Back in 2019, rumours abounded that actor Matt Smith would star as a pivotal character in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, but the plans fell through. Now, he’s come forward to confirm his character was in fact a big deal in the galaxy far, far away.
Most will recognise him as the Eleventh Doctor from Doctor Who, and since then, Smith has tried his hand at playing a number of villains on the silver screen. He played Alex in Terminator Genysis, Charles Manson in Charlie Says, and Loxias Crown in the upcoming Morbius. So, when whispers on the wind told Star Wars fans that he would be appearing in The Rise of Skywalker, a number of theories came to the fore.
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“As far as I can tell, I’m definitely not,” said Smith of his possible inclusion in the movie in early 2019. That tricksy phrasing had us musing that his face might have been obscured by a mask, hood or prosthetics if he was playing an alien. There was also the train of thought that he would be a young Palpatine in a flashback scene, or that he might have been Rey’s father. However, it sounded like whatever scenes he did film were ultimately cut from the movie, sadly.
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While Smith is still not able to lift the lid on who it was that he was portraying, he has shared a small insight into his chats with Disney in an interview with Josh Horowitz in his Happy Sad Confused podcast. “We were close to me being in it, but then it just never quite happened,” he clarified. “I think the thing they were thinking of me for, eventually the part became obsolete and they didn’t need it and so I never got to be in Star Wars.”
It could have been that the character was central to Colin Trevorrow’s script for Episode IX (titled Duel of the Fates) and then when the baton was passed to J. J. Abrams, there were a lot of significant changes that got rid of Smith’s character. Surely, seeing that this original draft never saw the light of day, Smith could tell us who he played?
“I could not possibly say, but it was a pretty groovy thing. It was a really groovy part and concept. It was a big thing, it was a big story detail. Like, a transformative Star Wars story detail, but it never quite got over the line. It was a big shift in the history of the franchise,” explained the actor.
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“Maybe I can come back, you never know,” said Smith. Well, if he does return to Star Wars, it’ll likely happen after he’s finished on House of the Dragon, the anticipated prequel to Game of Thrones focusing on the only family that anyone actually cared for. I mean, come on, you’re really going to tell me you’d rather hear about the history of the Starks when there are literal dragon battles happening on the other side of the world?
Featured Image Credit: Disney, BBCTopics: Star Wars, Disney, Game Of Thrones
