LEGO Star Wars: Rebuild the Galaxy is truly made by the fans, for the fans

15/09/202415/09/2024 Rachael Davies 47 Views 0 Comments

The team behind LEGO Star Wars: Rebuild the Galaxy are long-time fans of both LEGO and Star Wars – and their passion pays off for the animated series.

From showrunners and writers Benji Samit and Dan Hernandez to the actors bringing the characters to life, the cast and crew of Rebuild the Galaxy is filled with LEGO, Star Wars, and LEGO Star Wars fans. Without that personal connection, the animated show might never have even been made, as Benji attested to in an interview.

“We [he and Dan] became friends with a lot of the people at Lucasfilm and LEGO,” Benji explained. “I think they saw not only what big Star Wars fans we are, with the deep knowledge of all that lore, but [also that] I’m a huge LEGO person.

“They came to us when they wanted to do a big special, and we got to talking about what we could do that felt different from all previous LEGO Star Wars content that has come before, and how can we make something really special.”

That passion carries through to the cast too

And something special really was born in the form of Rebuild the Galaxy, LEGO Star Wars’ What If..? style four-part series. While the show features some twisted takes on iconic characters like Luke Skywalker, Darth Vader, Rey, and Threepio (to name but a few), there are also a few original characters, such as Stig and Dev Greebling, played by Gatan Matarazzo and Tony Revelori.

Both actors are self-confessed LEGO Star Wars fans or, as Tony put it, “a big nerd at heart.”

“I grew up watching these Star Wars movies and getting to give my inner younger child everything he wished he could do as a kid is just great,” he said. “The fact that I have a LEGO set now and I have my own lightsaber as a character, it’s everything I wanted.”

Gaten had a similar Star Wars-filled background that made stepping into the role an easy transition, saying: “Stig’s just a big old Star Wars nerd and that’s exactly what I am, so that helps. I had been doing research for this show without even knowing it for about 15 years.”

Perhaps the most highly anticipated addition to the cast for long-term LEGO Star Wars fans was Jedi Bob, played by Bobby Mohnihan. Once again, Bobby has fond memories of LEGO both as a child and an adult, saying: “I’m a fan of all things Star Wars and LEGO.

“When I was a kid, I didn’t have LEGO sets, I just had a big canvas bag that some neighbour threw away that had five or six sets broken up altogether. I played with with whatever and made my own stuff.”

Now, Bobby has some treasured (and complete) LEGO sets, including 43222 Disney Castle, 21330 Home Alone, and – of course – the LEGO Star Wars Rebuild the Galaxy sets that came out this year. It’s these personal connections to the subject matter that can so clearly be felt when talking to the cast and crew, so much so that Dan and Benji even got the mother of all compliments from none other than Mark Hamill himself.

“One of the things [Mark] said to us was, ‘I read your script and I think you guys really understand Star Wars. That’s part of the reason I really wanted to do this,'” Dan remembered. “That was unbelievable, the greatest compliment that we’ve ever received in our career. For Mark Hamill to tell us that we really know Star Wars, I still can’t believe it.”

Made for the fans, by the fans

The genuine care for the lore and the community can be felt through the fact that Rebuild the Galaxy is not just a silly animated show. There’s certainly silly humour and meme-fuelled humour, but there’s also plenty of heart, something both the cast and showrunners were careful to treat with respect.

“It would have been very easy to just turn this into a whole bunch of different little sketches and jumping between a silly thing with the Ewok bounty hunters and a silly Darth Jar Jar moment,” said Benji. “But it would have gotten old pretty quickly and it was important to us to have a strong Star Wars story with three-dimensional characters at the heart of it. Then everything else, all these gags and funny things, would be in service of the real story.” – Benji Samit”

“For me as a fan, getting to play [Jedi Bob] was the best, and you want to respect it,” Bobby agreed. “You want people to enjoy it. Dan and Benji did an amazing job with bringing this character to life and giving the fans what they deserve, which is a fun, amazing backstory for a silly little joke on the internet.

“I was glad that I got to do it with this character, the fact that it was just a Jedi with a beard and a smile. That’s it.”

All four parts of the upcoming LEGO Star Wars: Rebuild the Galaxy special are available to watch now on Disney+.

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Rachael Davies

I write about all the very best fandoms – and that means LEGO, of course. Spending so much time looking at and talking about LEGO sets is dangerous for my bank balance, but the LEGO shelves are thriving. You win some, you lose some.