ORDER Words
In The LasT Jedi, Rey teams up with Luke Skywalker – but he’s not the man we remember. And that’s not the only shock. Total Film talks to the key players about the Star Wars movie that changes everything.
Matt MaytuM
uke Skywalker has vanished,” announced the opening crawl to Star Wars: The Force Awakens. And vanished he remained, for pretty much the entire running time of the seventh instalment in the space saga. Sure, his presence hung heavily over that film, the first Star Wars movie in a decade, and the first to follow on from the events of 1983’s Return Of The Jedi. Luke ended that particular film a pretty well-balanced Jedi Knight, having helped destroy the evil Empire while resolving some of his daddy issues with Darth Vader. He was last spotted at a victory celebration on Endor, watched over by the Force ghosts of Obi-Wan Kenobi, Yoda and Vader/Anakin. What could go wrong?
Cut to 30 years later and the events of The Force Awakens, and Luke is nowhere to be seen – save for a brief flashback – until the final moment when he’s handed his trusty lightsaber by Rey (Daisy Ridley), a young scavenger from the desert planet Jakku who has recently discovered Force sensitivities of her own. The long hair and grey beard can’t disguise the tormented scowl of the galaxy’s original golden boy. This is not the Luke we remember.
As Mark Hamill himself puts it to TF, “It’s shocking to hear Luke say, ‘I know only one truth: it’s time for the Jedi to end’ – the last time we saw him, he was the most optimistic character. He was sort of at the peak of his powers, and you would imagine that he’d then become a Jedi master and train other people and so forth. What has happened to him that has so traumatised him into where he is now?”
That is the question that drives
The Last Jedi, aka Episode VIII. In 2015, J.J. Abrams’ The Force Awakens was a critical and commercial smash, putting Star Wars back on top (after the plastic prequels squandered fan goodwill), scoring more than $2bn at the global box office and an overwhelmingly positive response. Last year’s standalone ‘Story’ Rogue One was also a hit to the tune of $1bn, proving that the world was ready for adventures outside
the core episodic structure. But now we’re back to the narrative throughline of Rey, Kylo Ren, Finn, Poe… and of course, Leia and Luke. (The journey of the former, who we’ve seen go from orphan to princess to spy to senator to general of the Resistance during the franchise, is apparently unaltered in The Last Jedi, despite Carrie Fisher’s death meaning this will be her last Star Wars movie.)
“Watching the film, there’s going to be a very emotional reaction to what she does in this movie,” says TLJ director Rian Johnson. The indie auteur behind Brick, The Brothers Bloom and Looper, he’s something of a Padawan when it comes to blockbuster filmmaking on this scale. Johnson’s the only person besides George Lucas to have a solo writer-director credit on a Star Wars movie, and it seems he used that autonomy to make some pretty bold choices, even in a series celebrated for its twists. Hamill even famously told Johnson, “‘I pretty much fundamentally disagree with every choice you’ve made for [Luke],” before he came round to Johnson’s way of thinking (and he’s now hoping the audience will have the same reaction). Daisy Ridley was similarly surprised when she first read the Episode VIII script. “I had certain [expectations] of what I thought would happen [in the story] and then I was taken aback by what did happen,” she explains. “I went and talked to Rian about it and then you’re like, ‘Oh, OK.’ Hearing the thing from the person as to what it is that they are picturing made it all seem great instead of nerve-wracking.”
To speak to Johnson himself, it’s hard to imagine he could ever cause shock or worry in an actor, given his politeness and warmth. And despite the fact he’s taken the characters from The Force Awakens and pulled them out of their comfort zone, he admits to being driven by his own intense Star Wars fandom. He also asserts that the film will very much be a continuation of The Force Awakens: narratively, stylistically, tonally. “As much as I could I was trying to [maintain the tone], because it’s a continuous story,” he says. “And in fact, you know, some of the things we do get a little heavier in this movie, but I was very conscious of trying to continue the tone from the last movie… It was delightful. It was a blast. And I didn’t want to lose that. I didn’t want to descend into heaviosity with this movie.” All that said, The Last Jedi will be anything but a repeat of TFA. “The second chapter has a much different function than the first chapter, and I knew there were going to be things that were
‘i was very conscious of trying to continue the tone from the last movie… it was delightful’ rian johnson
different about it – just the same way that there are things that are different about Empire from A New Hope.”
Luke Who’s Talking
For all the impact of Luke’s appearance at the end of The Force Awakens, something significant was missing. Dialogue. In person, Hamill couldn’t be further from the sombre, taciturn Luke of the current movies. Garrulous and generous to a fault, an innocuous question leads to an anecdote avalanche – littered with spot-on impersonations of George Lucas, Harrison Ford and Alec Guinness – and our allotted time disappears faster than the Millennium Falcon on the Kessel Run.
