Mark Hamill Pens Touching Letter To Star Wars Fans In Skywalker Saga Box Set

With Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker having now almost left cinemas, the 42-year Skywalker saga is over. It’s been a hell of a journey, encompassing four great movies, two mediocre ones and three awful ones (I’ll let you decide which go in which categories). To mark the occasion, Lucasfilm and Disney are releasing an extra-special 4K Blu-ray box set containing the full story, a lot of bonus features and a book full of beautiful Ralph McQuarrie (RIP) art. In total, fans will get a whopping 27 discs of material for the princely sum of $250.

One other cool thing the set contains though is a signed letter from Mark Hamill commemorating the end of his involvement in Star Wars. And now, with an HD image of the set available online, an enterprising fan has zoomed in and transcribed what that letter says.

Here it is in full:

What an extraordinary journey it’s been. Back in 1976, when Carrie, Harrison, and I were testing for our roles in what was then called “The Adventures of Luke as taken from The Journal of the Whills Saga: The Star Wars”, there’s no way we could have known what an incredibly rich and imaginative set of adventures this obscure little space movie would launch, inspiring eight more chapters to tell the entire Skywalker story. For some of you, that journey began with us over 40 years ago, inviting Star Wars into your lives from the seats of just a few dozen theaters in its first days of release. For others, may have joined us somewhere along the way, from the harrowing saga of young Anakin’s descent to the dark side in the prequel trilogy or the introduction of an entirely new generation of heroes in the sequel trilogy.

As Carrie once said, Star Wars is about family, and that is what we have all become — one giant community who shares the common experience of these stories and the fundamental values they instil in us. Whether you’re a relative newcomer to the Star Wars galaxy or a long time U.P.F. (ultra passionate fan), am deeply thankful for your continued enthusiasm and dedication to George’s faraway galaxy, which will continue to grow with new storytellers building an even bigger galaxy filled with heroes, villains, action, romance, and, of course, the Force.

May the Force be with you… always.

Mark Hamill

It’s touching stuff, though I can’t help but wonder if we’d be sitting here four decades on from Star Wars‘ release if they’d stuck with the original title of The Adventures of Luke as taken from The Journal of the Whills Saga: the Star Wars. Hamill’s words are obviously spoken from the heart, and though The Rise of Skywalker has apparently capped off his involvement in a galaxy, far, far away, I wouldn’t be surprised to see him return in some sort of cameo appearance in future movies or TV shows.

If nothing else, this box set basically encompasses forty years of evolution in blockbuster cinema – from the models, puppets and innovative motion-controlled camera work of the Original Trilogy, the then-groundbreaking CGI of the prequels and right through to the slick combination of the two in the Sequel Trilogy.

It releases on March 31st and will likely never be reprinted, so if you desperately want this, then now’s the time to reserve a copy.