Footage from Star Wars: A New Hope was used in Pedro Pascal’s The Mandalorian on Disney Plus.
In an effort to save some of the budget for bigger moments in Pedro Pascal’s The Mandalorian, the filmmakers used footage from Star Wars: A New Hope to create one of the locations that the bounty hunter travels to in the Disney Plus series. In an interview with ICG Magazine, VFX supervisor Richard Bluff explained that instead of spending part of the budget on creature effects for a simple background shot in Pedro Pascal’s The Mandalorian, Industrial Light and Magic just repurposed footage from Star Wars: a New Hope instead.
“For example, there’s a scene in episode five when Mando sees two Banthas off in the distance. I was adamant we shouldn’t build a fully animated and rigged furry Bantha for just two shots and suggested we pull out the plates from A New Hope’s dailies. I knew I could come up with a shot design to leverage the Banthas from that,”
Another moment taken from Star Wars: A New Hope in Pedro Pascal’s The Mandalorian is when the bounty hunter flies towards Tattooine. Richard Bluff explained that the shot used the original painting by Ralph McQuarrie to build the footage on. The VFX supervisor went on to reveal that a photographer visited the exact spot that George Lucas shot Mos Eisley from during A New Hope in order to gain a high-res quality for the shot.
“When Mando flies toward Tatooine, we are actually seeing the [Ralph McQuarrie] matte painting seen early in the original film. We reused another painting of Mos Eisley for a fly-in; in that case, I sent a photographer out to the exact spot George [Lucas] shot his original plate, capturing high-res elements so we could up-res as necessary.”
Did you notice the Star Wars: A New Hope footage in Pedro Pascal’s The Mandalorian? Sound off in the comments below!
Here is the official synopsis for The Mandalorian:
After the stories of Jango and Boba Fett, another warrior emerges in the Star Wars universe. The Mandalorian is set after the fall of the Empire and before the emergence of the First Order. We follow the travails of a lone gunfighter in the outer reaches of the galaxy far from the authority of the New Republic.
The Mandalorian stars Pedro Pascal, Gina Carano, Giancarlo Esposito, Emily Swallow, Carl Weathers, Omid Abtahi, Werner Herzog, and Nick Nolte. The Star Wars series was written by Jon Favreau, who also serves as an executive producer alongside Dave Filoni, Kathleen Kennedy, and Colin Wilson. Karen Gilchrist is also on board as a co-executive producer.
Dave Filoni will direct the first episode of The Mandalorian and additional episodes will be helmed by Thor: Ragnarok director Taika Waititi, Jurassic World star Bryce Dallas Howard, Dope director Rick Famuyiwa, and Jessica Jones director Deborah Chow.
The Mandalorian is now available exclusively on Disney Plus.
Source: ICG Magazine
