Mark Hamill Compares Luke’s Star Wars: The Last Jedi Arc To His Own Life

Not for the first time, Mark Hamill has reflected on the tragic arc of Luke Skywalker from Star Wars: The Last Jedi.

While chatting to IGN, the franchise veteran spoke candidly about the ways in which Luke had changed since Return of the Jedi – gone is the hopeful, wide-eyed farmboy and in his place is a stubborn and isolated hermit – and now, he’s offered some insight into how the character’s “tragic” arc reflects his own life. Or, at the very least, Hamill called upon real-life experiences to help him better understand the tragedy that is Luke Skywalker’s story.

Via IGN:

It is tragic. I’m not a method actor, but one of the techniques a method actor will use is to try and use real-life experiences to relate to whatever fictional scenario he’s involved in. The only thing I could think of, given the screenplay that I read, was that I was of the Beatles generation – ‘All You Need Is Love’, ‘peace and love’.

The actor also addressed Luke’s somewhat contentious journey, and how he arrived on Ahch-To as a world-weary Jedi Knight ready to shut himself off from the Force. Of course, we know this arc was initially triggered by Kylo Ren (AKA Ben Solo), Luke’s estranged nephew who rebelled against his master and sent Skywalker into hiding.

Hamill continued:

There’s just such a huge gap between Return of the Jedi and Force Awakens – I had to really contemplate that. I said ‘hey, how did I go from being the most optimistic, positive character to this cranky, suicidal man who wants people to get off his island?’ It was a radical change, but I think sometimes being pushed out of your comfort zone is a good thing. Although a part of me said to Rian, ‘but you know, a Jedi would never give up’. My concept of the character was that even if I chose the New Hitler thinking he was the New Hope, yeah I’d feel terrible, but I wouldn’t secret myself on an island and then turn off the Force.

Now that The Last Jedi has come and gone, all eyes in the galaxy are beginning to turn toward Star Wars: Episode IX. It’s yet to nail down an official title (that we know of), though we understand J.J. Abrams and his team are already in the midst of pre-production.