Warning: This article contains MAJOR SPOILERS for Star Wars: The Last Jedi.
Phew! Star Wars: The Last Jedi is stuffed with Easter eggs, cameos and callbacks. Here are all the references and cameo appearances we found.
Cameos
Billie Lourd
It was very moving to see Carrie Fisher share screen time and space with her own daughter. Lourd appears in the film in the role of Lieutenant Connix, a junior member of the Resistance stationed on the same ship as General Leia. Scenes in which they appear together have an unintentional emotional weight. They did not know that Fisher would no longer be with us at the time the film reached audiences. Sob.
Gareth Edwards
In the trenches on Crait, when the Resistance is defending its base from an attack by the First Order, the camera lingers on one face just long enough to realise this is someone of note – Rogue One director Gareth Edwards.
Princes William and Harry (Kind of)
This royal duo was rumoured to be appearing as stormtroopers, but the scene in which they were reported to feature seems to have been cut from the final edit. William and Harry are apparently seen in a lift with Benicio Del Toro’s character, alongside Finn and Rose, as he infiltrates Snoke’s Star Destroyer. One of the royal brothers allegedly slapped Del Toro on the derriere in the scene.
Latest news, however, is that they’re still in it — and can be seen in scenes with Finn, Rose and DJ.
Tom Hardy
There is a point in the film where a gruff murmur could be Tom Hardy. But no, those particular throaty tones, however, belong to Benicio Del Toro who plays shady wheeler-dealer DJ. The Venom and Dunkirk actor has a cameo confirmed by John Boyega himself, so we know Tom turned up and filmed his role. However, it’s been reported that the scene was actually left on the cutting room floor. Hardy apparently appeared as a stormtrooper, and the sequence will reportedly be included as a deleted scene when the film gets a home entertainment release.
Gary Barlow
Like Hardy and the royal brothers, you won’t see the former Take That member’s face either – he’s also playing a stormtrooper.
Joseph Gordon Levitt
A long-time collaborator of director Rian Johnson, Levitt is confirmed as having a voice role in the film and his name appears in the closing credits. He’s playing a Canto Bight alien character named Slowen-Lo, inspired by Beastie Boys song “Slow and Low”. He’s the guy angry at Finn and Rose for illegally parking their ship on the beach. There’s a history of naming characters after Beastie Boys songs in the franchise — Ello Asty and Ilco Munica are inspired by “Hello Nasty” and “Ill Communication” respectively.
Hamill Juniors
Like father, like son. @HamillHimself & @GriffinHamill with matching points 👉🏻👈🏼 pic.twitter.com/E9r1TURQ0h
— Well-Behaved Fangirl (@hamillslj) October 22, 2017
Look closely near the end of the scene at rebel base on Crait and you might just spot a chap or two who look remarkably like young Luke Skywalker. These are actually the actor’s real-life sons, Griffin and Nathan. Nathan Hamill also featured in Episode I, as a background character named Rehtul Minnau. We think their sister Chelsea makes up the third person in this shot.
Justin Theroux
Theroux plays the master codebreaker that Maz Kanata directs Finn and Rose to on Canto Bight. They recognise him by a red pin he wears on his lapel. However, their plan to bring the ostentatious, white-suited gambling man on board is thwarted when they’re intercepted by the authorities for parking illegally. And that’s the end of Theroux’s role in the film.
Lily Cole
You’ll spot flame-haired model-turned-actress Cole standing next to Theroux’s codebreaker at the gambling table on Canto Bight. Her character is called Lovey.
Adrian Edmondson
Fans of British comedy will know Ade Edmondson immediately. The Bottom and The Young Ones legend’s role is a bit bigger than a cameo, and he’s great as General Hux’s second-in-command.
Edgar Wright
Baby Driver director Edgar Wright is another director to luck out with a cameo. He plays a Resistance fighter but you’ll need to look very closely to spot him.
Joe Cornish
Cornish, who directed John Boyega in Attack the Block is also awarded a coveted cameo in The Last Jedi. Check out scenes in the rebel base on Crait closely. He’s playing a rebel trooper.
