ST Chewbacca / Peter Mayhew in Ep. VII

I think Lumpy, Itchy, and Malla already are canon, even if the SWHS itself is not. Chewie's family came from Lucas directly, and, according to Lumpy's Wookieepedia page, EU authors have been constrained by LFL to portray it as it was in the Holiday Special.
Aren't the core elements of the SWHS supposed to be derived from GL's original ideas for a Wookiee movie? Did those characters exist even before the Holiday Special was planned?

 

Possibly, but I think the SWHS was derived more from the vaudeville variety shows of the 1970s. Anyway, I'd love to see Malla and Itchy as well, but I'll totally just settle for the mighty Chewbacca!

 

No, no, I just mean the Wookiee / Life Day elements. I'm pretty sure the variety show mess was added to whatever Lucas' initial story was.
And actually, I was just poking around on the Wook, and I was reminded that Itchy/Attichitcuk goes back (as "Auzituck") to the 1973 rough draft - which means that Chewie's family may in fact predate the SWHS.

But yeah, aside from the possibility of his family, I'm more than thrilled to have Chewie and Mayhew back.

 

Oh yes! I remember that now! Hrm...I wonder if we'll see things more things from the early "Jedi Bendu" drafts in the ST.

Chewbacca and Lumpy go to Opuchi to enlist the aid of Seig Darklighter to overthrow the villainous Cos Da****!

 

Geez, next thing you know we'll be talking about if Chewbacca is a big fan of jizz in Episode VII.

 

Please dont tell me you guys will be excited if they confirm Kenny Baker is returning

 

That would be pretty sweet. Though nearing 80, it might be tough to do.

 

Maybe have Kenny Baker play an actual character, like someone related to the guy who designed the R2 series astrodroids.

 

I love the idea of Chewie returning just because it gives Episode VII the ability to pay tribute to the actors that made Star Wars what it is today. And not just Mark, Carrie, and Harrison.

 

I agree. As crazy as this sounds today, those people took a risk when they made the original Star Wars in the mid-70's for a 1977 release. It could have bombed. It could have ruined careers. They may have had other opportunities that they had to pass on. I am 100% in favor of the original cast reprising their roles as long as possible, not so much because I could tell the difference between Mayhew and someone else of equal height in a Chewbacca costume, but because he deserves it.

 

Isn't it kind of weird that Wookiees have a certain style to their names, that still doesn't sound at all like anything anyone of them could actually pronounce?
It would be fun to hear Chewie actually say his own name.

 

Honestly, I would be more frightened than excited. I really don't want an octogenarian inside of a several hundred pound metal tomb on wheels in the middle of the Moroccan desert at high noon.

"Aaaaaand, action, R2-D2!"

[....]

"Action, R2-D2!"

[....]

"Kenny, that's you, buddy!"

[....]

But seriously, I do hope Baker is allowed to come in and do one scene with Hamill, Fisher, Ford, Daniels and Mayhew just for old time's sake, not to mention a little positive mojo for the film.

I told a co-worker and fellow Star Wars fan about Mayhew last night and he just sort of shrugged and said "Does it really matter who's in the suit?". I don't know if that's the prevailing opinion or not, but personally I think it happens to matter quite a bit.

 

It's weird to hear that from someone who's an actual fan, I'll admit, but from non-fans, such sentiments really come as no surprise. To ordinary people who just gather round the water cooler, no, it doesn't matter who's in the suit at all. It's sad, but true. From the perspective of Johnny Lunchpail, Mayhew is a name they hear on occasion, if at all, during the course of their lives, quickly heard and as quickly forgotten. "How important is it to MY life if Mayhew is in it or not?," they'll say. "Are there no other tall people in Hollywood?" And from their perspective, there's no reason to think differently. Subtle differences of performance between actors are an abstract concept to them.

That said, it's clear that most fans understand that there IS a qualitative difference who's in there or not. There MUST be, or the people doing TCW would never have bothered to talk to him or ask him questions or get a sense of how he moved or behaved when designing their cartoon-Chewie. There would also have been no noticeable sense in that episode that this really WAS Chewiw, and yet it felt like him to me, demeanor, movements and all. That they went to all the effort, and that the effort actually paid off, pretty much counts to me as damn good evidence that you're right: it DOES matter quite a bit...

...at least to us.

