1 00:00:06,965 --> 00:00:08,508 I think there's a interplay 2 00:00:08,591 --> 00:00:11,136 with storytellers and the people you're telling the story to. 3 00:00:11,219 --> 00:00:13,221 Does this look Jedi to you? 4 00:00:13,304 --> 00:00:15,640 You find that the emotions run deep with Star Wars. 5 00:00:15,724 --> 00:00:19,644 And peoples' relationship, who grew up with it from a young age, 6 00:00:19,728 --> 00:00:21,312 feel a lot of connection to it. 7 00:00:24,190 --> 00:00:27,027 I think a consistent thing I'm feeling is that people care deeply 8 00:00:27,110 --> 00:00:31,448 that it's being handled correctly and that it's being handled respectfully. 9 00:00:32,240 --> 00:00:35,368 It meant so much and they wanna see it continue into the future 10 00:00:35,452 --> 00:00:38,747 and feel like it's all connected with consistency. 11 00:00:39,164 --> 00:00:43,043 We're very lucky that between Lucasfilm and Kathy, 12 00:00:43,126 --> 00:00:44,961 the whole group that we have 13 00:00:45,045 --> 00:00:48,048 are incredibly supportive and encouraging. 14 00:00:51,051 --> 00:00:53,011 BO-Incoming craft, identify yourself. 15 00:00:56,222 --> 00:00:59,267 Jon gave me the script for the season finale. 16 00:00:59,350 --> 00:01:01,144 I read it and loved it. 17 00:01:01,728 --> 00:01:03,188 It had a lot of action. 18 00:01:03,271 --> 00:01:07,734 It had a lot of great character stuff and a lot of emotion. 19 00:01:07,817 --> 00:01:10,111 But there was a character that came in at the end of it, 20 00:01:10,195 --> 00:01:12,947 and in the script it was written as a character called Plo Koon. 21 00:01:13,031 --> 00:01:16,910 And I knew Plo Koon was a Jedi, I think, from the prequel trilogy. 22 00:01:16,993 --> 00:01:18,536 I was, "How are we visualizing this?" 23 00:01:18,620 --> 00:01:20,872 He's like, "Come here, I wanna talk to you." 24 00:01:20,955 --> 00:01:26,169 And he gave me the real news that it was, in fact, not Plo Koon, 25 00:01:26,252 --> 00:01:30,173 but it was gonna be Luke. And I needed a moment. 26 00:01:31,049 --> 00:01:33,718 I needed to know, 'cause I've had a long relationship with Jon 27 00:01:33,802 --> 00:01:36,596 and I said, "Are you being serious? Is this real? 28 00:01:36,679 --> 00:01:38,348 "You're bringing the guy back?" 29 00:01:38,431 --> 00:01:40,266 He said, "We're bringing the guy back." 30 00:01:41,309 --> 00:01:46,022 Jon sanctioned this, I'll say this for the first time in 15 months to two years. 31 00:01:46,106 --> 00:01:47,107 "Luke Skywalker." 32 00:01:47,816 --> 00:01:49,234 We were never allowed to say it. 33 00:01:49,317 --> 00:01:51,069 We'll get the performance out of Plo Koon, 34 00:01:51,152 --> 00:01:53,696 and in post, we can get a bunch of options. 35 00:01:53,780 --> 00:01:57,283 When we refer back to what we did, we talk about the code names. 36 00:01:57,367 --> 00:01:59,702 We simply do not utter those two words. 37 00:01:59,786 --> 00:02:03,289 If there's one person in the galaxy that you'd be okay 38 00:02:03,373 --> 00:02:05,750 taking this kid from The Mandalorian, 39 00:02:05,834 --> 00:02:07,627 it's gotta be Luke. 40 00:02:08,378 --> 00:02:10,755 You know, usually, Jon and I tend to think... 41 00:02:10,839 --> 00:02:13,842 If he and I are aligned on something like that, 42 00:02:13,925 --> 00:02:16,845 it's probably gonna, I like to think, turn out good. 43 00:02:16,928 --> 00:02:19,597 But if I had been like, "No way. Luke..." 44 00:02:19,722 --> 00:02:22,433 Jon would respect that, "Okay, let's figure it out." 45 00:02:22,517 --> 00:02:25,103 But it just felt right to both of us. 46 00:02:25,186 --> 00:02:27,730 Even the Force that's just moving around him. 47 00:02:27,814 --> 00:02:31,651 So, every move you're making is one step ahead. 48 00:02:31,734 --> 00:02:34,445 I instantly went from being thrilled to feeling the weight 49 00:02:34,529 --> 00:02:36,990 of responsibility of this character. 50 00:02:37,073 --> 00:02:39,534 Because outside of all the technical considerations 51 00:02:39,617 --> 00:02:44,038 of how we were gonna bring Luke Skywalker of that period to life, 52 00:02:44,664 --> 00:02:46,916 there was a real responsibility in the storytelling 53 00:02:47,000 --> 00:02:50,503 to have it feel organic in the context of The Mandalorian. 54 00:02:51,045 --> 00:02:55,383 Because it's very easy to see a version where you bring Luke into The Mandalorian, 55 00:02:55,466 --> 00:02:57,802 and it completely usurps all the drama. 56 00:02:59,762 --> 00:03:01,556 We had a lot of conversations 57 00:03:01,639 --> 00:03:04,684 in the writing, in the shooting, in editorial, 58 00:03:04,767 --> 00:03:09,355 about how much Luke was enough, how much was too much, 59 00:03:09,439 --> 00:03:10,690 finding that balance. 60 00:03:10,773 --> 00:03:12,192 Weirdly, he's a device. 61 00:03:12,275 --> 00:03:15,320 I mean, he comes in, it's not like he's the delivery guy. 62 00:03:15,403 --> 00:03:18,990 You know, none of the characters are sitting there in awe of, 63 00:03:19,073 --> 00:03:22,118 "It's Luke Skywalker. He's the guy who blew up those Death Stars." 64 00:03:22,202 --> 00:03:26,789 That's not where they're coming from. He is a Jedi. He's this mythical figure, 65 00:03:26,873 --> 00:03:29,834 because none of them have ever really encountered a Jedi. 66 00:03:29,918 --> 00:03:34,172 That was interesting to me. I felt like, as I think Jon and Dave felt, 67 00:03:34,255 --> 00:03:37,175 that this is a balancing act that we can figure out, 68 00:03:37,258 --> 00:03:40,720 and we can make it feel still like The Mandalorian, 69 00:03:40,803 --> 00:03:42,847 while broadening the palette a bit. 70 00:03:44,390 --> 00:03:47,143 It was this carefully-laid discussion. 71 00:03:47,227 --> 00:03:51,022 You know, the stages of, "Is it gonna be him?" 72 00:03:51,105 --> 00:03:52,357 "How could it be him?" 73 00:03:52,440 --> 00:03:56,402 Because we realized, watching it, that you're kind of in denial, 74 00:03:56,486 --> 00:03:58,738 no matter how obvious we made it. 75 00:03:59,280 --> 00:04:02,992 You do not think it's gonna be him when that hood comes off. 76 00:04:03,076 --> 00:04:06,246 Like, that shot, it was the one of all the shots that had to work, 77 00:04:06,329 --> 00:04:10,708 because it was gonna be the completion of this wish fulfillment, 78 00:04:11,417 --> 00:04:12,961 "Is it really Luke?" 79 00:04:14,462 --> 00:04:16,798 We knew we wanted Mark Hamill front and center, 80 00:04:16,881 --> 00:04:19,050 because you can't bring back Luke Skywalker 81 00:04:19,133 --> 00:04:20,134 without Mark Hamill. 82 00:04:20,551 --> 00:04:22,845 I suppose technologically-speaking, you could. 83 00:04:22,929 --> 00:04:25,640 But we didn't want to. We wanted to have the real guy. 84 00:04:25,723 --> 00:04:27,934 We wanted Mark here. 'Cause he is Luke Skywalker. 85 00:04:28,017 --> 00:04:31,479 I was contacted by Jon and Dave, 86 00:04:31,562 --> 00:04:35,566 inviting me to come over and take a look at The Mandalorian. 87 00:04:35,650 --> 00:04:38,403 They said they'd love my opinion. 88 00:04:39,112 --> 00:04:41,114 That should've been a giveaway right away. 89 00:04:41,781 --> 00:04:45,535 So I went over and they asked me to do a voice 90 00:04:45,618 --> 00:04:49,455 for a character that was in the cantina. 91 00:04:49,539 --> 00:04:52,375 I'm a hunter. I'm lookin' for some work. 92 00:04:52,458 --> 00:04:56,754 Unfortunately, the Bounty Guild no longer operates from Tatooine. 