- 7 weeks ago
Chewbacca actually got his much-deserved medal long before The Rise of Skywalker...
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00:00From secret abilities he was forbidden to use in battle, to what actually went into
00:04the creation of his unmistakable growl and furry look, these are all of the things you
00:10likely never knew about the eventual pal of the Porgs.
00:13Gareth here from WhatCultureStarWars and here are 10 things you didn't know about Chewbacca.
00:1810. He was nearly forced to wear a pair of lederhosen
00:22Before he eventually debuted in A New Hope back in 1977, Chewbacca went through quite
00:28a few different looks in the development stage. The great Ralph McQuarrie's early concept art
00:33showed off a version of the eventual Wookiee that resembled an unsettling lemur-ape hybrid.
00:38With those sketches eventually evolving into a version of the mighty alien that looked like
00:43the less terrifying version of Chewbacca fans know and love today. And it was after a star
00:48who eventually scored a cameo in The Last Jedi, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, posted some of these early
00:53draft images on eggs that Mark Hamill delivered a fun fact via retweet that initially sounded too
00:59surreal to be true. According to the Luke Skywalker Superstar, 20th Century Fox execs were a little
01:05concerned about Chewie's lack of pant, whilst the team were in the early stages of shooting the first
01:10Star Wars. In fact, they were so bothered about a naked Wookiee on screen, they even suggested throwing
01:16him into a pair of lederhosen. So a pair of family members being burned to a crisp was just fine,
01:22but a furry alien species wandering around in only a bandolier was oddly a cause for concern for this
01:28studio. How strange.
01:309. He has a wife and kid
01:32If you were someone that was only really introduced to the galaxy far, far away in the time after the
01:38original trilogy was first released in theatres around the globe, there's a good chance you've
01:42never been put through the bizarre experience that is the Star Wars Holiday Special. But if you do
01:47ever feel like celebrating Life Day with Chewie and the rest of the gang on Kashyyyk in this weird TV
01:52special, then you'll discover that Chewbacca has an entire Wookiee family that has never really been
01:58seen on the big screen at any point, and that Chewie's father is a rather horny old man who enjoys VR,
02:04erm, experiences. The smuggler slash freedom fighter actually has a wife called Malatobuk,
02:10and the pair also have a son known as Lumpawaru, or Lumpy. And while the pair wouldn't pop up again
02:15on screen in the time post holiday special, Chewie did eventually reunite with his lost son and wife
02:21during the liberation of Kashyyyk after the galactic civil war, with Lumpy being forced to work in an
02:26imperial labour camp for years when the planet was enslaved by the Empire. And after all that,
02:32at number 8 he actually retired at one point. That's right, after years of risking it all to smuggle
02:37goods across the galaxy and fighting the Empire, this brave rebel hero finally decided to take a
02:43step back from living the adventurous life. Not long after helping to liberate his homeworld alongside
02:48old pal Han Solo in the Aftermath Life Debt novel, this Wookiee chose to remain with his family on
02:54Kashyyyk, leaving his smuggler pal to manage his own shipping company and even oversee a piloting
03:00championship known as the Five Sabres at one point. But throughout all of that,
03:04Chewie still kept in contact with his long-time mate and his new Republic senator wife, Leia.
03:09Retirement isn't for everyone though, and it wasn't too long before Chewbacca was back smuggling
03:14for a living with his pal after Han and Leia split in the wake of Ben Solo's fall to the dark side.
03:19The two then continued working together right up to the point they bumped into Rey and Finn
03:24on the Millennium Falcon during the events of The Force Awakens.
03:27Number 7, he had extendable claws but typically didn't use them in battle.
03:31More often than not, whenever this big ball of passionate fur was found taking down stormtroopers
03:36on the battlefield, his weapon of choice was a rather effective Wookiee bowcaster.
03:41What you may not have been aware of however, is the fact that Chewie actually possessed another
03:46somewhat savage tool up his hairy sleeve, one that he was forbidden from using in combat.
