ST Chewbacca / Peter Mayhew in Ep. VII

Mean but funny:



Speaking of the "Leia hugs Rey instead" kerfuffle, Abrams weighed in on it himself:

http://www.slashfilm.com/leia-hugging-rey-jj-abrams-force-awakens/

That was probably one of the mistakes I made in that. My thinking at the time was that Chewbacca, despite the pain he was feeling, was focused on trying to save Finn and getting him taken care of. So I tried to have Chewbacca go off with him and focus on Rey, and then have Rey find Leia and Leia find Rey. The idea being that both of them being strong with the Force and never having met, would know about each other — that Leia would have been told about her beyond what we saw onscreen and Rey of course would have learned about Leia. And that reunion would be a meeting and a reunion all in one, and a sort of commiseration of their mutual loss....Had Chewbacca not been where he was, you probably wouldn’t have thought of it. But because he was right there, passed by Leia, it felt almost like a slight, which was definitely not the intention.

To be fair, I can buy the notion that Chewie would be more concerned about getting Finn to safety than stopping with Leia. Besides, we get a shot of Chewie sulking, like, 30 seconds later anyway.

 

another moment that was blown out of proportion.

 

Was anyone else annoyed with Han taking Chewie's bowcaster?

First, it was kinda pointless. I think there's supposed to be some sort of "hey this is powerful" fun going on, but it didn't do anything for me.

Why not add more comedy to it? Why not have Han try to use the bowcaster...only to find it weighs like 100kg or something, instantly slipping through his hands like a cartoon anvil...or it's so powerful the recoil knocks him on his ass when he shoots it. So, we find out that you need to be Wookiee strong to use it. Harrison could have sold the **** out of that.

I really didn't like Chewie literally having his power taken out of his hands. Why is Han even shooting Chewie's bowcaster? Why not just let Chewie be a total commando badass in that sequence?

It was different when we saw the beautiful princess suddenly snatch the blaster out of the fly boy's hands and rescue herself. There was a point to that.

Here we have the hero taking the power from what is basically a minority character.

 

They're friends. Han asks Chewie if he can try it out. I don't see it as anything more than one friend letting the other friend try out his cool toy for a minute.

 

Yep. And was also drawing attention to how powerful the bowcaster is, to show that it's not just a scratch when Kylo gets hit in the abdomen

 

scene was fine it was inserting some humour and showing how close chewie and han are. also shows how powerful the weapon is to set up kylo losing to rey or fighting to a stalemate depending how you view it. its good storytelling

 

It would have been pretty funny to have Han chucked around by the recoil or something similar but it works pretty well as is.

 

Not to mention Han's coat....
on, off, on, off.....
I thought that was pretty funny!

 

What do we think of this explanation about Chewi not hugging Leia?

https://www.reddit.com/r/FanTheories/comments/51nsol/why_leia_did_not_hug_chewbacca_in_the_force/

 

So watching the movie, is anything where Chewie is standing not Peter Mayhew? Or is there no way to know?

I will also admit that I am slightly flummoxed nobody called him "Chewbacca" the whole movie but I don't think even Han has ever called him "Chewbacca" so I guess I can let it slide.

And I'm STILL excited that we finally saw Chewie's fingers!

 

Unless there is CGI of Chewie (unlikely given the pro-practical effects stance of the film-makers) then as far as I know then the only one playing Chewbacca is Mayhew. Quite apart from anything else, there aren't many people tall enough to stand in properly anyway, and much like Prowse as Vader, there is a lot of 'body acting' that is put into a character especially one who is unintelligible to an audience - why find another really tall dude who could imitate all of Chewie/Mayhew's body language when he's already right there on the set?

 

I stand corrected. Kudos to the new guy then because he did a great job.

 

Life debt paid

 

I don't think PM is necessary to SW to be Chewbacca. I think if he "taught" another person to be him, his mannerisms and all he could retire. He already has someone doing his stunts. I just can't imagine having no Chewie .

 

Chewie and the rest were all leaving the base, and Han was too. But he changed his mind for one last ditch play to lure back his son. And he seemed unsure about doing it, too. That's their reason why they were separated from Han. At least Chewie let out that roar and fired his crossbow, and finished the job by detonating the bombs.

 

You know, something I've thought of

What exactly is Chewbacca's mindset after Han's death? Clearly it drives him berserk, but when you think about it, wouldn't Kylo Ren/Ben have pretty much amounted to sort of a nephew for him? I'd imagine he helped raise him until he turned bad and left. Is it possible that he actually intentionally shot just to wound rather than kill? Regardless, he's still family too