[UPDATED] Grumpy Luke and More New Photos From Star Wars: The Last Jedi

Jill Pantozzi | August 9th, 2017

Entertainment Weekly got a new look at Star Wars: The Last Jedi and talked to some of the cast while remaining spoiler free.

Previously we had our first full look at characters (new and old) thanks to Vanity Fair, and a behind-the-scenes video and posters out of D23, but today EW is dropping several new articles on the Rian Johnson-directed film starring Daisy Ridley, John Boyega, Mark Hamill and more:

When Daisy Ridley’s Rey heard stories of Mark Hamill’s farmboy-turned-Jedi, she expected to discover the warrior we remember from the original trilogy. Instead, she finds a man overpowered by regret, eager to close the book on his past while living out the rest of his days on an isolated island.

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John Boyega’s Finn, now a “big deal” in the Resistance, who embarks on a glamorous mission to the casino city Canto Bight alongside Star Wars newcomer Kelly Marie Tran, who plays Rose Tico, a self-described “nobody” who works as a Resistance mechanic.

Here’s the outside of the casino…

And some new looks at Poe (Oscar Isaac) and Finn.

And the fancy EW covers…

In a focus on Luke and Rey’s meeting at Ahch-To, EW reports:

“The fact that Luke says, ‘I only know one truth. It’s time for the Jedi to end…’ I mean, that’s a pretty amazing statement for someone who was the symbol of hope and optimism in the original films,” Mark Hamill tells EW as part of our new cover story on the Dec. 15 film.

“When I first read it, my jaw dropped,” the actor says. “What would make someone that alienated from his original convictions? That’s not something that you can just make up in an afternoon, and I really struggled with this thing.”

“I don’t think one girl, who he doesn’t know, turning up with a lightsaber is gonna make him go, ‘Oh, s—, yeah, of course I’ll get back into the action,’” Ridley told them.

In their article on Finn and new character Rose Tico (Kelly Marie Tran):

She is a gearhead, a grease monkey, a behind-the-scenes jack-of-all-trades, while her sister Paige (played by Veronica Ngo) is the dynamic one — a Resistance gunner who fights on the front lines alongside Resistance luminaries like Poe Dameron, Oscar Isaac’s X-wing ace.

“Poe Dameron is super cool. Finn’s super cool. Even though [Rose] is good at what she does, she’s not known,” Tran says. “She’s not cool. She’s this nobody, this background player, which is what makes her interesting. She’s not the best. She’s not royalty. She’s someone who is just like everyone else.”

Boyega added, “He’s a hero to people like Rose, who fight for the Resistance because their homes have been destroyed by the First Order.”

EW is going to have more today and tomorrow, I’ll update as they come…

[Update #1] We’ve engaged the Porg.

EW write, “The porgs are so ubiquitous, they even leaked out ahead of time, sneaking past Lucasfilm security to bounce around the internet. In real life, they were puppets created through Neal Scanlan’s creature shop, with wide black eyes and furry, flapping wings.”

There’s also another alien race living on the island, one that apparently “tolerates” Luke’s presence there.

“They’re kind of these sort of fish-bird type aliens who live on the island,” Johnson says. “They’ve been there for thousands of years, and they essentially keep up the structures on the island.”

The Caretakers are slightly more anthropomorphic than the porgs. They’re animated with a person inside (Daisy Ridley said a friend played one of them) and they wear clothes and speak in an alien tongue.

“They’re all female, and I wanted them to feel like a remote sort of little nunnery,” Johnson says. “Neal Scanlan’s crew designed them, and costume designer Michael Kaplan made these working clothes that also reflected sort of a nun-like, spartan sort of existence.”

[Update #2] Supreme Leader Snoke is protected in the film by his Praetorian Guard. EW says they’re “a variation on the crimson-cloaked Imperial guards who flanked the Emperor in Return of the Jedi.”

“The Emperor’s guards were very formal, and you always got the sense that they could fight, but they didn’t,” Johnson explained to EW. “They looked like they were more ceremonial, and you never really saw them in action. The Praetorians, my brief to [costume designer] Michael Kaplan was that those guys have to be more like samurai. They have to be built to move, and you have to believe that they could step forward and engage if they have to. They have to seem dangerous.”

Snoke will play a larger role in The Last Jedi but will we learn more about him? Don’t hold your breath.

“Similar to Rey’s parentage, Snoke is here to serve a function in the story. And a story is not a Wikipedia page,” the filmmaker says. “For example, in the original trilogy, we didn’t know anything about the Emperor except what Luke knew about him, that he’s the evil guy behind Vader. Then in the prequels, you knew everything about Palpatine because his rise to power was the story.”

Johnson did confirm one thing however, Snoke will be “entirely a mo-cap performance.”

[Update #3] EW has now posted their next article which focuses on Carrie Fisher’s Leia and Poe Dameron. They remind us the Resistance is in a tight spot since the First Order decimated the Republic. “They’re a small band that’s now cut off, on its own, and hunted when the Republic is shattered,” said Johnson. “When the First Order did that hit, the Resistance is isolated, and they’re very, very vulnerable. That’s where we pick them up.”

“Poe’s arc is one of evolving from a heroic soldier to a seasoned leader, to see beyond the single-mindedness of winning the battle to the larger picture of the future of the galaxy,” Isaac says. “I think Leia knows she won’t be around forever and she, with tough love, wants to push Poe to be more than the badass pilot, to temper his heroic impulses with wisdom and clarity.”

“Poe is in some ways a surrogate son for Leia,” Isaac added. “But also I think she sees in him the potential for a truly great leader of the Resistance and beyond.” [Editor’s Note: brb need tissues]

And on Laura Dern’s Vice Admiral Holdo….

We don’t know anything about the character at this point but EW writes:

There are also rivalries and alliances within the movement. Johnson isn’t ready to reveal what Laura Dern’s Vice Admiral Holdo’s role is in the story, but as a fellow commander in the Resistance she is likely to have a history with Leia Organa. The nature of it will be for the movie to reveal.

[Update #4] Benicio del Toro’s character DJ gets an official description via Lucasfilm: “DJ is an enigmatic figure whose tattered, threadbare clothes and lackadaisical attitude conceal a sharp mind and expert skills.” EW explains he’s neither good nor evil, just in it for himself.

“We just need a codebreaker and he’s the best in the galaxy. Unfortunately, he’s very dodgy and only in it for financial gain. He doesn’t fight for any side,” Boyega says.

In Star Wars parlance, a hacker is known as a “slicer,” and this is a side of the lore that the movies haven’t typically explored.

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“He has distinct opinions,” Boyega says. “The Resistance bombs the First Order one day, the First Order bombs the Resistance on another. It’s an ongoing war that will never end. For him, he’s trying to benefit off of that — which doesn’t make him the person you want to trust.”

[Update #5] Entertainment Weekly’s latest highlights the questions surrounding Rey’s family. Ridley told them: “You can always look for answers and that doesn’t mean that the rest of your life is so easy. It’s not like, oh, I know who my parents are so now everything falls into shape, especially in the Star Wars world… Yes, it would potentially change her mind, or at least give her a little bit more peace in moving forward. But ultimately what’s coming is coming, and whatever abilities she has are there. So, personally, I think it’s less important than even she may think.”