Marc Thorpe, VFX and Model Artist for Original ‘Star Wars’ Trilogy, Has Died at 77
We are sad to report that Marc Thorpe, who worked on props and visual effects for The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, has died at 77.
Thorpe’s daughter, Megan Feffer, announced her father’s passing on social media this past Friday. She discussed his long-term struggle with Parkinson’s disease and stressed the importance of remembering his many artistic achievements as a way of honoring him.
“This morning my dad, Marc Thorpe, passed away. This was his 30th year with Parkinson’s Disease. Although I’m sure it’s different for every patient, for him early-onset Parkinson’s Disease started out with relatively mild tremors, and then over time progressed toward less and less bodily autonomy – something particularly torturous for a fiercely independent artist like my dad whose joy in life was to create things with his hands…
“But if there’s one thing I know for sure it’s that my dad would want to be remembered – and not for his Parkinson’s Disease. He would want to be remembered for his art. So, here are some photos of his work throughout the years. From being a model maker at ILM on Star Wars and Indiana Jones to his creation of Robot Wars, he made many, many beautiful, weird, detailed and strange things.”
Marc Thorpe’s career in the film industry began when he was hired by Industrial Light and Magic in 1979 as a model maker and animatronic designer. Thorpe worked in the optical effects unit on The Empire Strikes Back and later contributed his talents to Return of the Jedi as well.
Thorpe’s effects work wasn’t limited to Star Wars, however. He also worked on all three of the original Indiana Jones movies as well as other major films from the 1980s and 1990s like Dragonslayer, Poltergeist, Explorers, Howard the Duck, and The Hunt for Red October.
Still, many people may remember Thorpe even more for what he did after his time at ILM. In the early 1990s, Thorpe was a senior designer at LucasToys, which was a division of Lucasfilm. During that time, he got the idea of hosting events in which contestants would remote-control their own robots in fighting matches against each other. Thorpe named this new venture Robot Wars, and the first event took place in 1994.
Sadly, Thorpe wasn’t involved with his creation for very long. In 1997, Profile Records assumed creative control of the business, and Thorpe took a step back from the robot-fighting community that began to grow from the success of Robot Wars. Even so, Thorpe proved that the audience for that kind of entertainment existed, and Robot Wars itself would continue for several more years. Additionally, other robot-fighting shows were later produced, some of which, like BattleBots and its spinoffs, continue to this day.
BattleBots was quick to post a tribute to Thorpe on social media, acknowledging him as the founder of robot fighting sports:
Today we honor and say goodbye to Marc Thorpe, the creator of robot fighting sports. Without this remarkable human being, creative genius, and pioneer, there would be no BattleBots, Robot Wars, RoboGames, NHRL, Robot Ruckus, Extreme Robots and so on and so on.
Marc touched all… pic.twitter.com/namqLNkeHf
— BattleBots (@BattleBots) November 24, 2023
Lastly, it’s worth noting that a number of inventors and engineers who would later go on to become famous in their own right participated in the early Robot Wars competitions. Those events featured robotic warriors created by the likes of Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman (the future hosts of MythBusters), Caleb Chung (one of the inventors of the Furby toy), and many others.
If you want to learn more about Marc Thorpe and his career in film and robot sports, you can check out his website.
We here at Star Wars News Net wish to extend our condolences to Marc Thorpe’s family and friends in their time of loss.
May the Force be with him.
Sources: The Hollywood Reporter, Gizmodo, Marc Thorpe’s website
Eric has been a fan of Star Wars ever since the age of five (or so) when his parents sat him down in front of a TV with pizza and a Sprite and showed him the original trilogy. He keeps trying to convince more fans to read the amazing 1980s Star Wars newspaper comics by Archie Goodwin and Al Williamson. When he's not reading, watching or playing Star Wars media, he's often enjoying other great fantasy and science fiction sagas or playing roleplaying games with his friends.
