10 Biggest Feuds In Star Wars History

WhatCulture

Even the Skywalkers don't get on in the galaxy far, far away.

Transcript

00:00For the most part, everyone who has worked on a Star Wars project has nothing but good things to

00:04say about their co-stars and directors. But saying that, though, it was inevitable that

00:09Star Wars would stumble across some friction behind the scenes, considering the Star Wars

00:13story has been consistently expanding for 45 years. So let's take a look at them as I'm Jules,

00:18this is WhatCulture.com, and these are the 10 biggest feuds in Star Wars history.

00:2410. Terrence Stamp and George Lucas

00:26Terrence Stamp signed on to play Chancellor Valorum in 1999's The Phantom Menace,

00:32only because he was interested in working with Natalie Portman. Apart from his disappointment

00:36that he would have very limited scenes with Natalie, Stamp would grow to hate working on

00:40the film because of Lucas' insistence on using CGI as much as possible. Most of Stamp's scenes took

00:46place in the Senate chambers on Coruscant, where he would be performing in a blue room against a

00:51piece of paper. It was just pretty boring, he said. Things weren't great between Lucas and Stamp,

00:56since Stamp hated spewing bad dialogue into an empty blue room. In an interview with Empire in 2013,

01:02Stamp recalled,

01:02I didn't rate him that much as a director, really. We didn't get on at all, and I didn't feel like

01:08it was a director of actors. He was more interested in stuff and effects. He didn't interest me,

01:12and I wouldn't think I interested him. Worst of all, when reshoots for the film began,

01:17Stamp was required to come back to shoot additional scenes without pay. Instead of pay,

01:21Lucas gifted Stamp some Star Wars stencils, which surely worsened an already strained relationship.

01:289. John Boyega and Disney

01:31Whilst John Boyega had nothing but good things to say about Star Wars and Disney during the making

01:36of the sequel trilogy, he's now stepped forward to share his complaints about working on the

01:40Star Wars sequels. Boyega felt like Disney misused Finn in the Star Wars sequel trilogy,

01:45and accused the company of parading Finn around as nothing more than to tick the diversity checkbox.

01:51In a 2020 interview with GQ, Boyega took aim at Disney for their mismanagement of Finn. He said,

01:57What I would say to Disney is do not bring out a black character, market them to be much more

02:01important in the franchise than they are, and then have them push to the side. It's not good,

02:06I'll say it straight up. He continued to throw blame at Disney's mishandling of his character

02:10and Star Wars as a whole, saying that you guys, Disney in this case, knew what to do with Daisy

02:15Ridley and Adam Driver, but when it came to me, you know f*** all.

02:18Since the interview, Boyega and Disney sat down to clear the air, and the two seem to have a

02:23better relationship now. Still, it doesn't seem likely that Boyega will ever return to Star Wars

02:27now that his sequel trilogy is done.

02:308. Peter Serafinowich and Star Wars

02:33Although Ray Park provided the physical performance of Darth Maul in 1999's The Phantom Menace,

02:38Peter Serafinowich voiced the character, since George Lucas felt that Park's natural voice was

02:43not intimidating enough for the Sith warrior. Lucas had initially sold Darth Maul to Serafinowich as

02:48the prequel trilogy's Darth Vader, though Serafinowich soon learnt that this was not the

02:53case, with the character only being on screen for a total of six minutes and having two lines,

02:57and would ultimately be killed off by the end credits. Since its release, Peter Serafinowich

03:01has not been shy about voicing his opinion on the film. In an interview with Digital Spy in 2011,

03:07he noted that,

03:07I was very disappointed when the film actually came out, because I didn't think it was very good.

03:12He eventually got removed from Star Wars completely as well, with Sam Witwer taking his place for

03:16voicing the character for projects like Star Wars The Clone Wars and Star Wars Rebels.

03:21Serafinowich even recorded lines for 2018's Solo A Star Wars Story, though it was revealed that he

03:25was again replaced for the theatrical cut.

