In the four-piece animated mashup, nothing in the Star Wars galaxy was off limits to create this wild and hilarious new series.
The creative team behind LEGO Star Wars: Rebuild the Galaxy knew they had landed their dream job when they got the chance to create a new four-part animated series. It was clear when they cast Bobby Moynihan as Jedi Bob and the longtime Star Wars and LEGO fan brought his own personal minifigure into the studio each day in his pocket. But perhaps the biggest pinch me moment for director Chris Buckley and showrunners, writers, and executive producers Dan Hernandez and Benji Samit was casting Mark Hamill to play a completely new version of Luke Skywalker: surfer dude. “Our entire lives led us to this moment,” says Samit.
Hernandez and Samit were uniquely qualified to write a LEGO Star Wars series as they were well-versed in LEGO, Star Wars, and comedy writing — a mandatory ingredient in any LEGO Star Wars story. After meeting in college and bonding over their love of Star Wars, Hernandez and Samit had worked together on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem and Pokémon: Detective Pikachu before taking on their first project in the galaxy far, far away. “There is something a little off kilter about LEGO Star Wars,” notes Hernandez. “There’s something a little bit diagonal to the regular Star Wars galaxy, and that really suited what we like to do so much. We could draw on these deep-cut references, or mash up characters we have been talking about privately for years and years.”
That excitement and penchant for mixing and matching their own LEGO set pieces led them to the premise of Rebuild the Galaxy — where the removal of a Cornerstone brick in a Jedi temple causes a seismic rebuilding and reshuffling of the galaxy — which in turn gave the creators lots of flexibility. In a rebuilt universe (think the salty landscape of Crait now being covered with enough pepper to make you sneeze), Hernandez and Samit didn’t have to pick one era or a small group of characters to build their story around. Instead, they could include characters like Jar Jar Binks from the prequels, Rey from the sequels, and Nubs from Young Jedi Adventures hanging out together on a transformed Millennium Falcon … oh, and, one more thing. They’re evil now.
Easter eggs in Rebuild the Galaxy abound, pulling in reference from both the Star Wars universe and the LEGO fan community. Sig Greebling’s first name is short for “signature figure,” which are LEGO minifigs built to represent a mini-version of their maker, while Greebling is a term used in the LEGO world to describe adding small LEGO parts to a surface to add to its visual appeal. The term “greeblies” was also coined by ILM in the 1970s as a term to describe taking small parts from model kits to use as detail elements on new models being made for Star Wars.
Sig and Dev’s occupation, as nerf-herders, will ring a bell with many Star Wars fans who might remember Leia Organa insulting Han Solo by calling him a “scruffy looking nerf-herder.” That line stuck with Samit and Hernandez so they decided to go all-in with the idea of “what would a nerf-herder’s life be like” and named Sig’s home planet Fenessa — a nod to a planet from a Legends Star Wars role-playing game where nerfs were known to live.
The legend of Jedi Bob
Perhaps no character in Rebuild the Galaxy illustrates the marriage of LEGO and Star Wars more than Jedi Bob, voiced by actor Bobby Moynihan. While Jedi Bob is technically a new character in the Star Wars universe, he is based on a minifig well-known to LEGO collectors. The minifig in question was an unnamed Jedi Knight in an Attack of the Clones Republic Gunship LEGO set released in 2002. As this Jedi didn’t appear to match up with any of the Jedi present at the Battle of Geonosis, he became something of a mystery. At some point, fans started referring to the minifig as “Jedi Bob,” and the legend was born. It’s even referenced in the book LEGO Star Wars: The Visual Dictionary. “I knew people would be excited about it,” Samit says, recalling fans reacting to seeing Jedi Bob in the trailer. “I felt it in my heart. It’s been very validating to the LEGO nerd in me.”
And Moynihan not only knew about the minifig, he already owned a few. Carrying the Jedi Bob minifig in his pocket during recording sessions, the actor was thrilled to be a part of the project. “When I read the script,” says Moynihan, “I thought, 'I would watch this every day even if I wasn’t in it.' They just knocked it out of the park.”
Embracing Star Wars fans and characters of all eras also included acknowledging the extended Legends stories as well as some of the weird, wacky, and downright hilarious memes and fan theories that have come up with through the years. “I wanted you to feel like everything that has ever occurred in any version of Star Wars that’s meant something to you exists in this special,” says Hernandez. “And that was really powerful to me, because I remember reading EU books and thinking ‘These are so incredible. I can continue my Star Wars journey.’”
