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Benicio del Toro and Laura Dern were announced Monday as being part of the cast of Episode VIII. Is that a good thing, or a bad thing?
Specifically – one of the things I think really works about the Original Trilogy is that most of the actors were unknown at the time, so they came in with very little baggage. I had no idea who Peter Cushing or Alec Guinness were as a kid, and in Cushing’s case, I think a lot of adults were unfamiliar with him, too, considering he spent much of his career in British horror films.
In the Prequel Trilogy, by contrast, you had the glaringly apparent faces of Liam Neeson, Ewan McGregor, Natalie Portman, Samuel L. Jackson, and Christopher Lee, all in prominent roles. For me, I wasn’t as able to separate them from their pre-existing movie baggage. Natalie Portman as a young assassin in training, Sam Jackson about to get medieval on someone and carrying a wallet that says “Bad #^$^%#&^%&^#” on it, Liam Neeson in that horrible Scottish movie that wasn’t Braveheart. You get the gist.
But for The Force Awakens, the known actors were hidden away. Simon Pegg and Gwendoline Christie were stuck in full body character costumes. Lupita Nyong’o and Andy Serkis were CGI, and you could barely recognize their voices. For me, that helped make the experience more authentic overall, and made it seem like we were talking about worlds that had no relation to our own.
So I’m hoping del Toro and Dern will also be CGI characters as a result, and I want to know if you feel the same way. Share your thoughts in the comments!
Trivia Time!
Test your knowledge of the Star Wars universe!Yesterday’s answer: Sarco Plank
Today’s question: On what part of his body was Chewie shot in The Force Awakens?