When we meet in London’s Rosewood Hotel, Hamill launches into a story about his original Star Wars audition process, totally unprompted. “And by the way, it got down to two sets of one Han, Luke and Leia, and another Han, Luke and Leia,” he says. “They never mixed and matched.
It was either Carrie, Harrison and me, or the three other people. Marcia Lucas [Star Wars editor and George’s ex-wife] took credit for urging him, because he couldn’t decide. So I always like to give her a shout-out, because it changed my life in so many wonderful ways.”
While Luke Skywalker would become a role that would define his life, Hamill still felt some hesitance about returning to the franchise – something that chimes with Luke’s own withdrawal from the world. “Well, it’s the fear of the unknown,” considers Hamill of his own reluctance. “Because I thought we had a beginning, middle and an end. What if we don’t catch lightning in the bottle again? Fans can be so judgemental. They were hypercritical of some of the prequels. A lot of it, I think, was because it didn’t go the way that they wanted it to go. And they became very possessive of this series.”
In terms of relating to Luke’s position, Hamill admits, “You always try to make some kind of a connection, even in a fantasy, to something in your own life… and maybe it’s that failure to change the world the way I wanted it to be, that I could relate to as Luke not being able to accomplish what he wanted to accomplish.” For Johnson, writing for Luke and pals was something of a childhood dream realised. “You type ‘Luke Skywalker’ into your screenplay program and then start typing dialogue, and you get chills,” laughs Johnson. “Or Leia, you know? But also, I’ll tell you the truth. As much as growing up with Star Wars, and that I was looking forward to working with Mark and Carrie, the thing that really hooked me – and I think hooked so many of the folks that are into these movies – is the new characters from The Force Awakens.”
Much as audiences and Star Wars devotees were excited to see Han Solo, General Leia and Luke Skywalker return to the fold for another Episode, they were always set to be key supporting characters, rather than the leads. The new trilogy would have run out of steam
pretty quickly if there weren’t any new characters worth investing in. That’s where Abrams struck gold, particularly with Rey, played by genuine overnight sensation Ridley. An orphaned scavenger, she found a family of sorts with Han Solo, Chewie and liberated stormtrooper turned Resistance fighter Finn. At the end of TFA, a lightsaber duel with Han’s estranged son (and murderer) Kylo Ren began to unlock some of Rey’s Force skills, and she would later head to Ahch-To to hand Luke his trusty ’saber. In a break from tradition, The Last Jedi will be the first Star Wars movie to pick up precisely where the last one finished.
No Jedi is an island
That direct continuation meant yomping back to Skellig Michael, the Irish island that stood in for Ahch-To. Filming there before principal photography began in earnest, it meant that Johnson had “a couple of ‘first’ days, weirdly.” A precarious location, it presented a number of challenges for Ridley. “Going to the toilet at the top of that island, I swear to God, that path was this big,” she gestures, making not the most reassuring indication of its width. “And there was no railing. So you’d be walking, thinking, ‘Why am I going to the toilet on the top of a cliff? And if I take a step to my right, will
I fall to my death? And is this worth it?’ So that was really, really surreal. And then it was sort of amazing actually because I think I remember [thinking], ‘This is the most amazing view ever.’”
What little we know of the plot to TLJ suggests Luke will train up Rey as a Jedi. “Actors want to fall into the characters they’re playing,” is all Hamill offers when we ask him if the mentor/trainee relationship was reflected off-screen. For Ridley, this film brought a shedload of new stunts to tackle that would push her to her limits, including a mysterious underwater sequence. “The dive for me was probably the most scary and the most thrilling thing,” she says. “The lightsaber stuff was great because I felt like I got a lot stronger and I could push myself a lot further than I thought I could the first time around… It sort of worked story-wise too, because as I was getting stronger with it, you would think in the story that was happening too. But the dive was my favourite thing. It was frickin’ awesome.”
Not that this new-found strength necessarily meant Ridley felt more
‘you always try to make some kind of a connection to something in your own life’ mark hamill
confident going into the sequel after the overwhelmingly positive response to TFA. “I found it much more scary, honestly,” she gasps. “I felt way more neurotic the whole way through. Because with the first one, I was lost in the whole journey of it, and on this one, I was much more aware of what was going on every day. Like, it felt more visceral. The first one felt like a dream the whole time.” And when audiences massively embrace your character, that only heightens the weight of expectations. “There’s a responsibility and a sort of feeling to uphold that people have connected to. So I actually found it a lot more scary, but also very rewarding.”