93 00:04:56,838 --> 00:04:59,132 He often will do unbilled cameos 94 00:04:59,215 --> 00:05:02,343 as voice talent for other Star Wars projects. 95 00:05:02,969 --> 00:05:05,430 -How do we thank you? -Win the war! 96 00:05:06,639 --> 00:05:08,683 So it made perfect sense that we'd bring him in. 97 00:05:08,766 --> 00:05:10,768 But we started showing him a lot of the stuff, 98 00:05:10,852 --> 00:05:12,770 and this is before anything had aired. 99 00:05:12,854 --> 00:05:15,315 We showed him that first episode with the reveal. 100 00:05:15,398 --> 00:05:19,527 And he was really captivated by it, he really liked it. 101 00:05:19,610 --> 00:05:21,529 He liked where we were going with it. 102 00:05:22,530 --> 00:05:24,991 So we told him what we were thinking of doing. 103 00:05:26,451 --> 00:05:29,996 It is pointless to resist, my son. 104 00:05:30,955 --> 00:05:33,916 When they went from the original trilogy to the sequels, 105 00:05:34,000 --> 00:05:37,086 obviously there was this huge gap in time, 106 00:05:37,170 --> 00:05:39,797 where there's all these untold stories. 107 00:05:40,548 --> 00:05:43,760 But I just assumed they'd get an age-appropriate actor, you know? 108 00:05:43,843 --> 00:05:46,012 And I didn't really think about it all that much. 109 00:05:46,095 --> 00:05:48,139 I just thought, "If they wanna tell stories 110 00:05:48,222 --> 00:05:51,851 "of Luke post-Return of The Jedi, I wonder who they'll get." 111 00:05:51,934 --> 00:05:54,312 When they said they were gonna use the de-aging process 112 00:05:54,395 --> 00:05:56,731 they used in the Marvel movies, 113 00:05:56,814 --> 00:05:58,524 I was just gobsmacked! 114 00:05:58,608 --> 00:06:01,152 I didn't answer right away, I had to think about it. 115 00:06:01,319 --> 00:06:05,156 But the more I thought about it, "This is really an opportunity 116 00:06:05,239 --> 00:06:08,034 "that was completely unexpected, 117 00:06:08,117 --> 00:06:11,954 "but something that almost was a responsibility." 118 00:06:12,663 --> 00:06:15,249 In other words, if they're saying they want me to do this, 119 00:06:15,792 --> 00:06:17,001 how can I say no? 120 00:06:18,836 --> 00:06:22,215 Over the holidays, this would've been December 2019, 121 00:06:22,298 --> 00:06:25,301 Jon and I drove up together to Mark's house. 122 00:06:25,385 --> 00:06:29,931 And we brought the script. And we brought Luke Skywalker's wardrobe. 123 00:06:30,014 --> 00:06:32,725 And we brought Grogu with us. 124 00:06:32,809 --> 00:06:34,811 Mark was so gracious, we came in. 125 00:06:34,894 --> 00:06:36,604 Jon and I sat with Mark's wife 126 00:06:36,687 --> 00:06:39,232 as he was in his office, reading the script in real time, 127 00:06:39,315 --> 00:06:41,025 so we were on pins and needles, 128 00:06:41,109 --> 00:06:44,445 'cause it was not necessarily a given that he was gonna be interested. 129 00:06:44,987 --> 00:06:48,116 I think he's very protective of this character, and rightfully so. 130 00:06:48,199 --> 00:06:50,910 Peyton and I were just trying not to jump through our skin. 131 00:06:50,993 --> 00:06:54,080 We get into this 'cause we're fans, so there are moments like this... 132 00:06:54,163 --> 00:06:56,040 Even when you get used to making this stuff, 133 00:06:56,124 --> 00:06:59,085 there are certain moments where you just... It's so surreal. 134 00:06:59,168 --> 00:07:01,712 He came out and he was thrilled. 135 00:07:01,796 --> 00:07:05,299 And I think a huge weight was lifted off of Jon's shoulders 136 00:07:05,383 --> 00:07:06,551 when that happened. 137 00:07:06,634 --> 00:07:08,261 When you have those feelings 138 00:07:08,344 --> 00:07:11,222 where it feels compelling, you know that you're onto something. 139 00:07:11,305 --> 00:07:13,015 We knew if we could pull this off, 140 00:07:13,099 --> 00:07:15,309 it would represent so much to so many people. 141 00:07:15,393 --> 00:07:16,519 Especially to Mark. 142 00:07:16,602 --> 00:07:19,772 To let him come in there and show Luke at this moment, 143 00:07:19,856 --> 00:07:23,943 and let it be a celebration, and also a culmination of a two-season arc 144 00:07:24,026 --> 00:07:26,279 about the journey of this little child. 145 00:07:26,362 --> 00:07:27,864 I'll see you again. 146 00:07:28,656 --> 00:07:29,657 I promise. 147 00:07:29,740 --> 00:07:33,369 Mark was excited, and he was in, and he got ready to see, 148 00:07:34,162 --> 00:07:35,913 "How were we gonna make the magic happen?" 149 00:07:35,997 --> 00:07:38,249 Which is good, 'cause we had to figure it out yet. 150 00:07:40,084 --> 00:07:43,796 Kathy Kennedy we brought in very early on this conversation. 151 00:07:43,880 --> 00:07:47,425 And Kathy, first and foremost, is a great producer. 152 00:07:47,508 --> 00:07:51,220 And producers figure out ways to make things happen 153 00:07:51,304 --> 00:07:55,183 that are creatively exciting to the storytellers. 154 00:07:55,600 --> 00:07:59,937 Not only does she understand how to create an environment 155 00:08:00,021 --> 00:08:02,523 where we can have all the tools that we need 156 00:08:02,607 --> 00:08:04,734 to explore and experiment and be creative, 157 00:08:04,817 --> 00:08:08,196 but also knows what it takes to incubate ideas 158 00:08:08,279 --> 00:08:10,740 and understands the significance of when you do it right, 159 00:08:10,823 --> 00:08:11,824 what that can represent. 160 00:08:14,660 --> 00:08:16,787 One of the big challenges on this show 161 00:08:16,871 --> 00:08:19,582 is the work is very ambitious. 162 00:08:19,665 --> 00:08:22,251 The expectation is the polish level to be 163 00:08:22,335 --> 00:08:24,670 as high as what's done on the features. 164 00:08:24,754 --> 00:08:27,089 So, some of this is working 165 00:08:27,173 --> 00:08:31,636 with the very talented and experienced artists that we have, 166 00:08:31,719 --> 00:08:35,473 giving them a meaningful turnover where they really understand 167 00:08:35,556 --> 00:08:38,601 what success means on the shots. 168 00:08:38,684 --> 00:08:42,146 The unique thing about visual effects technology 169 00:08:42,230 --> 00:08:44,649 or technology that can be used in visual effects, 170 00:08:44,732 --> 00:08:47,610 is that it can come from so many different places. 171 00:08:47,693 --> 00:08:51,197 It can come from the tech realm, it could come from a basement. 172 00:08:51,280 --> 00:08:56,661 And I think being open to getting inspiration 173 00:08:56,744 --> 00:08:59,330 for bleeding-edge technology from anywhere 174 00:08:59,413 --> 00:09:01,582 is a big part of what we do on this show. 175 00:09:01,666 --> 00:09:05,044 When we realized that we wanted to show a younger Luke Skywalker, 176 00:09:05,127 --> 00:09:07,338 we looked at all the techniques available. 177 00:09:07,421 --> 00:09:10,800 There's a few basic paths you could go at this level. 178 00:09:10,883 --> 00:09:13,803 They're overlapping a bit, but for simplicity's sake, 179 00:09:13,886 --> 00:09:17,723 you have a completely computer-generated version of a character 180 00:09:17,807 --> 00:09:20,893 based on scans and based on research and old footage, 181 00:09:20,977 --> 00:09:23,604 and that's like what they used for Grand Moff Tarkin. 182 00:09:23,938 --> 00:09:26,732 Your work exceeds all expectations. 183 00:09:26,816 --> 00:09:28,943 It's pretty easy to see what that is, 184 00:09:29,026 --> 00:09:31,779 but all these new render tools and processing power 185 00:09:31,862 --> 00:09:34,865 is making that get better very rapidly. 