03:51Despite boasting extendable claws on both hands, using these sharp parts of his anatomy for anything
03:57other than climbing was against the rules of the Wookiee honor code.
04:00And while Chewbacca would largely keep from ever unleashing said claws in the heat of battle,
04:05there was actually one moment shortly after Han Solo's tragic death,
04:09when the Wookiee did suddenly decide to use his dangerous claws on a First Order stormtrooper.
04:14In Chewie's mind the First Order had zero honor, and Kylo Ren had broken all the rules after
04:20committing patricide, so he was only too happy to break the code for these vermin in the moment.
04:256. He once won a Lifetime Achievement Award
04:29For decades, fans had been demanding justice for this valiant rebel hero,
04:33in the wake of being snubbed during the medal giving ceremony that followed Han, Chewie and Luke,
04:38successfully working together to blow up the first Death Star.
04:42And while the Wookiee icon would eventually be handed Solo's medal on screen,
04:46during the closing stages of The Rise of Skywalker by Maz Kanata,
04:50that wasn't actually the first time Chewie got his shaggy hands on a piece of gold.
04:55Back in 1997, during the MTV Movie Awards, that year's Lifetime Achievement Award was presented
05:01too, according to the host himself, one of the reasons Michael Myers became an actor.
05:06A montage showing off the Star Wars legend's finest moments fighting alongside his mates,
05:11and roaring his way through many a compelling scene soon followed.
05:14With Chewie then going on to finally be awarded the medal he deserved for two decades by Carrie Fisher
05:20herself as the crowd went wild. It was a proud and entirely absurd moment for this giant of the
05:26industry. 5. He's a lot older than you think
05:30Almost 20 years may have passed between the end of Revenge of the Sith and the start of A New Hope,
05:35but Chewbacca didn't look like he'd aged a damn day. And Chewie also didn't appear to possess any new
05:40grey hairs when he popped back up in The Force Awakens 30 years on from the conclusion of Return of the
05:46Jedi. The reason? Wookiees have a massive average lifespan of 400 years. So the entire Skywalker
05:53Saga timeline, 67 years, only really takes up a small chunk of his overall life, with Chewie actually
06:00already being a whopping 200 years old when fans first met him in Episode 4. This also explains why
06:06Chewie is able to go so long without seeing his family back home without feeling massively homesick.
06:10In Wookiee years, he wasn't really gone that long at all when he was away kicking Imperial slash First
06:15Order ass throughout the Galactic Civil and First Order Resistance wars. And with Chewie still only
06:21being in his mid-200s coming out of The Rise of Skywalker, perhaps he could still show up in the
06:26upcoming Daisy Ridley starring Star Wars feature to say hello to his old mate Rey while she's building
06:31the Jedi Order 2. 4. His voice is a combination of multiple animal cries
06:37While the average person hasn't got even the slightest idea what the sharp-shooting tech-savvy
06:41Wookiee is talking about the majority of the time, the various growls, cries, roars and howls that tumble
06:46out of Chewbacca's gob are actually more familiar than you realise. Chewbacca's voice was the first
06:52thing world-class sound designer Ben Burtt was hired to work on when creating the first Star Wars,
06:57and he'd spend a year recording a number of different animals that he'd use to create the iconic
07:02noises Wookiees would eventually make when communicating in this galaxy far, far away.
07:07Bears, walruses, badgers, lions and sick and domestic animals were all recorded by Burtt in that time,
07:13with the designer extracting different moans, grunts and purring sounds that he felt had emotional
07:19feelings connected to them. Burtt then ended up with a bunch of different categories of emotional
07:24sounds and began cutting those together to get a sense of speech out of Chewie, whilst also trying to
07:29land on a sound that felt believable coming out of a mouth that didn't really have articulated lips.
07:34So after recording everything from bears to badgers and a great deal of trial and error,
07:39the Wookiee way of speaking was born.