With Johnson thrusting the characters in unexpected directions, Rey is split from Finn, her fellow stowaway in TFA, as the story demands that she share the screen with Luke. Boyega’s Finn – who was left comatose at the close of the last film – will return to action in a mission that will take him away from Rey and towards the bright lights of obscenely wealthy casino planet Canto Bight. “Finn got a back injury and the Resistance is at its lowest point it’s ever been and they are very, very weak at the moment,” Boyega explains. “And so, for him, he has chosen to do this crazy mission.”
New Blood
Finn’s mission allies him with a couple of the galaxy’s fresh arrivals, including Resistance member Rose, played by newcomer Kelly Marie Tran. Pausing to consider what she can actually tell us about Rose, Tran offers, “She works in maintenance, and she is really good at what she does…” She pauses. “I keep saying she is not cool. I don’t want people to misinterpret that. By that, I mean she is not like this muscly superhero that you can never be. She’s this everywoman character. Like, what would you do as a normal human being if you got pulled into this?”
Finn and Rose end up having to form a cautious alliance with the film’s mysterious ‘DJ’ (Benicio Del Toro), a ‘slicer’ (read: hacker), whose particular set of skills the pair find themselves in need of. A quick Google search will reveal the meaning behind Del Toro’s initialled moniker, but we’ll leave that out for now for the spoiler-averse. Suffice to say, he’s probably not entirely
trustworthy. He’s one of a handful of fresh faces introduced in TLJ. In terms of the new characters, Tran is particularly stoked for audiences to see DJ and Laura Dern’s Vice Admiral Amilyn Holdo (see Q&A, opposite). “I think they bring a lot of cool, different energy into a franchise like this,” she says.
Also to watch out for in this instalment are new creatures, such as the already beloved porgs (see boxout p61), an insanely cute birdlike species that resides on Ahch-To. We’ll also see close-up glimpses of the First Order’s Supreme Leader Snoke (Andy Serkis), no longer hiding behind a hologram. Captain Phasma will return to clash with Finn. And if the final trailer is anything to go by, the parallels between Rey and Kylo Ren (a former apprentice of Luke’s gone rogue, remember) will become even more apparent.
“From the script [of The Force Awakens], to seeing the film for the first time, I felt like the dynamic between those two is fascinating and complicated and had a lot of potential,” grins Johnson. “That was one of the things I was really excited to figure out ways to get into, on this one.” The gaspinducing sign-off to the trailer suggests Rey reaches out to Kylo to “show me my place in all of this”, although Johnson assures us that if you’ve seen the trailer, you shouldn’t think you know it all. “We all love the trailer because we look at it and we say, ‘God, it looks like it sells the cow, but it doesn’t.’ Not because it’s tricky or it’s misleading you, but because there’s just a lot more… It doesn’t give you answers, it gives you questions, which is terrific.” End game Johnson also jokes that making the middle chapter is “so much easier”. “I just found it really fun, having had a great setup with these characters, and to then delve into each of them, and then to leave it in a place similar to what I felt on The Force Awakens… You’re excited for what comes next.” Not that you should expect anything ‘middling’ about The Last Jedi. “I did want the audience to feel like they’ve had a full meal, and they’re excited a few years from now for what comes next.”
Perhaps the biggest shock relating to the whole production was the fact the film itself was completely finished almost three whole months ahead of its release date, pretty much unheard of in this age of blockbusters being subjected to tweaks and adjustments right up to the 11th hour. Johnson’s longtime producing partner Ram Bergman expresses no surprise that Johnson has smashed it. “Rian is very specific,” Bergman says. “It makes preparation so much easier. It’s efficient.”
The jury will soon be in on where Johnson’s effort rates in the canon, but for now he has the bittersweet experience of handing back the reins to J.J. Abrams, who is returning to the saga to direct Episode IX after Colin Trevorrow departed due to creative differences with Lucasfilm. “J.J.’s seen several cuts of the movie, and he read a few drafts of the script,” says Johnson. “He’s been a great cheerleader through the whole process, and with very helpful notes. But that was all in context of just wanting his opinion as a filmmaker. That was before he was doing IX. We’ve had a couple of very small conversations, but nothing substantive about IX. But the truth is, I’m not really going to be involved at all.” With the picture locked, Johnson will effectively step back from the franchise, and resume following it as a fan. “It’s very similar to the handoff between VII and VIII. I kind of took it to a place, and now I’m going to hand the baton off and step back.” Johnson calls this “a complicated thing”, but can’t hide his glee when it comes to putting him back in the position of a punter once more, excited for what the future of the franchise holds. “I’m psyched,” he grins. “I can’t wait to sit back and just be an audience member again, and I’m really excited to see how J.J. finishes all this off.”
Star WarS: the LaSt Jedi openS on 14 december.
‘the last jedi felt more visceral. the first film felt like a dream’ Daisy riDley