The cast of J.J. Abrams’ Star Wars film has been finalized, and there they are, up there in a pow wow. Looks like R2 didn’t get to leave his box.
In addition to the original cast—Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher, Harrison Ford, Anthony Daniels, and Peter Mayhew (who played Chewie and, from the looks of his IMDB page, didn’t need much convincing)—VII will feature a few talented young actors you’ll be hearing a lot of from now till 2015. Oscar Isaac, who was robbed of an Oscar nomination for Inside Llewyn Davis, is on board, as is Adam Driver from Girls and Attack the Block’s John Boyega. Other names include motion-capture specialist Andy Serkis, About Time’s Domhnall Gleeson, and relative unknown Daisy Ridley. Max Von Sydow is also involved, and I’ll admit I did not know he was still alive.
Anyway, the decision to grab talented, yet not universally recognizable, actors will be probably prove to be a wise one. Isaac and Driver have shown they can play complex characters—Driver could make a great villain—and more importantly, they won’t overshadow the already hugely hyped task of transitioning the Star Wars universe into a new trilogy. (Could you imagine James Franco or Channing Tatum as Jedi? Well, Tatum would be fucking awesome but that’s beside the point.)
Nothing is really known about the plot, but it does seem like Han will be prominently involved. According to Deadline, “The big surprise, I’m told, is that Ford has a gigantic role in the first of the next three films. Disney hasn’t been commenting on any of this, and today’s no different.”
[H/T: Deadline]