186 00:09:35,950 --> 00:09:37,618 There's another technique for de-aging, 187 00:09:37,702 --> 00:09:40,871 which is actually like an airbrush artist doing fixes, 188 00:09:41,414 --> 00:09:43,583 painting out wrinkles and things. 189 00:09:43,666 --> 00:09:46,794 And then there's Deepfake, which is where you use machine learning 190 00:09:46,877 --> 00:09:52,133 to extrapolate from a tremendous amount of... 191 00:09:52,758 --> 00:09:54,552 Ingestion of images. 192 00:09:54,635 --> 00:09:56,470 You feed images, either from the Internet, 193 00:09:56,554 --> 00:09:59,849 or, in our case, you feed it from all of the existing footage 194 00:09:59,932 --> 00:10:02,351 that we have of that character at that time, 195 00:10:02,435 --> 00:10:07,398 and it creates a library of expressions, faces, looks, lighting scenarios. 196 00:10:07,982 --> 00:10:10,484 And then, when you have your performer perform it, 197 00:10:10,568 --> 00:10:15,948 the AI starts to figure out what expression would correspond 198 00:10:16,032 --> 00:10:19,910 to one that exists from the library of faces. 199 00:10:19,994 --> 00:10:23,456 And so it's actually replacing the face that you photographed 200 00:10:23,539 --> 00:10:26,542 with a photoreal image that it's picking out and matching up. 201 00:10:27,001 --> 00:10:29,045 And so, by matching all those things up, 202 00:10:29,128 --> 00:10:33,841 it creates the illusion that you're seeing this younger version moving around, 203 00:10:33,924 --> 00:10:35,301 but you're seeing photographs 204 00:10:35,384 --> 00:10:39,430 that are cherry-picked by this incredibly robust algorithm 205 00:10:39,513 --> 00:10:43,601 that's pulling in the proper eyeline or expression 206 00:10:44,185 --> 00:10:46,062 from the library of faces. 207 00:10:46,145 --> 00:10:48,814 So we were looking at all three of these techniques. 208 00:10:50,191 --> 00:10:54,737 Jon was really interested in, "Where is the technology right now?" 209 00:10:54,820 --> 00:10:58,282 And so he had Landis Fields locked away in my office, 210 00:10:58,616 --> 00:11:02,411 like his own skunkworks, kicking the tires on Deepfake. 211 00:11:02,495 --> 00:11:04,080 "Let's see how far we can push this." 212 00:11:04,163 --> 00:11:07,333 "Is there a version of Deepfake that makes it into the show?" 213 00:11:07,416 --> 00:11:09,502 "Is that how we find the likeness?" 214 00:11:11,212 --> 00:11:15,883 Landis is a brilliant art director, designer, modeler, 215 00:11:15,966 --> 00:11:18,803 and a kind of mad scientist. 216 00:11:19,553 --> 00:11:22,932 He's exactly the kind of person that we love at ILM. 217 00:11:23,015 --> 00:11:25,226 We locked him in a room, I'm serious. 218 00:11:25,309 --> 00:11:28,604 We locked him in a room for privacy and secrecy reasons 219 00:11:28,688 --> 00:11:31,065 and he just sat at his machine, Landis, 220 00:11:31,148 --> 00:11:34,610 and just doing this, literally, all day long. All day long. 221 00:11:34,694 --> 00:11:37,238 And he's got like a command center setup, 222 00:11:37,321 --> 00:11:40,700 running Deepfake tests over and over and over and over again. 223 00:11:40,783 --> 00:11:42,243 Anybody can download this software 224 00:11:42,326 --> 00:11:45,579 and anybody can have a go at making these kind of Deepfake images. 225 00:11:45,663 --> 00:11:46,872 Once you have the software, 226 00:11:46,956 --> 00:11:51,585 you have to provide it the information it needs to rebuild the face. 227 00:11:51,669 --> 00:11:54,130 So, in the instance of Mark Hamill, 228 00:11:54,213 --> 00:11:56,966 we put in a lot of footage from the original movies. 229 00:11:57,425 --> 00:12:01,512 We obviously have access to the 4K version of the show, 230 00:12:01,595 --> 00:12:03,848 so we fed it as much information as we can. 231 00:12:03,931 --> 00:12:06,767 Because it was the first time we used this particular technique, 232 00:12:06,851 --> 00:12:10,229 we also went online and found interviews that Mark gave. 233 00:12:10,312 --> 00:12:12,898 Anything we could find to build up the data 234 00:12:12,982 --> 00:12:15,276 that was gonna be used to provide a face. 235 00:12:15,359 --> 00:12:19,405 We can't go back in time and reshoot Luke the way we want, 236 00:12:19,488 --> 00:12:24,785 so we were having to pull very specific source footage. 237 00:12:25,369 --> 00:12:27,705 There was a moment I even scoured the Internet 238 00:12:27,788 --> 00:12:30,624 and found older interviews and that of Mark Hamill, 239 00:12:30,708 --> 00:12:32,626 that were lit really well. 240 00:12:32,710 --> 00:12:36,714 So, you know, there was a lot of things that we were paying attention to. 241 00:12:36,797 --> 00:12:39,341 You have to have a lot of trust in all the technicians 242 00:12:39,425 --> 00:12:41,886 that they're gonna make you look all right. 243 00:12:42,553 --> 00:12:45,181 With what Deepfake technology was at that point, 244 00:12:45,264 --> 00:12:48,559 it was felt as though we really needed to rely 245 00:12:48,642 --> 00:12:50,644 a bit more on the tried and true techniques 246 00:12:50,728 --> 00:12:52,104 rather than Deepfake. 247 00:12:52,188 --> 00:12:56,317 So we wanted to really kinda focus in on the de-ageing process. 248 00:12:58,611 --> 00:13:01,238 I had had some experience with de-ageing technology 249 00:13:01,322 --> 00:13:02,323 on the Ant-Man movies. 250 00:13:02,406 --> 00:13:05,159 In the first Ant-Man, we de-aged Michael Douglas 251 00:13:05,242 --> 00:13:08,037 from basically 70 to 40 years old. 252 00:13:08,120 --> 00:13:13,125 And in the second one, we did Michael, Michelle Pfeiffer and Laurence Fishburne. 253 00:13:13,209 --> 00:13:15,044 There was a company called Lola 254 00:13:15,127 --> 00:13:17,713 who had done most of this de-ageing technology, 255 00:13:17,797 --> 00:13:20,508 so we reached out to Lola and talked to them about it 256 00:13:20,591 --> 00:13:22,885 and had them on stage supervising all of this. 257 00:13:23,594 --> 00:13:25,554 We had two actors. We had Mark Hamill, 258 00:13:25,638 --> 00:13:27,640 and we also had a picture double named Max. 259 00:13:27,723 --> 00:13:29,975 And we shot both on set, 260 00:13:30,059 --> 00:13:33,312 and we had also shot Max previously with all of the cast. 261 00:13:33,395 --> 00:13:35,356 Casting him was a whole thing too 262 00:13:35,439 --> 00:13:37,817 because we had to work with Sarah Finn and say, 263 00:13:37,900 --> 00:13:39,568 "Look, we want to find somebody 264 00:13:39,652 --> 00:13:42,154 "who physically resembles what Mark looked like 265 00:13:42,238 --> 00:13:43,739 "right after Return of the Jedi." 266 00:13:43,823 --> 00:13:47,785 You couldn't just put out a casting call, so we created a whole list of people 267 00:13:47,868 --> 00:13:50,204 that she knew of that could be right, 268 00:13:50,287 --> 00:13:53,791 and we ended up reading him for a different role 269 00:13:53,874 --> 00:13:57,294 and then telling him what it was, and he was a great partner in that. 270 00:13:57,378 --> 00:14:00,422 I think, on that rehearsal, you were a bit to the right. 271 00:14:00,506 --> 00:14:02,424 -I'd love to get you in the center. -Dead center. 272 00:14:02,508 --> 00:14:06,512 We'd watch each other do the scenes, so we tried to match each other. 273 00:14:06,595 --> 00:14:09,515 I would look at the monitor and, of course, the image is small, 274 00:14:09,598 --> 00:14:13,018 but I thought, "Oh, my gosh, he looks more like me than me." 275 00:14:13,102 --> 00:14:16,230 It was just uncanny, this guy. 276 00:14:16,313 --> 00:14:17,898 And he's a good actor. 