Then, there’s the writing. There are times when it’s been rightfully maligned and mocked, but it’s largely solid and often so memorable that many lines – whether due to delivery, context, or the pure eloquence of the phrasing – have melded into the pop culture consciousness. There are loads of lines from the original trilogy people still use in everyday conversation, and we've counted down the best and most memorable of them all.

These are the 20 Best Lines In The Star Wars Original Trilogy, spoken "a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away..."

20. “NOOOOOOOOO!”

We start off with a line that’s not so much great for its purple prose – after all, it’s just one two-letter word – as much as for the context and intensity with which it’s said. It’s said more than once in the original trilogy. First up, there was young Luke Skywalker in The Empire Strikes Back. Darth Vader has just let slip that he’s his proud papa and Luke just can’t deal. He finds as many ways as possible to deny it. “No,” he declares, simply and monosyllabically at first, “That’s not true. That’s impossible.” But when Vader says Luke knows it to be true, he just can’t take it and screams at the top of his lungs, “Nooooooooo!”

Fast forward to the final act of Return of the Jedi and papa tosses out a little elongated “No” action of his own. This time, Vader is watching as his mentor, Emperor Palpatine, zaps his son with Force lightning. Palpatine plans to kill Luke and that’s just too much for Vader to bear. All the emotion built up through years of living in a life- suit and fighting his son builds up into a huge “Nooooooooo!” as he lifts up the Emperor and tosses him down a shaft to his death, securing Vader’s own death as he’s engulfed in the Force lightning that was meant for his son.

This list is about the original trilogy, but we can’t help but point out the fact that Vader’s first word after waking up in his suit in Revenge of the Sith was, you guessed it, “Nooooooooo!” Because it’s gotta suck to have lost your limbs, been burnt to a crisp and then be stuck in layers of electronics and armor for the rest of your life.

19. “WHEN I LEFT YOU, I WAS BUT THE LEARNER. NOW I AM THE MASTER.”

Sticking with Lord Vader, here’s a nice one from A New Hope. When Vader and Obi-Wan Kenobi meet up for the first time since Obi-Wan sliced off Vader’s limbs on Mustafar 19-odd years earlier, Vader has had a lot of time to master the dark side of the Force, and he has a little boasting to do. So he says, “When I left you, I was but the learner. Now I am the master.”

One of the main themes of the Star Wars saga is the relationship between mentor and protegee, and this line has that all over it. Obi-Wan, of course, was Anakin Skywalker’s master before Anakin turned to the dark side and became Vader. But when A New Hope first hit screens nobody knew all that backstory, so it was a nice hint of what we’d see years later in the prequel trilogy. And also just another line that solidifies Darth Vader as a true badass and one of the greatest villains in film history.

18. “ ON WHAT YOU HAVE LEARNED. LUKE… THERE… IS… ANOTHER… SK… SKY… WALKER…”

Where the previous line sets up the prequel trilogy, this one actually sets up the sequel trilogy that began last year with The Force Awakens. Or, more accurately, it sets up the backstory to the new trilogy. First, let’s set up the line. In Return of the Jedi, Luke has returned to Dagobah to visit his master, Yoda, before the latter's death. On his death bed, Luke starts grilling him about his family and whether or not Vader is really his dad. Yoda confirms, but adds, using his last strained breaths, “ on what you have learned. Luke… there… is… another… Sk… Sky… walker.”

First, this confirms that Luke has a sibling and teases the fact that Leia, his sister, is Force sensitive. This is a fact that is bound to come into play in some way in IX. And it also sets up Leia’s son, Ben Solo/Kylo Ren, to be strong in the Force. Then there’s the first part of the line, which sets up the backstory to The Force Awakens. We learn that Luke has, indeed, ed on what he has learned and started a new Jedi academy, which was subsequently ruined by Kylo Ren prior to the events of Episode VII.

17. “THE EMPEROR IS NOT AS FORGIVING AS I AM.”

Let's go back to Vader. He’s just full of great quotes that subtly reveal his badassery. This time, we are in the first scene of Return of the Jedi. Vader lands in his shuttle on the still-in-construction new Death Star. Commander Jerjerrod is clearly nervous about the whole situation, with this surprise visit and the Death Star not being ready and all that.

Sure enough, Vader is all like, “WTF, you morons? Why isn’t this bad boy gunnin’ down planets yet? You think my visit was a surprise? Well, guess what, losers? The boss is coming and he ain’t gonna be happy.” Well, something like that. He tells Jerjerrod that the Emperor is coming. The horrified commander says they’ll double their efforts, to which Vader responds with this great line, “I hope so, Commander, for your sake. The Emperor is not as forgiving as I am.” And Jerjerrod knows, as do we all after seeing him Force choke officers at the slightest offense, that Vader is not even a little bit forgiving. So imagine someone worse than that.

16. “I AM ALTERING THE DEAL. PRAY I DON’T ALTER IT ANY FURTHER.”

Okay, one more Vader quote and we’ll shove him aside for a little bit. We like this one because it shows a slightly different side to the Sith Lord, one that’s just a tiny bit lenient. In The Empire Strikes Back, Vader has just had Han Solo frozen in carbonite. Han, of course, was captured thanks to a deal Lando Calrissian made with Vader, which included Leia and Chewbacca being kept safe from Vader’s grasp.

