Lucasfilm Ltd
Actors need to create an identity and backstory for them to get their characters right. And for someone like Mark Hamill, who has played the iconic role of Star Wars’s Luke Skywalker for so many years, we aren’t surprised he has his own idea of how Luke ended up being the way he is before The Last Jedi. It has to be said that this idea Hamill shares with Entertainment Weekly isn’t considered canon or part of the Star Wars narrative. It’s just something the actor created to find the motivation of his character. And what do we learn? He thinks something devastating had to happen. “I wrote lots and lots of scenarios,” Hamill says. “I made notes that he fell in love with a woman who was a widow and had this young child.”
As fans know Jedis aren’t supposed to have personal relationships so Hamill worked this out saying he left the order during this time. But we also know he came back and founded a training academy that ended rather tragically, too, with his nephew Ben Solo ending up in the dark side as Kylo Ren. But in Hamill’s backstory he adds that, “He left the Jedi to raise this young child and marry this woman. And the child got hold of a lightsaber and accidentally killed himself.”
It’s a dark scenario fans might not be able to imagine for Hamill’s character but he says this kind of grief and guilt is what he needs to get back to the road of redemption. And it’s possibly what made Luke hesitant to hold a lightsaber again. “It’s nothing to do with the story, but when I think about gun violence and you read these tragic stories of kids getting hold of their parents’ guns and killing a sibling or themselves, I mean, I had to go to really dark places to get where Luke needed to be for this story,” he says. Hamill consulted with writer-director Rian Johnson to make sure he was getting the right tone for the character and says Johnson was “really nurturing” in this regard and encouraged him to find justifications for his actions.
And while this isn’t officially what happens, we have to admit, this is something we’ll think about when we see The Last Jedi this month.