Mark Hamill
Seriously, good luck spotting him but Mark Hamill not only takes the role of reluctant Jedi Master Luke Skywalker in the film but he’s also credited as having another role – a character by the name of Dobbu Scay.
Easter Eggs
Blue Milk
Remember the blue milk served up at the Lars homestead in A New Hope? Of course you do, it’s legendary. It comes from banthas – but another milk source is revealed in The Last Jedi in one of the film’s weirdest scenes. On Luke’s secluded Ahch-To island hideout, which is populated by a variety of strange creatures, the camera tilts down the body of a trumpet-snouted beast sitting upright to reveal some low-hanging teats. Luke approaches, squeezes a teat and milk is secreted. Depending on your point of view, it’s either blue or green. But anyway, he fills a bottle, which he then drinks from with a strange self-satisfied look on his face.
A Force Tree?
It is not referred to as a Force tree, but the big, gnarly old tree on Ahch-To houses a batch of original Jedi texts. Luke says it was “built a thousand generations ago” for the very purpose of storing those books. The tree seems to whisper to Rey, suggesting it’s Force-sensitive. Find out more about Force trees here.
Admiral Ackbar
A fan favourite from the original trilogy, Ackbar appeared in The Force Awakens and is seen again in The Last Jedi as admiral of Leia’s cruiser ship. Unfortunately, Ackbar goes the way of Han Solo in Episode VII and meets his sad demise onboard the ship. This could be the film’s most gut-wrenching loss.
Nien Nunb
Like Admiral Ackbar, Nien Nunb is a fan favourite from back in the day who also reappeared in The Force Awakens. He’s also on Leia’s ship.
Han’s Dice
In A New Hope, Han had a pair of gold dice dangling in the cockpit of the Millennium Falcon. They weren’t seen again in the rest of the Original Trilogy. But as Luke boards the Falcon for the first time since 1983’s Return of the Jedi, there they are, bold as brass. Or gold. Or whatever metal it is they’re made of. He immediately pockets them, and later hands them symbolically over to Leia when they reunite. Kylo Ren also has a moment with the dice at the end of the film.
Old Leia Message
In another nod to Episode IV, R2-D2, it transpires, is still carrying that old message from Leia inside his “rusty innards”. You know, the iconic one where she’s calling for Obi-Wan Kenobi’s help as the Rebellion’s only hope. Following a touching reunion between R2 and Luke, R2 plays part of the message, and Luke – who is reluctant to involve himself in this latest assault on the First Order/Dark Side, quips: “That’s a cheap move.”
Mouse Droid
A mouse droid, or MSE-6-Series repair droid, is seen in a shot with Kylo Ren on Snoke’s Star Destroyer emitting its signature sound. You know the one. Star Wars isn’t Star Wars without it.
Nod to ‘Gremlins’
There’s also a cheeky nod to Gremlins in The Last Jedi. Porgs are mischievous little creatures akin to mogwai and their naughtier alter egos. There’s a shot of some porgs playing around on the Millennium Falcon, and one of them is wearing glasses. It recalls the moment in Gremlins when Gizmo is seen looking through 3-D specs. It’s probably no coincidence that porgs share similar brown and white markings.
Almost There
The line “I have a bad feeling about this” is conspicuous in its absence, but there’s one callback to a classic Star Wars line that’s easy to miss. As Benicio Del Toro’s character is trying to break into the room containing the tracker he’s being paid to help Finn and Rose shut down, he says: “Almost there”. This echoes Red Leader Garven Dreis‘s words from A New Hope as he’s about to fire into the Death Star.
Binary Sunset
In a very emotional callback, we see Luke standing on Ahch-To, contemplating as he looks out to a red sky with two suns setting. As the film nears its conclusion, it neatly — if poignantly – recalls the moment at the start of A New Hope, when Luke contemplates his future gazing out towards Tatooine’s own binary sunset. John Williams’s emotive score soundtracks both scenes.
Obi-Wan Kenobi’s Death
Another of the film’s callbacks to Episode IV occurs right at the end, when Luke disappears from his mountain-top perch and his cape crumples to the ground. This, very stirringly, mirrors Obi-Wan’s death at the hands of Darth Vader.
And that concludes the list. If you’ve spotted anything we’ve missed, let us know @getfandom.
