Welcome to Star Wars Explained!
The Art of The Last Jedi is a collection of concept art and notes
compiled by Phil Szostak. It goes into the making of The Last Jedi,
unused ideas, and behind the scenes facts that I found to be interesting.
So here are over twenty fun facts from the book!
Well before Kylo Ren was ever named, he was simply known as the Jedi killer.
He was always meant to be a student of Luke's that wanted revenge.
The cheap imitation of Darth Vader was meant to haunt Luke as a constant reminder of his failure.
Rey's second costume at the end of The Force Awakens was initially going to be more of an homage to the fallen Han
Solo, including a vest and red piping down her pants.
It's ambiguous in the film whether or not Luke's X-wing is functional.
but he had set it on fire to make it clear he had no intention of leaving Ahch-To.
The Supremacy was always designed with the idea that it was where Snoke lived.
He has no planet that he calls home; only his mobile command center.
Snoke's throne room was designed to resemble Ralph McQuarrie's original designs for the Emperor's throne room in Return of the Jedi.
Andy Serkis wore Snoke's actual costume while he performed some of the motion capture scenes.
Snoke's attendants were designs made for The Force Awakens that were almost used
but abandoned. The designs were popular, so, again, they were almost used in Rogue One.
They finally made their way onto the big screen in The Last Jedi.
The design team was instructed to think of the sequel trilogy era as the Korean War, while the original trilogy era was World War II.
Ships and vehicles were meant to be iterations and updates on familiar designs.
For example, the Ninka is an updated version of the Tantive IV.
In the earliest versions of the story, Poe was supposed to travel with Finn to Canto Bight instead of Rose,
but Rian Johnson felt that the two characters didn't challenge each other to change and grow,
so Rose was created to accompany Finn and be the angel on his shoulder while DJ served as the devil.
Instead of wearing their Resistance costumes, there was a scene written where Finn and Rose stole some formal wear to fit in at the casino.
Rose would get an elegant dress and Finn would gain some ego-inflating attention for his tuxedo
only to learn that he was wearing it backwards.
The Master Code Breaker actually had a bit of backstory in the early drafts of the script.
He was on Canto Bight casing an insectoid warlord called the Butcher of Brix.
The Codebreaker intended to steal the blood jewels that financed the butcher's murderous regime.
He was also going to be found by Finn and Rose as he played piano. He would agree to help,
they would go out of a service exit to pick up his things, and they would all be caught and arrested.
Many of the patrons of Canto Bight were played by models, not actors.
Even some of the aliens that are head to toe in prosthetics were played by fashion models.
The costumes designed for the casino-goers were inspired by Ralph McQuarrie's images of the citizens of Cloud City.
Likewise, the Canto Bight police weapons were based off of the Cloud City Security weapons.
After Finn and Rose escaped their jail cell, they make their way to the fathier stables,
which were supposed to be another, even worse, jail.
The staircase on the ship DJ and BB-8 steal is meant to be an homage to the hidden staircase that Indiana Jones
falls down in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.
Rian Johnson requested a new alphabet be created for the riding on the Millennium Falcon's escape pod.
It's unconfirmed, but that riding could turn out to be Corellian.
Captain Phasma wasn't even supposed to be in The Force Awakens.
but enough people got attached to the chrome armor that they decided to make a character for it.
Phasma was created in four or five days in what is described in the book as complete panic.
That probably explains why she was so underused in both The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi.
The command bridge of the dreadnought was the same set as the supremacy, just redressed and lit differently.
Similarly, the Jedi Temple on Ahch-To, the cave blocked by rocks on Crait, and the mirror cave visited by Rey were all the same set, just redressed.
Original concepts for the Resistance Bombers referred to them as T-Wings.
Finn was also meant to be recovered by the time of the attack on D'Qar and on the same bomber as Paige.
He would hold her as she died and get a bloody handprint on his chest similar to the one he received on his helmet in The Force Awakens.
Since the movie was always meant to be rated PG-13,
the true violence of war couldn't really be shown on screen.
The red surface of Crait being kicked up and exposed was meant to symbolize the blood and violence of a battle.
They made the planet bleed since the characters couldn't.
Those are just some of the most interesting facts I wrote down from the book.
The whole thing is a great and interesting read if you want to dive into how and when this film was made.
If you liked this video you might also like the one I did on the Visual Dictionary, which you can watch right here.
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As always, thanks for watching and may the Force be with you.