A good story features creatures
Without the inclusion of mystical creatures, a galaxy far, far away would look just like, well, Ireland. In Star Wars: The Last Jedi (in theaters now), in addition to the regular aliens, droids and Chewbacca, filmmakers created brand-new otherworldly species that injected extra magic into filming locations like Skellig Michael, the real location of Luke Skywalker’s (Mark Hamill) remote island. So what’s the deal with these new creatures?
Ben Morris, creative director at Industrial Light & Magic (ILM), says his team of 1,000 artists created more than the “expected fantasy” in director Rian Johnson’s new chapter of Star Wars, contributing to 2,000 shots in the final film.
“Everything we created was in service of the story” rather than “spectacle just for the sake of spectacle,” Morris says. “Audiences have become too sensitized to this kind of use of visual effects and can quickly become bored if there isn’t a compelling story to justify the imagery.”
Morris chatted with USA TODAY about the new non-human characters and how they got their looks.
Porgs
Hometown: Ahch-To, Luke Skywalker’s remote island.
What they are: “When we were on Skellig Michael (which stands in for Ahch-To), it had tens of thousands of puffins,” Morris says. It’s no surprise that
The Last Jedi’s now-famous porgs look and act a lot like those inquisitive seabirds, only fatter, furrier, louder and beakless.
Behind the scenes: About half of the porgs seen onscreen were puppets, Morris says, but their adorable eyes were too big to open and close in real life. The visual-effects team added the blinking, twitching and breathing to the playful creatures.
Fathiers
Hometown: Canto Bight, the wealthy city with casinos and fathier races.
What they are: “They’re the first thing (the director) wanted to speak about three years ago,” when planning began on The Last Jedi, Morris says. Though they’re enormous, rideable and reminiscent of the tauntauns in The Empire Strikes Back, the fathiers are a “completely new species (that’s a) mixture of a giant horse, dog, cat and lion,” Morris says. The gentle giants can run 50 mph — which is why they’re used for racing — and are large enough for a 6-foot-tall man to stand under their bellies.
Behind the scenes: The space horses, which have more than 1 million strands of fur, were created completely by the digital-effects team. Actors performed on a riding rig before ILM turned the imaginary animal beneath them into a “huge, imposing physical presence (with) a very sympathetic look, because they’ve been abused by the horrible culture of the racetrack.” The key to the innocent expression? Big eyes.
Caretakers
Hometown: Ahch-To.
What they are: The fishlike anthropomorphic amphibians are the preservationists on their centuriesold island. Knock down a rock formation and you’ll tick off the all-female fish-nuns.
Behind the scenes: Wait for the deleted scenes, Morris says, because then you might see what the male caretakers (who were cut from the film) look like. Human actors brought the bipedal animals to life, but ILM turned their feet into birdlike ones.
BB-9E
Hometown: Starkiller Base.
What he is: He looks a lot like good droid BB-8, but the baddie is black with “more surface details, grills and dark holes,” Morris says. Instead of BB-8’s higherpitched “wee” sounds, BB-9E’s noises are lower and can sound like flatulence.
Behind the scenes: BB-“hate,” as Morris’ team called the droid, is a real robot. But visual-effects artists post-production had to erase the reflection of the film crew from his shiny body.