SWCO: Highlights from Mark Hamill’s Panel
It’s no secret that last year’s Star Wars Celebration in London was a bit of a disappointment in terms of big announcements and panels. Don’t get me wrong, Celebration is always fun and is an absolute paradise for die hard Star Wars fans, there just wasn’t a lot of stuff to show outside of Rogue One and Rebels. Thankfully one panel in particular ended up being a stand out moment of last years Celebration and that was the Mark Hamill, Himself panel. It was just such a fun and informative one man show hosted by Mark Hamill and it was one of my most anticipated panels of the year and my man did not disappoint this year!
First and foremost I love just how much of a showman Mark Hamill is and he does an incredible job of captivating the audience with stories and it feels like a very intimate panel. He has so many stories spanning over 40 years and to hear some of his first memories of Star Wars and with the original cast is so much fun for fans and really does provide some insights into the making of the classic. How to deal with George Lucas, working with Harrison Ford, and how to get away with improving lines in front of George.
I think my favorite stories he’s told over the this Celebration have been about Carrie Fisher and the effect she had on everyone and himself and he didn’t disappoint with the story he told about how they first saw the trailer for A New Hope before it was coming out. The two were meeting for a lunch in California and Carrie told him that the trailer for Star Wars was playing at a theater they passed. Naturally they wanted to see it because neither of them had yet, but they didn’t want to see a movie to watch it, so Carrie had Mark talk to the manager so they could watch it. It’s little stories like that that really show the kind of relationship the two had and how close they were. Carrie Fisher was such a talented and beautiful person and for Mark to have your one of your heroes talk about her that way, it just adds a lot to it. It’s stuff like this that make these panels important in my opinion.
Besides stories about the making of Star Wars, he talked a little bit about some upcoming projects he’s working on, as well as his other iconic role, that of the Joker in the Batman animated series. Besides Star Wars, he keeps an incredibly busy schedule and gave some little tid bits to his process and other projects he has worked on in the past and it had all of the classic Mark Hamill charm. Hearing him talk about his experience filming in Jay and Silent Bob and playing a character who curses every other word and how he coped with that was incredibly funny because he had never really cursed on film before. Going from the “clean” image that he had to this character that cursed so much and had such an adult name was obviously different for him. On top of that he talked a little bit about how Carrie Fisher played a nun in the movie as well and talking about that really got the crowd laughing.
He talked about his involvement in the recent Bad Lip Reading as Han Solo and I can’t tell you how much joy and laughter I get from hearing his play Harrison Ford so well. The first time I heard him as Han for a split second I couldn’t really tell the difference between real and fake Han Solo. The man can literally do it all!
Finally I think what people will talk most about this panel is who he would love to play one day in a movie and I want to see it right now. During the Q & A portion of the panel a fan asked him who his dream role and without missing a beat he said he wanted to play George Lucas in the movie about his life. Yes! Give it to me! I want it now! If you’re going to cast that movie there is no one better to play the creator than Luke Skywalker himself.
The panel was as expected, was a lot of fun and you should really check it out when it is officially uploaded to the official youtube channel! It is the epitome of Mark Hamill and Star Wars.
May the force be with you!
How can you write about Mark’s panel and not mention the fact that he could barely talk? I love Mark as much as anyone — he is the franchise’s best ambassador and I felt really bad for him — but at times it was painful to listen.
What do you mean? Do you think he was on something
I guess you did not watch.
The only panel I didn’t get chance to watch this weekend, when I saw him live at Celebration last year he just seemed exhausted
Mark had bad laryngitis.
The man’s a trooper, he must’ve been quite sick and was there talking, instead of canceling, when he had already been in 40 Aniversary Panel and TLJ Panel
I totally agree, and I love Mark. I don’t understand anyone writing this up not mentioning his voice issues, precisely for that reason.
It happens to everyone. Mark has lost his voice, but I don’t think it affected the panel in any way.
I would have to disagree. I think it definitely detracted from his segment. Please don’t turn this into an attack on Mark, because I’ve made it amply clear that it is not. To not mention the huge elephant in the room in this article is very strange.