Paying homage to Leia
Fisher’s role was woven into episode 9
This was supposed to be Carrie Fisher’s movie — her centre spotlight after the previous two films in Disney’s modern Star Wars trilogy successively featured Harrison Ford and Mark Hamill, her castmates across four decades.
“It’s nothing short of heartbreaking that she wasn’t here to collaborate on this film, because we couldn’t possibly tell the story without her,” J.J. Abrams says of directing The Rise of Skywalker without Fisher, who died three years ago last month.
Ever since her death, those creatively involved with the Skywalker saga have tried to honour Fisher’s memory while also wrestling with how to present her iconic character, Leia Organa, on screen.
The starkest misstep since was a digital motion-capture representation of a young Leia briefly in the one-off film Rogue One — an eerie effect that many fans thought fell squarely into the “uncanny valley.”
Lucasfilm had announced that Fisher would appear in The Rise of Skywalker but assuaged fans about how the posthumous “performance” would be handled.
“We would never consider recasting,” Abrams said recently. “And we wouldn’t want to do a digital character.”
Abrams had worked with Fisher on his 2015 Star Wars movie — “I knew her a little bit for a long time before we did Force Awakens,” he says — and Fisher’s presence is tastefully crafted from existing footage of her as Leia.
“Originally the frustration I felt at cutting out these scenes that we had shot in Force Awakens,” Abrams says, “were suddenly the relief that we needed in prepping The Rise of Skywalker.”
In several scenes in Rise, we see Leia guiding another Force-sensitive Jedi warrior, the new trilogy ’s central hero Rey (Daisy Ridley), to take on the Empire, including Leia’s own son, Kylo Ren (Adam Driver).
Chris Terrio, the Rise of Skywalker co-writer, says helping script Leia’s new scenes required “every skill that I’ve ever picked up along the way.”
“You would have scenes that honestly were shot with some different context in mind,” Terrio says. “But you’d want to get to the emotional truth of what was going on in the scene so that we could ... stay true to her acting choices.
“So when we were reconstructing scenes around Carrie,” the co-writer continues, “we would try to see what Carrie was doing and just look at the warmth and her wit and all these things that Carrie was.”
Notably, Fisher’s relatives blessed Abrams’ use of the existing footage.
“I’m grateful not just to (Fisher) for all that she did long before I was involved,” Abrams says, “but what she did when we made Force Awakens together and to her family for being as supportive as they’ve been — for allowing Leia to appear in the film.”