--- title: Star Wars: The Force Awakens and the Classic Scroll on TIME description: Kill time before the release of 'The Force Awakens' with this interactive feature that turns any TIME story into the movies' openings canonical: https://time.com/4144367/star-wars-the-force-awakens-crawl/ author: TIME Staff article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-12-13T23:00:06.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:27:35.770Z og:title: Turn Any TIME Story Into the Beginning of 'Star Wars' og:description: Kill time before the release of 'The Force Awakens' with this interactive feature og:url: https://time.com/4144367/star-wars-the-force-awakens-crawl/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Turn Any TIME Story Into the Beginning of 'Star Wars' twitter:description: Kill time before the release of 'The Force Awakens' with this interactive feature twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # Turn Any TIME Story Into the Beginning of _Star Wars_ by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) ## TIME Staff Dec 13, 2015 11:00 PM UTC by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) ## TIME Staff Dec 13, 2015 11:00 PM UTC Perhaps no movie’s beginning is as recognizable as that of [_Star Wars_](http://time.com/4134371/how-j-j-abrams-brought-back-star-wars/)—its yellow text crawling into the great beyond, establishing the state of affairs “a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away,” all set to John Williams’ famous score. The crawl has been part of [every _Star Wars_ movie](http://time.com/4110315/star-wars-time-magazine-cover/) since. With _Star Wars: The Force Awakens_ debuting on Dec. 18, we decided to bring the sequence to Time.com through a feature designed by interactive graphics editor Chris Wilson. You can now “Star Wars-ify” any article, turning its text into the style of Lucas’s introduction, in our Newsfeed or Entertainment sections. Try it out by selecting the light sabers in the “Star Wars-ify” icon above. To exit, select the light sabers in the top right-hand corner or hit the escape key. As it would happen, TIME had its own small role in the credit sequence. In the spring of 1977, George Lucas screened a rough cut of the movie for friends, including Stephen Spielberg, _Scarface_ director Brian De Palma and _Time_ writer Jay Cocks, according to Chris Taylor’s 2015 [_How Star Wars Conquered the Universe_](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0465049893?keywords=chris%20taylor%20star%20wars&qid=1449692550&ref%5F=sr%5F1%5F1&s=books&sr=1-1)_._ De Palma was a toughest critic of the film. But he wasn’t totally unhelpful. Together, De Palma and Cocks [volunteered to help re-write the introduction](https://books.google.com/books?id=uG0uCgAAQBAJ&pg=PT126&dq=jay+cocks+star+wars&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjg1bvnys%5FJAhWLVD4KHdZmC0AQ6AEINzAF#v=onepage&q=jay%20cocks%20star%20wars&f=false). Cocks went on to write screenplays for _Gangs of New York_ and _The Age of Innocence_ among other movies. **MORE** [How J.J. Abrams Brought Back Star Wars](http://time.com/4134371/how-j-j-abrams-brought-back-star-wars/) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4144367/star-wars-the-force-awakens-crawl/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4144367/star-wars-the-force-awakens-crawl/"},"headline":"Turn Any TIME Story Into the Beginning of Star Wars","datePublished":"2015-12-13T23:00:06.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:27:35.770Z","description":"Prepare for the release of Star Wars: The Force Awakens with this interactive feature","url":"https://time.com/4144367/star-wars-the-force-awakens-crawl/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Internet","Star Wars topic"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME Staff","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/time-staff/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4144367/star-wars-the-force-awakens-crawl/","name":"Turn Any TIME Story Into the Beginning of Star Wars"}}]}] ```