277 00:14:17,982 --> 00:14:20,734 What I think is more magical than the tech 278 00:14:20,818 --> 00:14:26,073 is seeing Mark trying to teach someone to be a younger version of himself. 279 00:14:26,156 --> 00:14:30,578 If you really remove all of the tools and all of the processes away from that, 280 00:14:30,661 --> 00:14:32,872 it's a very beautiful, endearing thing. 281 00:14:32,955 --> 00:14:33,956 Come, little one. 282 00:14:34,832 --> 00:14:37,585 I desperately wanted to have a conversation with myself, 283 00:14:37,668 --> 00:14:40,921 a seven-year-old boy that I think is still inside me, 284 00:14:41,005 --> 00:14:42,923 to remind myself, just think about 285 00:14:43,007 --> 00:14:44,800 where you are right now, what you're seeing. 286 00:14:44,884 --> 00:14:46,844 Maybe it's the English person inside me, 287 00:14:46,927 --> 00:14:49,138 which is that professionalism was still there. 288 00:14:49,221 --> 00:14:52,308 I didn't have my photograph taken with him or go over and say 289 00:14:52,391 --> 00:14:53,559 "I was the biggest fan", but... 290 00:14:53,642 --> 00:14:56,228 Deep down in everybody that's what we were all feeling. 291 00:14:58,522 --> 00:15:02,359 Okay. Look who returns and they're headed down the corridor. 292 00:15:02,443 --> 00:15:06,322 So, when we shot Mark, we shot him on the set 293 00:15:06,405 --> 00:15:10,409 of the bridge of the Imperial light cruiser in the Volume 294 00:15:10,492 --> 00:15:13,329 and let him drive that performance. 295 00:15:13,412 --> 00:15:15,205 And immediately following that, 296 00:15:15,289 --> 00:15:19,710 we walked him over to our lighting rig, which we call the Egg, 297 00:15:20,336 --> 00:15:23,339 and basically recreated everything that he had just done 298 00:15:23,422 --> 00:15:29,386 But doing that separately allows us to get ultra-high resolution textures of his face 299 00:15:29,470 --> 00:15:32,848 and have ultimate control over very technical things 300 00:15:32,932 --> 00:15:35,851 involved with lighting and positioning and timing. 301 00:15:36,268 --> 00:15:38,520 So then we can take both of those performances, 302 00:15:38,604 --> 00:15:40,814 the one on set and the one in the Egg, 303 00:15:40,898 --> 00:15:43,859 and use both of them to achieve the final result. 304 00:15:46,904 --> 00:15:51,533 The Egg itself is a assemblage of thousands of little LED lights 305 00:15:51,617 --> 00:15:53,744 that we have control over and can animate. 306 00:15:53,827 --> 00:15:55,829 We can set lighting to match on set. 307 00:15:55,913 --> 00:15:57,873 We can add interactive lighting, 308 00:15:57,957 --> 00:16:01,210 so it's not that dissimilar from the Volume itself. 309 00:16:01,293 --> 00:16:03,879 We would do a take, we would do a line. 310 00:16:04,338 --> 00:16:08,384 And then we would go through the dailies and actually live cut it into an edit 311 00:16:08,467 --> 00:16:13,472 where Jon and Dave and Peyton could make a select on a line delivery. 312 00:16:13,973 --> 00:16:17,643 And then from that, we would start giving it over to Lola and Trent at Lola. 313 00:16:17,726 --> 00:16:19,603 And they would program it into the Egg, 314 00:16:19,687 --> 00:16:22,314 so as we were shooting, they were doing circle-takes 315 00:16:22,398 --> 00:16:24,024 and feeding the Egg at the same time. 316 00:16:24,858 --> 00:16:27,111 We had to do this whole thing in one day. 317 00:16:27,695 --> 00:16:30,656 One day with Mark, one day with the Egg, 318 00:16:31,365 --> 00:16:34,702 was a very long day as you can probably imagine. 319 00:16:34,785 --> 00:16:37,121 Part of the secrecy too, right? 320 00:16:37,204 --> 00:16:41,000 Anybody that doesn't need to be up here? If we could clear, thank you. 321 00:16:41,083 --> 00:16:44,169 Even when we'd be shooting with these characters on set, 322 00:16:44,253 --> 00:16:47,172 most of the company would be on location at Simi Valley 323 00:16:47,256 --> 00:16:48,674 for Robert Rodriguez's episode. 324 00:16:48,757 --> 00:16:52,720 And so, the shooting crew that was gonna be kept behind for the moment 325 00:16:52,803 --> 00:16:54,972 when Mark Hamill walked on set 326 00:16:55,055 --> 00:16:59,226 was gonna be the smallest possible team we needed to get the work done. 327 00:16:59,309 --> 00:17:02,688 To give us the best chance possible to keep this secret. 328 00:17:02,771 --> 00:17:06,066 I said to the guys, "You don't have any worries from me. 329 00:17:06,150 --> 00:17:09,069 "I've learned a long time ago how to keep a secret. 330 00:17:09,153 --> 00:17:12,364 "That Empire secret, I had to keep it for a year and a half." 331 00:17:12,448 --> 00:17:14,366 But that's before social media. 332 00:17:14,450 --> 00:17:18,787 I said, "All it takes is one person in a lab, treating the film, 333 00:17:18,871 --> 00:17:24,918 "color correction, there's just so many variables and so many unknowns. 334 00:17:25,002 --> 00:17:29,882 "One person who sees that and goes on social media, goes, 335 00:17:29,965 --> 00:17:31,216 "'Guess what I saw today.'" 336 00:17:31,300 --> 00:17:32,634 It was one of those times 337 00:17:32,718 --> 00:17:35,929 when everybody was biting their nails right to the bitter end. 338 00:17:36,013 --> 00:17:38,849 Every day, to be honest, before the episode aired, 339 00:17:38,932 --> 00:17:41,602 folks would kinda google online, "The Mandalorian," 340 00:17:41,685 --> 00:17:44,730 just to see whatever the latest information was out there. 341 00:17:44,813 --> 00:17:46,774 Double checking that the one character 342 00:17:46,857 --> 00:17:50,069 that we knew we had to keep secret was not gonna get leaked. 343 00:17:50,152 --> 00:17:52,488 Everybody knew that Rosario was gonna be Ahsoka. 344 00:17:52,571 --> 00:17:55,574 Everybody knew that Temuera was gonna be Boba. 345 00:17:55,657 --> 00:17:57,910 Everything leaked, we didn't announce anything. 346 00:17:57,993 --> 00:18:00,496 But little by little, leaks spring, 347 00:18:00,579 --> 00:18:04,541 and you want the ship to get back to the harbor before the whole thing is done. 348 00:18:04,625 --> 00:18:06,293 We had to keep Mark a secret. 349 00:18:06,376 --> 00:18:08,712 That went from creating misleads in the script, 350 00:18:08,796 --> 00:18:11,381 creating art work that was not Luke, 351 00:18:11,465 --> 00:18:15,302 creating some temporary visual effects that were the character of Plo Koon. 352 00:18:19,056 --> 00:18:22,893 It's fairly well known by deep core fans that Plo Koon's my favorite Jedi. 353 00:18:23,310 --> 00:18:28,649 And a lot of people, if Plo Koon from the script got out, 354 00:18:28,732 --> 00:18:33,153 would assume, "Well, of course, 'cause Dave likes Plo Koon." 355 00:18:33,237 --> 00:18:36,698 So there's these layers of intrigue that we try to weave. 356 00:18:36,782 --> 00:18:42,121 We had a digital Plo Koon head placed on the actor in dailies. 357 00:18:42,204 --> 00:18:43,705 So it looked like Plo Koon. 358 00:18:43,831 --> 00:18:46,250 In the first season, Jon was able to successfully 359 00:18:46,333 --> 00:18:50,087 keep Grogu a secret, but was revealed at the end of the first episode. 360 00:18:50,170 --> 00:18:53,423 Second season, we had to make it through the entire season 361 00:18:53,507 --> 00:18:57,010 to the end of the last episode and not have this spoiled. 362 00:18:57,094 --> 00:19:00,514 In hindsight, it's a bit of a miracle that it remained a secret, 363 00:19:00,597 --> 00:19:01,807 and I'm thrilled 364 00:19:01,890 --> 00:19:06,395 because for people to be able to discover that in real time was magical. 