However, when Vader orders Lando to “take the princess and the Wookiee back to my ship,” Lando’s like, “Hold up, dude, we had a deal. They’re supposed to stay with me.” Or something like that. Vader could easily have just Force choked Lando right there on the spot, or even tossed him into the carbon-freezing chamber. But, no, he just looks Lando square in the eye, deals this not-so-veiled threat of a line, then basically drops the mike, turns and walks away. Obviously, Lando has nothing to say to that.

15. “LAUGH IT UP, FUZZBALL.”

When Han groans, “Laugh it up, Fuzzball,” to Chewbacca early on in The Empire Strikes Back, it immediately s as a classic line on so many levels. First of all, it’s just funny in and of itself, even out of context. It’s a great line to toss off to your friends when they’re laughing at your expense. And that leads us to the other reason it’s great: it beautifully illustrates the relationship between Han and Chewie. They’re both pretty much alpha males, but it shows that the Wookiee can laugh at his friend’s expense and they’ll still be friends. And that Han can call Chewie “fuzzball” and not have his head ripped from his neck, which would likely be the case if anyone else called him “fuzzball.”

And finally, there’s the reason Chewie’s laughing in the first place. Leia has just put a boastful Han in his place, calling him “laser brain.” The whole thing shows the flirtatious sparring relationship brewing between Han and Leia. And it also sets up another memorable line coming up later in the list.

14. “I THOUGHT THEY SMELLED BAD ON THE OUTSIDE.”

We’re going to stick with both Han and The Empire Strikes Back for this particularly memorable line. It’s one of those lines Star Wars fans can’t help but say along with Han as they watch the movie. He’s searched forever to find his lost buddy Luke on the frozen wasteland of Hoth, riding his trusty tauntaun. All three of them are freezing as wind blasts snow into them.

Two of them in particular are not doing very well at all. Han is hanging in there, but Luke is delirious and barely conscious (no pun intended) after his fight with the wampa snow beast. And the tauntaun has collapsed from, presumably, exposure to the cold and exhaustion. So, in order to keep Luke warm he takes Luke’s lightsaber and rips the dead and apparently smelly creature open, guts oozing out, and lifts Luke into the still-warm innards of the tauntaun corpse. Then comes the classic line Han breathlessly utters to no one but himself and a chuckling audience: “I thought they smelled bad on the outside.”

13. “THAT’S NO MOON. IT’S A SPACE STATION.”

Back we go to the original film that started it all, A New Hope. That film, of course, at least in of the plot, is all about the Death Star, the Empire’s gargantuan new battle station/weapon of mass destruction. It’s all about discovering it, witnessing its power and trying to destroy it. At this point in the movie, the audience has already discovered it and witnessed its unspeakably destructive power, as it destroys the planet Alderaan with one deadly shot.

But this line is all about our heroes discovering the Death Star for the first time. Han, Chewie, Luke and Obi-Wan are in the Millennium Falcon in the area of space where Alderaan used to be, so they already know something is up in the neighbourhood. Suddenly, an Imperial TIE fighter appears and seems to be baiting them toward what Luke thinks is a moon. But, no, says Obi-Wan, in awe, “That’s no moon. It’s a space station.” It’s a classic line and a dramatic reveal for our heroes, illustrating the monstrosity of the Death Star and the monumental task the Rebels have ahead of them.

12. “IT’S THE SHIP THAT MADE THE KESSEL RUN IN LESS THAN 12 PARSECS!”

When, in the bizarre environs of the Mos Eisley cantina, Han brags that his Millennium Falcon is “The ship that made the Kessel Run in less than 12 parsecs,” it’s delicious on so many levels. First off, this is our introduction to Han Solo. It’s his third line in A New Hope and it immediately illustrates two things the audience needs to know and will come to love about him: 1) He’s an amazing pilot; and 2) He’s a boastful bastard.

That would be enough to make it a great quote, but it’s so much more than that. For example: the Kessel Run. What on Earth is the Kessel Run? It’s one of those off-handed references we get throughout the original trilogy that are completely alien to us, but at the same time evocative of something fantastic. We can’t help but imagine some sort of amazing, infamous space race (although we now know from non-film canon material that it’s a complicated route used by smugglers). And finally there’s the fact that it launched the great parsecs debate. In the “real world,” we know that parsecs are not a unit of time, but of distance, so the quote is technically inaccurate. But it’s still awesome. (And, actually, science-y folks have figured out how it could make sense.)

11. “I FIND YOUR LACK OF FAITH DISTURBING.”

Welcome back, Vader, and thanks for providing us with another deliciously unsettling line, complete with another not-so-veiled threat. A bunch of bad guys are hanging out in a Death Star conference room in A New Hope. They’re a little nervous about the mounting threat of the Rebellion, combined with the fact that their ultimate weapon, the one they’re all standing in, is not yet fully operational.

Vader has listened mostly quietly until one particularly slimy officer, iral Motti, gets a little too trigger happy about the Death Star to Vader’s liking. The Sith Lord suggests that the astounding technology put into the creation of the Death Star is “insignificant next to the power of the Force.” And that’s when Motti makes the mistake of throwing some sass at the biggest, baddest dude in the room (if not the galaxy). Who in their right mind would look at Vader and mock the Force as sorcery and a “sad devotion?” Sure enough, Vader interrupts Motti’s inadvisable diatribe with a good old Force choke and a calm recitation of the line, “I find your lack of faith disturbing.” No kidding, Vader. And ultimately, it's just a threat, as he lets him live. It’s another great line to use in real life, on friends who doubt you, and it launched a thousand memes.