03:297. Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher

03:31Whilst shooting the first film, Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher had a three-month-long affair,

03:37which was kept a secret until Carrie Fisher finally revealed what had happened between them

03:40in her 2016 book The Princess Diarist. Fisher was only 19 at the time, whilst Ford was married with

03:47two children. In her book, Fisher recalled toying with the idea of asking Ford to leave his wife for

03:51her towards the end of their affair. In 1979, Ford divorced his wife, but Fisher insisted in a

03:572016 interview with Radar Online that it happened for reasons that have nothing whatsoever to do with

04:02me. In a public statement shortly after her death, Ford praised his co-star, saying that Carrie was

04:07one-of-a-kind, brilliant, original, funny, and emotionally fearless. She lived her life bravely.

04:13Even so, Ford was also quick to brush the affair under the rug. When GQ asked him about the affair

04:18in 2016, Ford replied, you know, with Carrie's untimely passing, I really don't feel it's a

04:22subject that I want to discuss. Even though this was not strictly a feud between the two because they

04:27became good friends during and after the making of the original trilogy, it certainly made things

04:31pretty awkward for the pair when working on the films.

04:336. Carrie Fisher and Richard Marquand

04:37With George Lucas stepping away from the director's chair after the first film, Richard Marquand took

04:42his place after Lucas watched and enjoyed his 1981 film Eye of the Needle. Now, with Marquand

04:48directing Return of the Jedi, the dynamic between the director and actor had changed. Mark Hamill spoke

04:53highly of Marquand, describing him as very personable and that he liked him very much in the 2013 book

04:58The Making of Return of the Jedi. Despite Hamill and others getting on with Marquand, though,

05:02Carrie Fisher did not share a friendly relationship with him, since Fisher felt that Marquand was

05:07treating her unfairly when compared to the relationship that he had with her co-stars.

05:11In an interview with the Daily Beast, Fisher said,

05:13I hated him. He fell all over Harrison, but he would yell at me constantly.

05:18The bad blood between the two lasted throughout the film's production,

05:21making it a painful experience for both Fisher and Marquand.

05:255. Sir Alec Guinness and Star Wars

05:28It's been well documented that Guinness was never really a fan of Star Wars. As noted by The Guardian

05:33upon the film's 1977 release, Guinness admitted that, apart from the money, I regret having embarked

05:38on that film. Guinness even seemed to enforce his hatred of the franchise onto fans that he would

05:43meet. In his autobiography, A Positively Final Appearance, Guinness recalled of an incident where

05:48he met a Star Wars fan who had seen the first film over a hundred times, and told him that he would

05:52only give them his autograph if they promised to never watch Star Wars again. Guinness would also

05:57appear in The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, but insisted that he only signed on for

06:02the role out of courtesy, and that, if anything, he thought that The Empire Strikes Back was worse

06:07than the first, and that he really didn't want to do it.

06:104. David Prowse and George Lucas

06:13This feud began with the premiere of Star Wars in 1977, when David Prowse found that all of his

06:19dialogue had been redubbed by James Earl Jones without George Lucas telling him.

06:24Relationships worsened when Prowse spoiled the biggest plot twist in cinema history when he

06:27said to the press shortly before the release of The Empire Strikes Back,

06:30Father can't kill son, son can't kill father, so they live again to star in Star Wars 4.

06:36Prowse was also infuriated when he learned that he would not be playing the role of the

06:39unmasked Vader in Return of the Jedi, with the role instead being filled by Sebastian Shaw.

06:44Lucas eventually banned Prowse from Star Wars conventions in 2010 after Prowse

06:48participated in the documentary The People vs. George Lucas, which took aim at the director

06:53for his mismanagement of the franchise. Even after the feud, Lucas would still pay tribute

06:57to Prowse after learning of his death in 2020, saying to the BBC that Prowse was up for anything

07:02and contributed to the success of what would become a memorable, tragic figure.