365 00:19:06,478 --> 00:19:09,690 I remember the first time we all crowded into the editing room 366 00:19:09,773 --> 00:19:10,941 once Peyton had a rough cut. 367 00:19:11,024 --> 00:19:14,903 There was about seven of us and six folks had tears in their eyes. 368 00:19:14,987 --> 00:19:17,156 It was spectacular. 369 00:19:17,239 --> 00:19:19,366 And then, the realization was, 370 00:19:20,325 --> 00:19:23,495 "Oh, boy, this really works. We've now gotta change his face." 371 00:19:23,579 --> 00:19:25,706 Only now would we realize what it is... 372 00:19:25,789 --> 00:19:28,917 The responsibility we have to make this moment work, 373 00:19:29,001 --> 00:19:31,461 once we do the visual effects. It was frightening. 374 00:19:32,754 --> 00:19:37,259 This is a character that people have over a 40-year relationship with, right? 375 00:19:37,342 --> 00:19:41,471 There is an emotion that just comes out of seeing that character again. 376 00:19:41,555 --> 00:19:44,183 Certainly seeing that character show up in this show. 377 00:19:44,266 --> 00:19:45,601 And also for fans... 378 00:19:45,684 --> 00:19:48,437 You know, I was 13 when the original Star Wars opened, 379 00:19:48,520 --> 00:19:50,731 so I grew up with Star Wars. 380 00:19:50,814 --> 00:19:54,651 And there was always that fanboy part of me that wanted to see, 381 00:19:54,735 --> 00:19:58,447 "What's he like in full, peak-Jedi mode post-Return of the Jedi?" 382 00:19:58,530 --> 00:19:59,698 We had a chance to do that. 383 00:19:59,781 --> 00:20:02,743 There should be some injury, and then it's the Force... 384 00:20:05,746 --> 00:20:07,456 I remember joking with George, I said, 385 00:20:07,539 --> 00:20:12,127 "You know, when Return of The Jedi ends, it's all over for me." 386 00:20:12,211 --> 00:20:17,257 And that would almost be like taking three movies to tell you 387 00:20:17,341 --> 00:20:22,262 how James Bond earned his license to kill. And then it's over. 388 00:20:22,346 --> 00:20:25,724 No Dr. No, no Goldfinger, no From Russia with Love. 389 00:20:25,807 --> 00:20:27,517 And I was joking, really, 390 00:20:27,601 --> 00:20:30,354 but it did occur to me that he went from a farm boy, 391 00:20:30,437 --> 00:20:32,814 then to a trainee to a Jedi. 392 00:20:32,898 --> 00:20:39,029 And yet, then it's over, and there's no tales of his exploits as a Jedi. 393 00:20:39,112 --> 00:20:41,865 So, it was nice to have a rare look 394 00:20:41,949 --> 00:20:47,537 at what he would be doing prior to establishing the Jedi Academy, 395 00:20:47,621 --> 00:20:49,289 but post Jedi. 396 00:20:49,373 --> 00:20:51,667 This last hallway, it's the crescendo, right? 397 00:20:51,750 --> 00:20:55,545 So, we've now seen on every deck, him moving through. 398 00:20:55,629 --> 00:20:56,838 We had a discussion 399 00:20:56,922 --> 00:21:02,844 about it would be very easy to just make him so over-the-top skilled, 400 00:21:02,928 --> 00:21:06,807 but I was like, "You know, what's interesting is, he's had training, 401 00:21:06,890 --> 00:21:09,810 "but I don't know who's been teaching him sword-fight training." 402 00:21:09,893 --> 00:21:14,815 So, he had to have a style that was better than what we saw in Jedi, 403 00:21:15,232 --> 00:21:19,987 but fundamentally still of the same tree of sword-fighting technique. 404 00:21:20,070 --> 00:21:22,990 And his technique and Ahsoka's technique should be very different. 405 00:21:23,073 --> 00:21:26,493 And technically, she's had vastly more training than he ever has. 406 00:21:26,576 --> 00:21:29,496 She's his senior, which is difficult for people to remember 407 00:21:29,579 --> 00:21:31,957 'cause of when these characters were created. 408 00:21:32,040 --> 00:21:36,169 So, a lot of consideration given to every detail. 409 00:21:36,253 --> 00:21:39,381 We decided to have him look like he did in Return of the Jedi. 410 00:21:39,464 --> 00:21:42,509 I knew it as I was an usher in the movie theater when it was playing. 411 00:21:42,592 --> 00:21:43,593 I saw it a lot. 412 00:21:43,677 --> 00:21:47,055 Interestingly, the Luke costume from Jedi is not the color you think it is. 413 00:21:47,139 --> 00:21:50,600 We have to make decisions like, "It's really brown, but it looks black." 414 00:21:50,684 --> 00:21:53,562 There's something very dramatic about this. 415 00:21:53,645 --> 00:21:56,773 Part of it was, "Well, it should look black." 416 00:21:56,857 --> 00:22:00,777 The reason they went with that costume was to create some moral ambiguity 417 00:22:00,861 --> 00:22:02,571 whether he had turned to the dark side, 418 00:22:02,654 --> 00:22:05,657 with him doing a bit of a Force choke on the Gamorreans. 419 00:22:05,741 --> 00:22:09,953 That's a part of the story of Luke, which isn't part of the story for us. 420 00:22:10,037 --> 00:22:12,331 But if we didn't have that look, 421 00:22:12,414 --> 00:22:15,417 it would deviate from people's collective memory 422 00:22:15,500 --> 00:22:18,086 of what Luke Skywalker looks like at that moment. 423 00:22:18,170 --> 00:22:20,422 So, there's a million little conversations we had. 424 00:22:20,505 --> 00:22:23,800 And fortunately, Peyton Reed's a huge fan, Dave's a huge fan, 425 00:22:23,884 --> 00:22:27,220 and so we all kind of look at photos, and then we make decisions together. 426 00:22:27,304 --> 00:22:31,558 And go down. Is it like a downward motion or just that fist? 427 00:22:31,641 --> 00:22:33,393 -I think it's just the fist. Yeah. -Okay. 428 00:22:39,191 --> 00:22:42,944 What makes Luke, Luke? What expressions make Luke, Luke? 429 00:22:43,028 --> 00:22:45,113 What lighting scenarios make Luke, Luke? 430 00:22:45,197 --> 00:22:47,741 It's really interesting if you look at the footage. 431 00:22:47,824 --> 00:22:51,495 In every scene, in every shot, he looks a little bit different. 432 00:22:51,578 --> 00:22:53,663 And when you start getting down to it 433 00:22:53,747 --> 00:22:56,958 and you analyze his cheek shape or his nose shape, 434 00:22:57,042 --> 00:23:00,170 he's the same person, but in different lighting scenarios, 435 00:23:00,253 --> 00:23:03,632 it can definitely read differently. 436 00:23:03,715 --> 00:23:05,258 In Jabba's palace, 437 00:23:05,342 --> 00:23:08,678 with some very stark lighting on him, he looks a particular way. 438 00:23:08,762 --> 00:23:11,598 And then he's on Endor and he's hanging upside down 439 00:23:11,681 --> 00:23:14,101 when the Ewoks have captured him, he looks very different. 440 00:23:14,184 --> 00:23:18,939 So, if you line up all the likeness of Luke across all those movies, 441 00:23:19,022 --> 00:23:20,690 people will point to different images 442 00:23:20,774 --> 00:23:23,985 as to what their version of Luke in their mind looks like. 443 00:23:24,069 --> 00:23:26,947 That was the same when we were doing the work. 444 00:23:27,030 --> 00:23:29,741 We would look at something, whether it was a haircut, 445 00:23:29,825 --> 00:23:31,827 whether it was a pose, whether it was a smile, 446 00:23:31,910 --> 00:23:33,745 or a glint in his character's eye. 447 00:23:33,829 --> 00:23:38,542 And people had a different impression of, "Is the likeness on-target?" 448 00:23:38,625 --> 00:23:41,294 And so, we would experiment with different things. 