According to a blog post by John Brownlee, the logo design of George Lucas’ Star Wars was inspired by Joseph Goebbels, the notorious Nazi propaganda minister and one of the closest friends of Adolf Hitler.

In the autobiography by Suzy Rice, the logo designer (read what to look for in a good logo designer) of the original Star Wars, she recounted that George Lucas asked for a “very fascist” logo in this movie. At that time, Rice was reading a book about German type design and used Helvetica (Helvetika in German) Black as her reference. This is the same font used by Goebbels in his propaganda materials for the German Socialist Party.

Asking for a fascist logo is really weird but if you watch the Star Wars movies you can understand the connection. The Empire symbolizes the authoritarian rule and the uniforms of those troopers are suggestive of Nazi officers.

In one of the general discussions at Typophile, several members cited there are some inaccuracies with Rice’s version and the origin of Helvetica.

Helvetica as a Safe Business Font

In a news article, this font is said to be a safe choice for businesses because of its clarity and neutrality. In the words of Frank Wildenberg, managing director of Linotype, the German firm that owns the font, “It’s durable. It comes from natural design forms. It doesn’t have an expression of fashion. It has very clear lines and characters, it looks like a very serious typeface.”

On the other hand, some designers loathe the use of Helvetica font because it is “bland, unadventurous, unambitious.”

In the end, it is important to choose a font that is very fitting to the image you want to stress as well as the overall feel of your industry.

If you’re competing in the financial or funeral industry, for instance, using a cartoonish font like Comic Sans will not help your business at all.