07:073. Disney and the Fans

07:09Despite fans giving The Force Awakens a warm reception, things would change in 2017 once

07:15The Last Jedi was released. With The Last Jedi being such a major shift in tone and story,

07:20it's no wonder that some Star Wars fans would turn their backs on Disney. And turn their backs

07:24on Disney they did. Fans would also boycott 2018's Solo A Star Wars Story, leading to the film

07:30suffering at the box office and convincing Disney to cancel any similar follow-up projects.

07:35And there wasn't much improvement in relations when The Rise of Skywalker released in 2019,

07:39with fans and critics alike dismissing the film as an overly safe and uninspired mess.

07:43Despite this, things seem to be improving between the fans and Disney,

07:47with the Star Wars projects on Disney+, such as The Mandalorian, receiving a lot of praise.

07:522. Anthony Daniels and Kenny Baker

07:55Possibly the most well-known feud in Star Wars history, the inseparable droid duo could not have

08:01been further from best friends off-set. Anthony Daniels and Kenny Baker had a difficult relationship

08:06when working together on the Star Wars films, since neither could hear one another when shooting

08:10a scene, making it difficult for the two to properly bond. Worse still, Baker accused Daniels

08:14of being the rudest man I've ever met, refusing to talk to him or acknowledge him between takes

08:19and off-set. According to Baker, Daniels was a social recluse who declined multiple offerings

08:24to socialize with his co-stars outside of the film. Kenny Baker has certainly never painted a

08:28particularly flattering image of Daniels. In a 2019 interview with Express Online, Anthony Daniels would

08:33defend himself against Kenny's accusations, saying that Kenny decided that he wanted to say unkind,

08:38unpleasant, rude, hurtful things. It got worse and worse. And rather, like Mr. Trump, if you say it

08:43often enough, people believe you. It's hard to believe that the pair would have such a poor

08:47relationship when on-screen they shared such a fun dynamic. Still, perhaps that's what happens when

08:52you're stuck in a metal suit for hours at a time in Tunisia's blazing heat.

08:561. George Lucas and the Fans

08:59It's fair to say that the feud between George Lucas and the fans over the prequel trilogy is by

09:04far the biggest Star Wars has ever seen. From the release of the first prequel, The Phantom Menace,

09:09George Lucas received plenty of critic and fan backlash for the overuse of CGI, stilted acting,

09:14and appalling dialogue. Fans absolutely loathed Jar Jar Binks, the portrayal of Anakin Skywalker,

09:19the Jedi who would become the most feared man in the galaxy as a whiny brat,

09:23and the laughable lines that Lucas would feed his actors.

09:25By 2012, Lucas, tired of the criticism and wanting to retire to raise his daughter,

09:32decided he wanted to sell Star Wars, eventually reaching a deal with Disney later that year.

09:37When asked why he didn't want anything to do with Star Wars anymore, Lucas replied,

09:40why would I make any more when everybody yells at you all the time and says what a terrible person

09:44you are? Ironically, fans have now turned their fury towards Disney over the direction of the

09:49franchise, and are clamoring for Lucas to return to the helm of Star Wars. So it seems like this feud

09:54has actually come full circle, with fans now praising Lucas' prequels over Disney sequels.

09:59What a mad world, eh?

09:59And there we go, my friends, those were the 10 biggest feuds in Star Wars history. I hope that

10:05you enjoyed that, and please let me know what you thought about it down in the comments section

10:08below. As always, I've been Jules, you can go follow me over on Twitter at RetroJ with a zero,

10:12or you can swing by Live and Let's Dice, where I do all of my Warhammer battle reports and streaming

10:16outside of work, and it'd be great to see you over there. But before I go, I just want to say one

10:20thing. In life, it's never good to have a feud, an unhealthy relationship with another person,

10:24so if you can, my friends, if you have the capacity to do so, I ask you to forgive people that have

10:29made mistakes against you in the past, and try to move forward with love in your heart instead of

10:33hate. Try to build bridges instead of burning them, because at the end of the day, the only way

10:37that we're going to get through this mad thing called life is together as a society. So big love

10:41to you and your neighbour. As always, I've been Jules, you have been awesome, never forget that,

10:46and I'll speak to you soon. Bye.

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