449 00:23:41,378 --> 00:23:44,214 We would change the hair, we would put it over the ears, 450 00:23:44,297 --> 00:23:47,092 we would have it fall further behind his neck. 451 00:23:47,175 --> 00:23:50,929 We would change his neck size, bring his collar up, his shoulders down. 452 00:23:51,012 --> 00:23:52,889 And all of this is to test. 453 00:23:52,973 --> 00:23:56,768 To see when do we go too far. When does the likeness stop? 454 00:23:56,852 --> 00:24:03,525 Digital faces are the most difficult visual effect in the entire world. 455 00:24:03,608 --> 00:24:06,236 And it's not just because it's technically hard 456 00:24:06,319 --> 00:24:08,613 or the technology is still emerging. 457 00:24:08,697 --> 00:24:12,284 It's because every human is an expert in faces. 458 00:24:12,367 --> 00:24:17,289 There's something so magical and innate about the human face. 459 00:24:17,372 --> 00:24:23,879 And everybody has a point of view on how to read a human face. 460 00:24:23,962 --> 00:24:28,300 And then you add on top of it, such a recognizable human face 461 00:24:28,383 --> 00:24:32,095 that means so much to so many people. 462 00:24:32,846 --> 00:24:34,681 May the Force be with you. 463 00:24:37,559 --> 00:24:39,269 Every aspect of this is important. 464 00:24:39,352 --> 00:24:43,982 The build-up of X-wing, to lightsaber, to lightsaber color, to fighting style, 465 00:24:44,065 --> 00:24:46,401 to outside the door with the cloak, to reveal, 466 00:24:46,485 --> 00:24:49,279 builds the anticipation that says, "I want this." 467 00:24:49,863 --> 00:24:52,616 When you want this 'cause you're bought in as the audience, 468 00:24:52,699 --> 00:24:56,119 then the face and the voice are gonna work better, right? 469 00:24:56,203 --> 00:24:58,872 And suddenly you have this fusion moment 470 00:24:58,955 --> 00:25:02,876 where the wish fulfillment meets the expectation of the story, 471 00:25:02,959 --> 00:25:06,171 what it's telling, and it's just ballistic and it all happens. 472 00:25:06,254 --> 00:25:12,010 But if any one of those things fails, it's gonna derail the rest of it. 473 00:25:13,053 --> 00:25:17,474 You know, I think people focus on one thing and say, "Well, the face..." 474 00:25:17,557 --> 00:25:21,186 Okay, but it's probably a lot of other things 475 00:25:21,269 --> 00:25:23,271 that are making the buy-in work or not. 476 00:25:23,563 --> 00:25:26,107 That's the first time in that last episode 477 00:25:26,191 --> 00:25:28,568 that we actually hear any music 478 00:25:28,652 --> 00:25:31,071 that's from the original trilogy. 479 00:25:41,456 --> 00:25:42,749 Are you a Jedi? 480 00:25:44,042 --> 00:25:45,043 I am. 481 00:25:46,419 --> 00:25:50,131 Everything up to that point had been original music by Ludwig. 482 00:25:50,215 --> 00:25:54,302 And that's the first time you could hear any John Williams music. 483 00:25:55,011 --> 00:26:00,475 And that also... Let's never underestimate the importance of John Williams. 484 00:26:02,394 --> 00:26:05,355 Because that's part of what makes Star Wars, Star Wars. 485 00:26:05,438 --> 00:26:09,693 And so, for us to not use any of those themes for any of the show 486 00:26:09,776 --> 00:26:14,030 and then to use it at this point, it's saving a very powerful tool 487 00:26:14,114 --> 00:26:17,117 that I think all those things help to sell the visual effect. 488 00:26:17,701 --> 00:26:19,744 He doesn't want to go with you. 489 00:26:20,829 --> 00:26:22,205 He wants your permission. 490 00:26:23,415 --> 00:26:26,334 You know, many years ago, I think it was 1993, 491 00:26:26,418 --> 00:26:31,172 I was directing a making-of documentary for Forrest Gump with Robert Zemeckis. 492 00:26:31,256 --> 00:26:35,135 ILM at that time was doing stuff where they made JFK talk 493 00:26:35,218 --> 00:26:39,347 and President Johnson, and people Forrest Gump meets along the way. 494 00:26:39,431 --> 00:26:42,225 I remember, Ken Ralston and Bob Zemeckis, 495 00:26:42,309 --> 00:26:46,146 all the visual effects people who were working on that movie 496 00:26:46,229 --> 00:26:48,690 having that very conversation in the early '90s, 497 00:26:48,773 --> 00:26:51,776 about, like, this is really, you know... 498 00:26:51,860 --> 00:26:54,863 "We're just sort of starting to crack this technology 499 00:26:54,946 --> 00:26:56,698 "in a kind of remedial way." 500 00:26:57,365 --> 00:27:00,452 But there's gonna come a point where it'll be so sophisticated 501 00:27:00,535 --> 00:27:04,581 that, you know, it could certainly be used in really bad ways. 502 00:27:04,664 --> 00:27:08,668 Well, a tool is neither good nor bad in and of itself. 503 00:27:08,752 --> 00:27:11,921 It's kind of how the artist wields the tool 504 00:27:12,005 --> 00:27:16,718 and, you know, we try to apply ethics to what we do, 505 00:27:16,801 --> 00:27:19,763 where we're only using these tools for good. 506 00:27:20,221 --> 00:27:23,558 Much like in The Sorcerer's Apprentice in Fantasia, 507 00:27:23,642 --> 00:27:26,686 you have a new technology available to you, 508 00:27:26,770 --> 00:27:29,022 just as Mickey had the magic book. 509 00:27:29,105 --> 00:27:30,523 That magic book allowed him 510 00:27:30,607 --> 00:27:33,610 to have the mops carry the buckets and do the work for him. 511 00:27:33,693 --> 00:27:35,487 And every technology is like that, 512 00:27:35,570 --> 00:27:38,657 and there are unintended consequences with new innovations 513 00:27:38,740 --> 00:27:42,786 if you don't fully appreciate what these things are capable of. 514 00:27:42,869 --> 00:27:44,663 I think in the case of Deepfake, 515 00:27:44,746 --> 00:27:47,248 you know, as we're exploring these different technologies 516 00:27:47,332 --> 00:27:49,626 to make Luke Skywalker look young for a story 517 00:27:49,709 --> 00:27:52,587 we couldn't tell any other way, and we're telling you how we do it, 518 00:27:52,671 --> 00:27:54,881 showing you this is stuff we didn't develop, 519 00:27:54,964 --> 00:27:56,800 this is stuff that's available, readily, 520 00:27:56,883 --> 00:28:00,720 it sort of is a reminder that it might be used for purposes 521 00:28:00,804 --> 00:28:03,556 that are more misleading and more detrimental. 522 00:28:04,307 --> 00:28:07,560 And what's nice about doing this is we could point to it and say, 523 00:28:07,644 --> 00:28:11,815 "Well, we still have a few years before it really gets indistinguishable." 524 00:28:11,898 --> 00:28:15,151 But it will get to a point where you can't tell them apart. 525 00:28:16,027 --> 00:28:20,573 And it made us think about it, because when you know it's there, 526 00:28:20,657 --> 00:28:22,826 it's kind of fun and a point of discussion. 527 00:28:22,909 --> 00:28:26,621 But something people didn't realize is that his voice isn't real. 528 00:28:26,705 --> 00:28:28,832 His voice, the young Luke Skywalker voice, 529 00:28:28,915 --> 00:28:34,295 is completely synthesized using an application called Respeecher. 530 00:28:34,379 --> 00:28:38,216 It's a neural network you feed information into and it learns. 531 00:28:38,299 --> 00:28:40,760 So I had archival material from Mark in that era. 532 00:28:40,844 --> 00:28:43,596 We had clean recorded ADR from the original films, 533 00:28:43,680 --> 00:28:45,890 a book on tape he'd done from those eras, 534 00:28:45,974 --> 00:28:49,519 and then also Star Wars radio plays he had done back in that time. 535 00:28:49,602 --> 00:28:52,689 I was able to get clean recordings of that, feed it into the system, 536 00:28:52,772 --> 00:28:56,401 they were able to slice it up and feed their neural network to learn this data. 537 00:28:56,484 --> 00:29:01,948 The computer is sampling sounds and tones from younger Mark Hamill 538 00:29:02,031 --> 00:29:06,286 and creating a performance that sounds like that Luke Skywalker. 