An awful lot of fans didn’t care much for how Lucasfilm ultimately handled the Star Wars Sequel Trilogy, with The Last Jedi’s deviations from canon leading to Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker hastily trying to retcon as much as possible and doubling down on fan service in the process, and at the end of the day all we were left with was two incredibly divisive movies that both split opinion down the middle.
Despite the criticism that’s constantly being thrown in the direction of the Disney era of the franchise though, Star Wars still remains one of the most popular and beloved properties in the world, with multiple generations falling in love with a galaxy far, far away. That extends to some of the biggest names in the business, too, and the Sequel Trilogy was loaded with secret cameos from world-famous fans.
Karl Urban has now admitted that he’s on that list, with The Boys star recently revealing that he was the latest in a long line of big names to play a very minor role in the franchise, having suited up as a Stormtrooper in The Rise of Skywalker, thanks to his friendship with his Star Trek director J.J. Abrams.
“Here’s the process. I had the good fortune to go and visit J.J. Abrams while he was shooting The Rise of Skywalker. While I was there, he put me in a Stormtrooper uniform and we had a really fun day on set. It’s been one of my lifelong goals to be a Stormtrooper, so I can tick that off now. What is in the cut is my voice saying ‘Knights of Ren’ as Kylo Ren walks down a hallway past two Stormtroopers. I am one of those Stormtroopers.”
Having finally got to realize his lifelong dream in Star Wars: the Rise of Skywalker, you can now add Karl Urban to the list of stars that played incredibly small parts in the Sequel Trilogy alongside Simon Pegg, Daniel Craig, Kevin Smith, Justin Theroux, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Edgar Wright, Tom Hardy, Princes William and Harry, Lin-Manuel Miranda and Ed Sheeran. Some of them may have been left on the cutting room floor, but even getting to step in front of the camera on a Star Wars movie would no doubt have been more than enough for these A-list fanboys.