20 facts you might not know about Star Wars: The Last Jedi

J.J. Abrams directed The Force Awakens, the first film of the new trilogy. Before that movie hit theaters, Rian Johnson had been tapped to write and direct The Last Jedi, though it did not have that name then. However, Johnson’s production process was a little complicated. He and his team had to get to writing before The Force Awakens finished, which proved difficult.

While Johnson is the sole credited writer on The Last Jedi, a movie this massive for a company as big as Disney isn’t going to have a single writer. Johnson worked with a “story group” to help flesh out the film. The director had his group watch several old films to serve as inspiration for his movie, including Twelve O’Clock High, Gunga Din, and Bridge on the River Kwai.

Actresses, including Olivia Cooke, Gina Rodriguez, Tatiana Maslany, and Gugu Mbatha-Raw, were all considered for roles throughout the casting process. What those roles were, we don’t know, but one assumes they were being considered for Rose Tico. That role went to the relatively unknown Kelly Marie Tran. Although, the Comedy Bang! Bang! diehards would have recognized her from one episode of that show.

Benicio Del Toro played the character listed as “DJ” in the credits, though he doesn’t have an actual given name in the film. Before he took the role, it was reportedly offered to Joaquin Phoenix, who turned it down. Not that he’s necessarily against acting in a well-known cinematic universe. After all, he’d win an Oscar for playing Joker.

Look, people who grew up on Star Wars love to cameo in these movies. The opportunities are often there. Among the people to cameo, seen or unseen, in The Last Jedi are Justin Theroux, Rogue One director Gareth Edwards, Edgar Wright, and Prince Harry and Prince William.

Johnson broke out as a director with his debut film Brick. That film starred, among others, Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Noah Segan. Since then, the two have been regulars in Johnson’s films, though often in small roles and cameos to serve as de facto good luck charms. The Last Jedi is no different. JGL has a voice cameo, while Segan plays a Resistance fighter.

Chewbacca was long played by Peter Mayhew. Unfortunately, Mayhew’s body could no longer hold up, so he had to step down. Joonas Suotamo stepped into the role, though Mayhew had a credit as “Chewbacca consultant.” Meanwhile, Jimmy Vee took over as R2-D2 because Kenny Baker died in 2016.

It’s hard to keep a secret in modern filmmaking. And yet, Johnson and Disney were able to keep Yoda’s appearance in The Last Jedi under wraps. To make that happen, Frank Oz was kept off all cast billing for the film and was sequestered when he was on set. Johnson also decided to bring back the puppet version of Yoda, feeling that was the version of Yoda that Luke had interacted with.

Luke Skywalker has a massive role in The Last Jedi, though it’s a different take on the character than usual. Luke is somewhat jaded and embittered, which not everybody liked. Initially, Mark Hamill was one of those people. He expressed his dislike for the take on Luke. Later, he stated he regretted publicizing those concerns and walked back his misgivings.

Hamill has had a successful career as a voiceover actor. He did a bit of that in The Last Jedi in addition to playing Luke Skywalker. Hamill voices Dobbu Scay, the leprechaun-like character who mistakes BB-8 for a slot machine on Canto Bight.

Johnson’s production took the shooting of the movie around the globe. The scenes at Crait were filmed on the Salar de Uyuni salt flats of Bolivia. Meanwhile, Luke’s new home on Ahch-To is Skellig Michael, a craggy island in Ireland.

Evidently, Skellig Michael had a whole bunch of puffins native to the island. They couldn’t get rid of them. To deal with that, Johnson decided to CGI over the puffins. Thus, the Porgs were born.

Dern is an acclaimed actor and an Oscar winner. Apparently, she was having fun playing Admiral Holdo. When she was shooting her blaster in the film, she was making audible “pew” sounds. While they are not audible in the final product, you can allegedly catch one “pew” in the movie.

In The Force Awakens, Rey slices Kylo’s face with a lightsaber. She gets him across the bridge of the nose. In The Last Jedi, his scabbed-over injury is now under his right eye. The reason for the difference? Johnson thought the scab over the nose looked “weird.”

The stormtroopers don’t have the best of luck in the world of Star Wars. In addition to seemingly being uniformly terrible shots, their armor is useless against a laser blast. That is unless you are Captain Phasma. The head honcho of the stormtroopers is hit with a blaster, but it is harmlessly deflected. This marked the first time a stormtrooper was hit with a blaster and not affected by it. Evidently, this is due to her armor not being of standard issue, which leads us to wonder why she’s the only one who gets this laser-proof armor.

It’s common for big movies to shoot under fake production titles to try and garner a little privacy. Star Wars has been doing that since A New Hope, filmed under the production title “Blue Harvest.” Johnson seemed to be having a bit of fun with the title he chose for The Last Jedi. The false title used for its production was “Space Bear.”

We’ve gotten film-length bloat in the last decade or so. Every major film is over two hours these days. The Last Jedi takes the cake in the world of Star Wars. At two hours and 32 minutes, this is the longest of any Star Wars film to date.

Fisher was vital to Star Wars. In addition to playing Leia Organa, she used her skills as a script doctor to help punch up the movies and would adlib on occasion. Unfortunately, Fisher died between finishing filming The Last Jedi and its release, making it the first posthumous release of her career. The movie is dedicated to her, and unused footage from filming the first two movies of this trilogy were used to give her a limited role in The Rise of Skywalker.

Star Wars films tend to rake in the big bucks. Sure, they also cost a ton of cash. The Last Jedi reportedly cost $200-$317 million. It was all good because the movie made $1.333 billion worldwide. It was the highest-grossing movie of 2017 and the ninth-highest-grossing movie of all time.

The Last Jedi earned itself four nods at the Academy Awards. However, they were all for technical categories. The Last Jedi was up for Best Original Score, Best Sound Editing, Best Sound Mixing, and Best Visual Effects. However, it didn’t win any of those.