539 00:29:06,369 --> 00:29:07,954 He is strong with the Force. 540 00:29:08,955 --> 00:29:11,166 But talent without training is nothing. 541 00:29:11,249 --> 00:29:13,918 You know, it makes you realize that it becomes harder 542 00:29:14,002 --> 00:29:16,463 to trust your eyes and ears when it comes to this stuff. 543 00:29:16,546 --> 00:29:19,632 And, so... I mean, the good news is that technology is probably... 544 00:29:19,716 --> 00:29:23,052 You know, technology is not going away, in any event. 545 00:29:23,136 --> 00:29:25,638 But other people who understand technology, 546 00:29:25,722 --> 00:29:27,223 if we can anticipate these things... 547 00:29:27,307 --> 00:29:30,894 Even now, there's blockchain technology, like we talk about chain codes. 548 00:29:30,977 --> 00:29:34,105 My chain code has been encoded in this armor for 25 years. 549 00:29:35,273 --> 00:29:38,067 You see, this is me. Boba Fett. 550 00:29:38,151 --> 00:29:39,861 We were alluding to that there's 551 00:29:39,944 --> 00:29:42,655 a blockchain identification that everybody has. 552 00:29:42,739 --> 00:29:47,577 I wonder if certain images or videos that are released in official capacity 553 00:29:47,660 --> 00:29:49,412 could have some kind of a stamp with it. 554 00:29:49,496 --> 00:29:52,499 Something... When you see something, that you know it's real. 555 00:29:52,582 --> 00:29:55,919 Because it's becoming harder to tell fake from real. 556 00:29:56,002 --> 00:29:59,130 And if we know that, we have the technology that could address that. 557 00:29:59,631 --> 00:30:02,091 Now, having tokens that are associated, 558 00:30:02,175 --> 00:30:06,554 that have, "Where does this image come from?" Built into the blockchain. 559 00:30:06,638 --> 00:30:10,266 "How has it been edited or changed? When was it created?" 560 00:30:10,767 --> 00:30:16,105 Those are identifiers that don't require a database or a central governing body. 561 00:30:16,189 --> 00:30:19,692 However, if the big tech companies got together and say, 562 00:30:19,776 --> 00:30:23,279 "Come up with a standard of verification," they do it in social media. 563 00:30:23,363 --> 00:30:27,700 I know if somebody's giving a real quote as they're verified with a blue checkmark, 564 00:30:27,784 --> 00:30:29,869 if they're somebody who's of social consequence, 565 00:30:29,953 --> 00:30:32,288 that they've deemed somebody they would verify. 566 00:30:32,372 --> 00:30:36,042 And like in Fantasia, when the wizard comes in 567 00:30:36,125 --> 00:30:42,632 and he's able to undo the things that Mickey did in his haste. 568 00:30:43,299 --> 00:30:46,344 And because he was engaging with technologies, 569 00:30:46,427 --> 00:30:50,390 or, in this case, magic, that he didn't understand the full ramifications of. 570 00:30:50,473 --> 00:30:51,474 The good news is 571 00:30:51,558 --> 00:30:55,103 we have all these wonderful technologies available to us to tell stories. 572 00:30:55,186 --> 00:30:56,312 Only gonna get better. 573 00:30:56,396 --> 00:31:00,275 Part of our responsibility, you guys and me, 574 00:31:00,358 --> 00:31:04,779 is to keep an eye on that and see how we can help 575 00:31:04,863 --> 00:31:09,742 maximize the benefit while diminishing or eliminating the downside. 576 00:31:13,162 --> 00:31:14,455 Growing up with Star Wars, 577 00:31:14,539 --> 00:31:16,291 you never think you'd be a part of making it. 578 00:31:16,374 --> 00:31:20,587 For Jon, I think it's so special to have a character like Grogu 579 00:31:20,670 --> 00:31:26,426 that can stand right next to R2-D2 in the same frame and talk to him. 580 00:31:27,051 --> 00:31:28,970 You don't ever imagine that. 581 00:31:29,053 --> 00:31:33,933 And it's a huge responsibility to put that character next to those characters. 582 00:31:37,312 --> 00:31:39,397 I remember the look on Jon's face. 583 00:31:39,480 --> 00:31:41,691 We were talking about the scene, getting into it, 584 00:31:41,774 --> 00:31:45,028 and I said, "Well, if we bring Luke in, you get Artoo." 585 00:31:45,111 --> 00:31:47,989 And Jon was like, "Artoo." 586 00:31:48,072 --> 00:31:49,991 My favorite character when I was little. 587 00:31:50,074 --> 00:31:54,412 Oh, my God... They didn't even have toys of him. Had the little figures. 588 00:31:54,495 --> 00:31:56,456 If I could have a radio-control one 589 00:31:56,539 --> 00:31:58,833 like they have now, I would've lost my mind. 590 00:31:58,917 --> 00:32:01,085 You know that you see someone's inner child, 591 00:32:01,169 --> 00:32:06,841 and I saw in Jon, I saw in him that young person that first saw Star Wars. 592 00:32:06,925 --> 00:32:10,762 It was right there in front of me when I mentioned Artoo. 593 00:32:10,845 --> 00:32:17,101 And so I immediately did a sketch of Artoo talking to Grogu. 594 00:32:17,185 --> 00:32:18,937 And I was like, "The moment we want 595 00:32:19,020 --> 00:32:21,773 "is the one that's like when Wicket meets Artoo." 596 00:32:23,358 --> 00:32:27,362 In post, we reanimated his little lights. That was a lot of fun, actually. 597 00:32:27,445 --> 00:32:30,073 For his lens that's right in front that moves around, 598 00:32:30,156 --> 00:32:33,076 gives you an indication of his mood and what he's thinking, 599 00:32:33,159 --> 00:32:37,705 we took an animation directly from Return of the Jedi 600 00:32:37,789 --> 00:32:41,417 and reanimated it for the scene and got to put it in there. 601 00:32:41,501 --> 00:32:44,879 So we got to use some Return of the Jedi directly on Artoo. 602 00:32:48,174 --> 00:32:49,384 And action! 603 00:32:50,051 --> 00:32:51,886 It was already intense because... 604 00:32:51,970 --> 00:32:55,264 My God, here's Mark Hamill dressed as Luke Skywalker, 605 00:32:55,348 --> 00:32:57,725 on our set in a starship hallway. 606 00:32:57,809 --> 00:33:00,895 It was just... It felt like a dream. It was very strange. 607 00:33:00,979 --> 00:33:04,232 And I was fine. And then R2-D2 rolled on. 608 00:33:04,857 --> 00:33:07,527 And I just had a moment where R2-D2 was there 609 00:33:07,610 --> 00:33:10,029 and I... That's when I broke down. 610 00:33:10,113 --> 00:33:13,449 And it felt... I didn't understand why it felt silly, you know? 611 00:33:14,200 --> 00:33:15,618 But I started tearing up. 612 00:33:16,285 --> 00:33:18,663 And I was like, "Let me remember this moment." 613 00:33:18,746 --> 00:33:20,206 Uh, even now, I'm sort of moved. 614 00:33:20,289 --> 00:33:22,417 But I don't understand why, I really don't. 615 00:33:22,917 --> 00:33:24,293 I don't understand why. 616 00:33:24,836 --> 00:33:27,338 But it just shows you how deep that stuff goes, 617 00:33:27,422 --> 00:33:31,175 and what it touches from your childhood and how you felt then. 618 00:33:31,259 --> 00:33:32,719 For a generation of kids now, 619 00:33:32,802 --> 00:33:35,930 Grogu represents something that Artoo represented to me, 620 00:33:36,014 --> 00:33:37,598 that Yoda represented to me. 621 00:33:37,682 --> 00:33:42,645 It's a magic, special character that we take very good care of, I hope. 622 00:33:47,817 --> 00:33:50,486 The Grogu puppet is so believable. 623 00:33:50,570 --> 00:33:54,657 Déjà vu with Yoda, you know? I mean, Yoda was so real to me. 624 00:33:54,741 --> 00:33:57,744 I just thought, when I was watching the episodes, 625 00:33:57,827 --> 00:34:01,956 I said, "I've got to meet the Child," and it's justified 626 00:34:02,040 --> 00:34:04,959 because I'm the only one that has any experience 627 00:34:05,043 --> 00:34:06,210 with the species. 