Will he have a beard again?
We were just as excited as anyone else when we heard Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, and Carrie Fisher were returning for Star Wars: The Force Awakens. However, we didn’t know in what capacity Luke, Han, and Leia would appear in the story. Details have trickled out, especially their character designs for the film. Many were happy to see Luke Skywalker sporting an Obi-Wan Kenobi style zen-beard.
So, while we have a good idea how they’ll appear in The Force Awakens, we don’t know how they will be used in Star Wars: Episode VIII. More to the point, we’re not entirely sure how they’ll look… assuming they appear at all.
Well, thanks to a scoop from Aintitcoolnews, we have a photo of Mark Hamill during the current Episode VIII shoot at Skellig Michael.
Well, let’s see the photo.
Here it is:
Keep in mind this picture was supposedly taken after a long day of shooting at a bar, so this isn’t exactly what he’ll look like on screen. People can look very different after walking out of the hair and make up trailer:
For comparison’s sake, here’s how he looked during the Force Awakens shoot:
So, he’s lost the beard.
We imagine that was for several reasons. First of all, Mark Hamill has long been outspoken regarding his dislike for his beard, calling it “contractually obligated” in an interview with Yahoo Movies:
“That is what I call my contractually obligated beard. I never got used to it. But face foliage is almost a part of the costume. And it does bring a gravitas, perhaps unearned, but nevertheless, it makes a statement that they wanted to make, and I’m more than happy to oblige them.”
So, we imagine for the next installment of his character’s saga he wanted to remain clean shaven. It seems director Rian Johnson and producer Kathleen Kennedy were happy to let him lose the fuzz.
Could there be a story reason for it?
Indeed there could be. We saw Mark Hamill really grow out his facial hair for the film, which leads us to believe he’s been in isolation for a while. After all, nothing says “crazy hermit” like a nice long beard.
Obviously, the search for an absent Luke has been widely known as a driving force (no pun intended) in The Force Awakens. Now that he’s been found, he’s presumably come out of hiding to a certain degree and taken an interest in others. As a result, he’s lost the beard and groomed himself up a bit. Being clean shaven, after all, has been a mark of a civilized man for quite some time… though we’re sure many beard enthusiasts would disagree.
Still, it’s great to see Luke return to his old self. He’s had many looks over the years, but we’ll always remember him as the clean shaven boy from Tatooine.
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