07:413. The iconic costume has evolved over the years
07:45Chewie's voice wasn't the only thing that was created with a little help from some of our planet's
07:49various creatures. As revealed by the towering star beneath the Wookiee fur during the original
07:54trilogy, Revenge of the Sith and The Force Awakens, Peter Mayhew, the suit he would spend a ton of time
07:59walking around in on set was actually originally made from a combination of yak hair and mohair,
08:05a fabric or yarn made from angora goat hair. According to the late Mayhew, the suit during
08:10those first three films was heavy and warm, and the trick was to get in and out of it as quickly as
08:15possible. When he ultimately returned to the legendary role for episode 3 though, he was pleased
08:20to find the suit had been given a bit of an upgrade. This time around, the actor was treated to a new
08:25costume that was water cooled and relatively easy to wear. Juno Suatamo, who would step into the role
08:32full time from episode 8 onwards, would also note how the metal inside the costume was replaced with
08:37foam after episode 7, with the actor also explaining how his jaw is actually very much pushing down
08:43Chewie's lower jaw whenever the Wookiee speaks on screen, and that process is pretty tiring. The
08:49costume has certainly gotten more comfortable over the years, but it's still often hot and tiring work
08:54bringing this furry icon to life, you know. Number 2, George Lucas's dog inspired him to create this
09:00Wookiee. A long time ago, in the time when George Lucas was writing the first ever chapter in the
09:05galaxy far, far away, the Star Wars creator would often be accompanied by a furry companion of his own.
09:11His sweet Alaskan Malamute Indiana, the name that would later be used for another iconic Harrison Ford
09:17character, would always be sat next to him whilst he was scribbling away, with the large pooch even sitting
09:23in the front seat of his car whenever he went for a drive. And as he'd reveal in an issue of Star
09:28Wars Galaxy Magazine, having his 130 pound canine with him all the time, eventually inspired Lucas to
09:34give Han Solo a sidekick who was like a big furry dog. Lucas would swiftly add that this sidekick would
09:41not be quite like a dog, but intelligent. Ever wondered what went into naming Solo's best bud too? Well,
09:47that was seemingly a case of Lucas just changing a few words around to make Wookiee words,
09:52and liking the sound of Chewbacca the best, with the Wookiee species getting their name.
09:57After the improvised line, I think I just ran over a Wookiee, Terry McGovern uttered in Lucas's THX 1138
10:04film, you never know where inspiration's gonna strike. So now you know.
10:08And number one, he properly died in the Expanded Universe. Ending things on a rather depressing note,
10:14I am sorry. Star Wars Expanded Universe actually went and did what The Rise of Skywalker would only dare
10:21tease. Thirteen years before Disney acquired Lucasfilm in 2012, a novel by the name of the
10:26New Jedi Order Vector Prime was published. And it was in this story that Han Solo and Chewbacca
10:32ended up on the planet Cernpedal, with that world in danger due to its moon being about to collide with
10:37it. However, as the longtime pals attempt to rescue thousands of folks before the moon smashes into
10:42Cernpedal, Chewie is soon left on the planet after having to save Han's son, Anakin Solo,
10:48it was a different time, during the evacuation, and is actually killed when the moon finally comes
10:53crashing down. What? Sure, this heartbreaking death would ultimately be reversed when Disney
10:58decided to spend billions on George Lucas's brainchild, but there was definitely a time there
11:03when it looked like Chewbacca's days of protecting the galaxy were very much over. With the fallen Wookiee
11:09ultimately becoming a legend on his homeworld in the years that followed his heroic sacrifice.
11:14And that's our list, know of any other things people didn't know about Chewbacca? Well let us know all
11:18about them in the comments section right down below and don't forget to like, share and click on that
11:22subscribe button while you're down there. Also if you like this sort of stuff then please head on over
11:26to WhatCulture.com and find some more fantastic Star Wars articles just like the one this video you're
11:31watching right now is based on. I've been Gareth from WhatCulture Star Wars, may the force be with you
11:36as always. Cheers for blasting in to see us today and hopefully we'll see you soon.
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