628 00:34:06,294 --> 00:34:07,420 Hey, go on. 629 00:34:09,088 --> 00:34:11,549 That's who you belong with. He's one of your kind. 630 00:34:14,427 --> 00:34:19,432 It was important that the end of that show have a really strong, slow build, 631 00:34:19,515 --> 00:34:21,517 and build in emotion 632 00:34:21,601 --> 00:34:25,730 about how the audience was responding to the appearance of that character 633 00:34:25,813 --> 00:34:29,484 and to the separation of Mando and Grogu. 634 00:34:30,526 --> 00:34:32,862 I talked to Jon a lot about the ending of E.T. 635 00:34:32,945 --> 00:34:36,657 The way that you spend a whole movie with E.T. and Elliott. 636 00:34:36,741 --> 00:34:40,078 And then, there's a certain point where E.T. has to go. 637 00:34:40,161 --> 00:34:43,039 And that whole ending where Spielberg goes around 638 00:34:43,122 --> 00:34:47,418 and you're just witnessing the emotion between E.T. and Elliott. 639 00:34:47,502 --> 00:34:50,338 The emotion of E.T.'s mom and brother, everybody in that scene, 640 00:34:50,421 --> 00:34:53,508 and it is all through this amazing John Williams score. 641 00:34:53,591 --> 00:34:56,928 I said, "We want to introduce a bit of that into the Star Wars universe." 642 00:34:57,011 --> 00:35:00,306 Let's not be afraid of that emotion at the end of the thing, 643 00:35:00,389 --> 00:35:03,810 'cause that's... To me, that was the win of that episode. 644 00:35:03,893 --> 00:35:07,230 And it felt like it merited it, because to split up those two characters 645 00:35:07,313 --> 00:35:11,025 at the end of that season broke a lot of hearts. 646 00:35:13,736 --> 00:35:15,947 All right, pal. It's time to go. 647 00:35:21,744 --> 00:35:23,037 Don't be afraid. 648 00:35:23,121 --> 00:35:26,666 What was interesting about watching Peyton's episode, 208, 649 00:35:26,749 --> 00:35:28,209 I was watching it with my family, 650 00:35:28,292 --> 00:35:31,254 and so there was a little bit of a gap in your muscle memory 651 00:35:31,337 --> 00:35:33,339 of how the episode played out. 652 00:35:34,549 --> 00:35:36,676 I got pretty choked up watching it. 653 00:35:36,759 --> 00:35:39,345 And not only seeing the character and emotion come though 654 00:35:39,428 --> 00:35:41,305 and, of course, the spectacular music, 655 00:35:41,389 --> 00:35:45,184 but I think it was the finally letting go of the emotion of, 656 00:35:46,310 --> 00:35:47,478 "Now the world knows. 657 00:35:47,562 --> 00:35:50,898 "Now we can let go of some of what's been inside this whole time." 658 00:35:50,982 --> 00:35:54,652 And maybe I can say "Luke Skywalker"? Maybe not. I'm not sure. 659 00:35:57,655 --> 00:36:01,701 To see the reactions, that was a high point of my whole career. 660 00:36:01,784 --> 00:36:05,997 That was definitely on those moments you could count on one hand, 661 00:36:06,664 --> 00:36:10,459 of what makes you grateful that you're doing what you're doing, 662 00:36:11,085 --> 00:36:15,423 and to hear Peyton react and Dave react and especially Mark. 663 00:36:16,090 --> 00:36:19,510 When Mark was seeing the stuff... And we live in an interesting time. 664 00:36:19,594 --> 00:36:24,557 We live in a time when people make their feelings known. 665 00:36:24,640 --> 00:36:28,186 And if you choose to, you could dip into that river 666 00:36:28,269 --> 00:36:30,688 of information, of feedback. 667 00:36:31,189 --> 00:36:37,737 Jon sent me links to reaction videos, which were just, you know... 668 00:36:37,820 --> 00:36:40,198 'Cause I don't get to see these things in the audience. 669 00:36:40,281 --> 00:36:42,575 To see grown men cry. 670 00:36:42,658 --> 00:36:45,620 And just those people screaming their heads off. 671 00:36:46,329 --> 00:36:51,918 It was really, really thrilling for me to see them enjoying it so much. 672 00:36:55,880 --> 00:37:00,218 We love the fans. If it weren't for them, I wouldn't be sitting here talking to you. 673 00:37:00,301 --> 00:37:03,429 They are the most loyal, passionate group of people 674 00:37:03,512 --> 00:37:05,973 that I've ever encountered. 675 00:37:06,390 --> 00:37:10,895 I just have a deep gratitude to their enthusiasm over the years. 676 00:37:10,978 --> 00:37:15,983 I never expected that, and it's just been something that I really cherish. 677 00:37:19,028 --> 00:37:23,282 This job is great in so many ways, and I think people think the job is great, 678 00:37:23,366 --> 00:37:26,369 'cause we get to tell the story, because we do these effects, 679 00:37:26,827 --> 00:37:30,414 because we get these experiences, because we go to Celebration, right? 680 00:37:30,498 --> 00:37:32,625 But also great is just standing on the side 681 00:37:32,708 --> 00:37:34,043 and watching somebody... 682 00:37:34,126 --> 00:37:37,630 Like I said, I saw the child inside Jon, that he experienced Star Wars. 683 00:37:37,713 --> 00:37:41,926 I sit there with Peyton, you see your crew just staring at Mark 684 00:37:42,510 --> 00:37:45,221 and you realize they're remembering what it meant to them. 685 00:37:46,180 --> 00:37:49,141 And you realize that you've been a part of constructing something 686 00:37:49,225 --> 00:37:51,018 that's giving that experience to people. 687 00:37:51,644 --> 00:37:56,691 This good feeling, which, fundamentally, Star Wars should deliver a good feeling. 688 00:37:57,108 --> 00:38:01,279 An uplifting feeling in you and your family, your kids, whatever. 689 00:38:03,406 --> 00:38:05,825 A lot of Star Wars fans are of this age 690 00:38:05,908 --> 00:38:08,786 where they're not the Luke Skywalkers anymore. 691 00:38:08,869 --> 00:38:11,580 They're the parents now, and they're saying goodbye to their kids 692 00:38:11,664 --> 00:38:14,083 as they go off to school or off to college. 693 00:38:14,667 --> 00:38:18,087 And I think that what's nice about a good myth and a good story 694 00:38:18,170 --> 00:38:19,797 and the world that George created 695 00:38:19,880 --> 00:38:22,425 is that there's room for all the archetypes of every age, 696 00:38:22,508 --> 00:38:25,553 and I think that's part of why it becomes an intergenerational experience. 697 00:38:25,636 --> 00:38:28,055 And just as my father brought me to the first Star Wars, 698 00:38:28,723 --> 00:38:31,851 there's a lot of people sitting on the couch with their kids. 699 00:38:31,934 --> 00:38:34,979 They may be watching for different reasons, like different things. 700 00:38:35,062 --> 00:38:39,400 But I like, you know, in this atomized entertainment economy 701 00:38:39,483 --> 00:38:42,403 where everybody is looking at things that are bespoke for them 702 00:38:42,486 --> 00:38:44,322 and everybody has their own log-in 703 00:38:44,405 --> 00:38:47,366 and everybody has their own platform that they like to look at, 704 00:38:47,450 --> 00:38:53,873 to have a moment where you could have several members of a family together, 705 00:38:53,956 --> 00:38:57,918 watching the same thing and sharing the same experience. 706 00:38:59,211 --> 00:39:02,214 That's what good television and good movies are all about 707 00:39:02,298 --> 00:39:05,092 and I really... I'm very proud of that, 708 00:39:05,176 --> 00:39:09,472 The Mandalorian has that element to it. 709 00:39:10,765 --> 00:39:14,977 And it's a great way to introduce the next generation to Star Wars.