Imperial black uniforms in ANH

[Thrawn McEwok]

Asking this as someone who's interested in movie continuity rather than replicas, but this seemed like a place I might get answers...

ANH features at least two distinctive versions of the black Imperial uniform. The guards in the clamshell helmets use a distinctive type - a tunic based on an old NYPD design, gloves with a metal wrist-buckle, loose trousers and short boots. I've seen suggestions that the strips masking the tunic buttonholes may in fact be dark red or brown, and would be curious if anyone knows about that...

The bigger question relates to what the black-uniform officers in the standard Imperial caps have - they wear knee-boots and jodhpurs like their khaki-clad counterparts, but it's not clear if the tunics are the same. A user here called Inquisitor Peregrinus has suggested they might have reused costumes from Truffaut's Fahrenheit 451, while back in 2014 Brandon Alinger replied to one of his queries by posting a pic of a faded screen-used costume that's very different from the grey/green style, basically a smock with a velcro-fastened slit - but I'm not clear, is that an ANH tunic or a Fahrenheit 451 one?!

I would have loved to have shown the ANH NY Police-style tunic, with the ribbon covering the tunics original buttons.

View attachment 408054

I don't believe anything from Farenheit 451 was used in Star Wars. We do touch on those tunics (and the ones from Blue Max they considered using) in the book, but the 451 tunics have a very different collar.


View attachment 408056
Most likely they served as the model, and new tunics were made specifically for SW. The Archives does not have any of those in the collection, or the beige colored jacket, although again we did touch on it in the manuscript.

In ESB and RotJ these were all replaced by uniforms of the same style as the standard grey/green "officer" type, which may explain why these variants still aren't well-known...

Any comments would be very much appreciated!

Thanks,
Mac

 

[James Kenobi 1138]

Interesting topic! If you could post a few pics to show what you’ve mentioned I’d love to take a look and see if I see what you’re seeing.

 

[division 6]

IIRC the Imps talking to Vader on the Tantive 4 had collars that opened on the side instead of the front.

 

[Thrawn McEwok]

Interesting topic! If you could post a few pics to show what you’ve mentioned I’d love to take a look and see if I see what you’re seeing.

There are a couple of pics embedded in the quote from Brandon Alinger within my post - you can click the link to view its original context, or click the direct links to see the pics full-size...

For convenience, here are the direct links again, with some context.

This shows the "NYPD" uniform worn by the ordinary troopers - https://www.therpf.com/forums/attachments/dstrooper-jpg.408054/

Note that the right-hand lapel closes straight-across in front, below the shoulder, and that there seems to be a dark brown or red stripe on either side of the front plackart/plastron. I'm pretty sure that every "scuttle-helmet" trooper in ANH wears this type of uniform (except a few who wear TIE Fighter style jumpsuits, all of whom I think were added in post-production/second unit filming in the US).

And this is what I think is a picture of a screen-used "officer" uniform - https://www.therpf.com/forums/attachments/imperial-uniform-233-jpg.408056/

The style is rather like the Fahrenheit 451 costumes, but it has pockets for the code-cylinders, and, I think, a closed collar and shoulder-seam. The wrist straps puzzle me, though. Those would work okay with long-wristed gloves, but is that really the style used by the officers without them?

There are not many other shots I know of that show the details of the "officer" version clearly, but for further reference, here's another picture of the "NYPD" trooper uniform, where you can see the lapel style clearly again...

In contrast, ESB has a couple of scuttle-helmet guards on the Executor (I suspect they're specifically intended as Vader's "door guards") who now wear an "officer" uniform of the same style as the standard grey/green one; see here...

... while RotJ occasionally pairs the "scuttle" helmet with the standard "officer" uniform, but more usually with the "TIE Pilot" jumpsuit (easily recognized by the Imperial badge on the shoulders); you can see both versions here...

IIRC the Imps talking to Vader on the Tantive 4 had collars that opened on the side instead of the front.

I've seen this suggested before, but I'm not sure what it's based on - it's true of the Fahrenheit 451 costumes, and you can see something similar on the side of the collar of one of the other officers (Peter Sumner, "Lieutenant Treidum", in the docking-bay control room), see here and here - but I wonder, with reference to the photo I shared above, if it's just a seam...

Thanks,
Mac