Director J.J. Abrams returned to the franchise for Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, completing the trilogy he started in The Force Awakens. He’s not just a major player behind the scenes, though, as the filmmaker also has a secret role in the movie that you might’ve missed. Mainly because he doesn’t actually appear on-screen.
Instead, Abrams lent his voice to one character who’s a pretty big part of the pic: tiny droid D-O. The adorable little guy is first discovered by BB-8 on the abandoned ship of Ochi of Bastoon on the planet Pasaana. Beebee wakes D-O and the pair become firm pals. However, Dio’s clearly very nervous around humans, something that Rey deduces is down to him being abused by Ochi, his previous owner, a Jedi hunter who worked for Emperor Palpatine. When he does start talking, D-O speaks in short sentences like “hello” or “no, thank you”. And that’s Abrams we’re hearing.
Abrams isn’t the only crew member who turns up in TROS, either. His co-writer Chris Terrio also has a vocal cameo as the voice of Aftab Ackbar, the young Mon Calamari Resistance fighter – who’s actually the son of the late Admiral Ackbar. Longtime composer John Williams appears as well, in person though, as someone at the club where the gang find Babu Frik on Kijimi. As this is the final time he’s going to score a Star Wars film, it’s nice that he finally got to join the cast, too.
As for D-O, he seems like a character who could have potential to appear again following this movie, so it’ll be interesting to see whether Abrams is called on to voice the droid once more. Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker establishes BB-8 and D-O as a new Threepio/Artoo-like double act, so if the former returns – and it seems likely he will – then the latter will most probably be back alongside him.