 

You can't hear it but right now I am saying "Chewbacca" in a way that sounds like that dog on YouTube who says "I love you" on command.

 

I think the jury's still out on this one. I'm new to this forum, but I want to say my piece.

Sure, people love nostalgia, familiar faces, etc. Plus it means a lot to the actor. I personally was never a big Chewbacca fan, and actually appreciated his death in Vector Prime because it set the proper tone for the NJO and he died a hero's death. Ultimately, his sacrifice was not in vain even if Star by Star partially undid it.

However, the big issue here is, of course, that this means the Expanded Universe is going to be pruned in some way. Everything post-Young Jedi Knights is now in question, and if we don't get Jacen, Jaina etc, then the entire post-RoTJ EU comes into question. What has set Star Wars apart over the years has been its unified canon. Even crap such as the Reborn Emperor and the Sun Crusher have been woven into a fairly logical and cohesive continuity, with some things retconned very cleverly to avoid inconsistencies.

That won't really be possible with the release of Episode 7. We're basically going to be left with two post-RoTJ timelines. This is okay if it's executed correctly. Writers should be allowed to continue expanding the (generally) wonderful post-RoTJ timeline that we already have. But on the other hand, this opens up the floodgates for new, original stories in the post-RoTJ phase: we'll have a chance to expand off fresh new movies and possibly undo some of the boneheaded decisions in the EU, such as killing characters prematurely, putting people in power who shouldn't be there, Sun Crushers, no VestaraxBen at the end of FotJ, etc.

I've come to terms with the death of the EU as far as official movie continuity goes. But why not continue to cultivate the "alternate timeline" so that everyone can be happy? It's simple, it's elegant, and the only real loss is that we won't have Jacen and Jaina (and other EU stuff) on the big screen, and the stories we grew up with have lost their canon - from a certain point of view.

 

Welcome, Deckiller! Glad to have you on board!

It sounds like what you want is for the new films to keep intact the EU you like and disband the EU you don't like. But I'm sure there fans out there who like the EU you don't like and dislike the EU you do like. Where does that leave them? The only way to please all EU fans would be to keep the entire EU intact and it was unrealistic for us to ever expect JJ and company to stay completely within the boundaries of the EU. That would severely limit their abilities as creators of art by putting them inside of a box with many moving parts and walls and saying they can't operate outside of it. Unrealistic.

At the end of the day, those books, comics, games, etc. are still on your shelves and always will be. You loved them the first time you read them and you can still love them as you read them again. The EU can still be really meaningful to you even if the new films contradict some plot points in some of the books.

I'd suggest you visit the Official Sequel Trilogy/Expanded Universe discussion thread - there's a lot of great discussion and speculation by other EU fans in there about what the ST all means for the EU.

Anyway, back to Chewie. As someone who was OK with what the EU did with Chewie, what are you looking for from him as a character in Episode VII now that we know he'll be back?

 

Thanks!

Actually, I'd rather them keep the whole EU intact as an alternate universe, and use some ideas from the EU in the films. Both the old EU and the new EU can continue to be expanded.

Edit: I'm looking for Chewie to have a bigger role in the story. I want to see him do some unilaterally heroic things.

 

If Lumpy is included that means that that Holiday Special actually exists...

 

I don't know that this really stands to reason. If Lumpy is included, that means that Lumpy actually exists. It doesn't really mean that anything else that took place during the Holiday Special actually canonically happened (like Ackmena doing a song and dance routine to drive out the patrons of the cantina).

 

Damn shame. She was the only likable character.

 

What about the guy who poured drinks in his head?

 

I think he's the main bad guy in Episode 7.

 

Given the numerous versions of the last 10 minutes of Return Of The Jedi, you could take the Yub Nub ending as the starting point for EU reality (since the Special Edition shows a definitive fall of the Empire via the Coruscant uprising) and have the Special Edition ending (take your pick, Shaw or Hayden) be the starting point for sequel trilogy reality. Not in an official capacity of course, but in your own mind as you try to hold on to whatever elements of EU you want to hold on to. Maybe the death of Palpatine could be the splitting point. It causes a rift in the Force as he tries to preserve his spirit. He manages it by literally shifting his spirit into an alternate reality, allowing the Emperor to return in EU while preserving the blank slate in the sequel universe.

 

I thought there were only two versions of that ending?