcon this sort of crap into one of the films that we all still love and adore? I'm insulted. Worse, Luke complains in A New Hope about how he didn't get much for his Landspeeder, that they weren't in demand since the new model came out. I get that Luke's whinny, but seriously, this retcon means he's bitching even though Obi-Wan just swindled the vendor to get that money. It's not like Luke could miss that, since in the previous scene, Obi-Wan, sitting in the Landspeeder, had done the "these aren't the droids you're looking for" trick, and explained how it worked to Luke. You've just retroactively made Luke stupid.

Thanks a lot, Lucas. I really needed you to piss all over my childhood yet again, and you and your money-machine were all too happy to oblige me.