It’s been fairly well-documented by fans that comments coming from both Rian Johnson and Mark Hamill, the respective director and one of the stars of ‘Star Wars: The Last Jedi,’ have been a bit divisive in terms of how each felt about the on-screen journey of Hamill’s character Luke Skywalker. Johnson, of course, had a heavy hand in the finished on-screen product, and Hamill has made some comments that seemed to indicate that he wasn’t 100% on-board with how his character was portrayed in the film.
The two got together in a recent interview to attempt to clarify their feelings on the matter together. Said Hamill about ‘The Last Jedi:’
“I was amazed at the complexity of it, that it was so challenging, the range of emotions, every color in the pallet. Mine happened to be of a darker hue.”
Johnson was quick to chime in:
“That was part of the challenge with the character of Luke. It felt like I couldn’t have him on the island because he’s a coward or he’s giving up. He had to have an active reason he was there. His reason is, he genuinely believes the Jedi are a hindrance to the galaxy. And so he actually turns it into this kind of heroic act he’s taken on his shoulders of, he knows his friends are suffering and he’s making the choice to do the most painful, difficult thing for him, which is take himself out of the fight.”
In terms of working with Johnson in bringing Luke back to the big screen, Hamill waxed poetic a bit:
“Well, you have to trust someone. As long as I was able to express my reservations about Luke — because you can’t help but feel some measure of ownership like ‘Luke wouldn’t say that,’ or ‘Luke wouldn’t do this,’ — but once we had that conversation, my job was to wipe out what Mark Hamill wants and do my best to realize Rian’s vision.
“And I thought I’m going to turn over everything. I usually have an [interal] mechanism that says ‘this feels right,’ ‘this doesn’t feel right.’ All throughout the process… he’d say, ‘we got it.’ I’d say ‘shouldn’t we do one more?’ and he’d say ‘no, we got it.’ I said, well, Rian, if you’re happy, I’m happy.”
It sounds like, for now, the two creative (pardon the pun here) forces are content with what was presented on-screen, and audiences will have to wait and see if a Luke Force Ghost has a home in any of Johnson’s future ‘Star Wars’ plans.
‘Star Wars: The Last Jedi’ is in theaters now.