The “What if we did that?” attitude that propelled Rebuild the Galaxy led to an alternative version of Jar Jar Binks — Darth Jar Jar. “That’s something that was one of our day-one pitches,” says Samit. “And to our great surprise and pleasure everyone at Lucasfilm was on board to do it. This was the perfect opportunity to tell some of these alternate stories of Darth Jar Jar or what a redeemed Jedi Vader would be like.”
“It’s Mark.”
A highlight for many cast and crew members working on Rebuild the Galaxy was working with Mark Hamill, aka Luke Skywalker himself. “You want to be professional,” notes Hernandez, “but…” “It’s Mark,” adds Buckley. While some crew members were initially nervous about pleasing Hamill, their concerns were unnecessary as the actor loved the script and was excited to bring a new beach bum version of Luke to the screen. Hamill even offered up his own jokes about Luke — many of which made it into the final cut. “It’s not about making fun [of Star Wars],” says Hernandez, “It’s about having a loving perspective on the Star Wars galaxy and now bringing it into this LEGO Star Wars context, and saying, we can have fun with this.”
In addition to Hamill playing Luke Skywalker like we’ve never seen him before in Rebuild the Galaxy, Jar Jar Binks actor Ahmed Best returned as Darth Jar Jar, Rose Tico actor Kelly Marie Tran voiced Darth Tico, Dee Bradley Baker chimed in as Darth Nubs, and Anthony Daniels channeled his dark side to play a bounty Hunter version of C-3PO.
Buckley embraced letting actors let loose with ideas and improvised dialogue. “When good stuff comes at you, you can’t say no. You can’t be precious about it,” he says. “And I think that’s the great thing about this group. None of us are precious about things. We just want to make the best, most exciting and fun Star Wars event we can.”
Making a great Star Wars story that stood on its own was also vitally important. “Our approach was to say, yes, this is LEGO Star Wars, but we are telling a Star Wars story. If it doesn’t stand as a Star Wars story, no matter the kind of fun we’re having or the jokes we are putting into it, this isn’t worth doing,” said Hernandez.
Moynihan, who fondly remembers free building with LEGO bricks as a child, embraced playing a unique Jedi after “playing Star Wars” his whole life. “I am a lazy Jedi and it’s my dream role,” jokes Moynihan. “Jedi Bob knows he’s not the best Jedi — he talks about how he’s bad at using a lightsaber — and I love that. It makes me so happy to play a Jedi who isn’t that great at it, but has all the powers. It makes me laugh.” In addition to embracing moments where his character’s dialogue played against the iconic Star Wars theme “Duel of the Fates” Moynihan also tried to shoehorn some of his favorite quotes into his recording sessions. “‘I have a bad feeling about this. May the Force be with you. Open the pod bay door.’ I just kept trying to say Star Wars stuff.”
Everyone involved in creating Rebuild the Galaxy was passionate about getting the Star Wars nods and the LEGO references just right. “There’s nothing LEGO nerds hate more than an illegal build,” Samit jokes. During the process of making the series, Samit worked on mashing together the X-Wing and TIE Fighter into one ship in his LEGO building room in his house, later working with LEGO designers in Denmark for a set now available to purchase. Creators also wanted to push the boundaries of what a LEGO Star Wars universe could look like. Buckley used LEGO studs of different colors and sizes to create a new LEGO version of hyperspace in Rebuild the Galaxy.
The creators also wanted to honor the way kids and adults have played with LEGO over the decades, including the last 25 years since the LEGO and Star Wars partnership began. For many LEGO fans, “It’s not that you build a set and put it on the shelf and that’s it,” notes Samit. “No. The way it really works for a kid is all of your LEGO Star Wars are in a big bin and you dump it on the floor to mix and match it together and suddenly Darth Maul is a good guy and different eras are matching up. The timeline doesn’t make sense. You’re just having fun. So that’s essentially what we did. Let’s take the entire LEGO Star Wars universe and dump it and mix and match.” “We embrace everything,” adds Hernandez. “We embrace every way that you want to enjoy Star Wars, every way that you want to enjoy LEGO. We get it and we’re there with you.”
Read more from the creators and cast behind LEGO Star Wars: Rebuild the Galaxy in Part 2 of this two-piece StarWars.com series.
