Admiral Raddus is a Mon Cal Winston Churchill
A pessimist sees the trap in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every trap.
Last week, we talked about the parallels between Robert Oppenheimer and Jyn Erso's dad, Galen.
Now, it turns out Oppenheimer isn't the only wartime figure who's had an influence on Rogue One — our newest Mon Calamari hero, Admiral Raddus, is inspired by Winston Churchill, the British Prime Minister from 1940 to 1945 (and again from 1951 to 1955).
“We always tried to find a real world example of who these creatures may be, and in this case we used Churchill,” creature effects supervisor Neal Scanlan told Entertainment Weekly.
“Admiral Raddus is a very strong figure. We would use [Churchill] not only as visual reference for his physical features, but also when it came to performing him and expressing him through the actor.”
Scanlan also told Entertainment Weekly that aliens in the background of Rogue One have been modelled on famous faces like Bela Lugosi, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Ernest Borgnine, Lee Van Cleef and Peter Lorre.
It makes sense that Churchill would be used as an influence for Raddus — Churchill was seen as a strong wartime leader, and his stern countenance definitely seems to be reflected in his Mon Calamari counterpart.
Funnily enough, Churchill has recently been portrayed by two actors with ties to the Star Wars universe.
John Lithgow, who provided the voice of Yoda in the NPR radio dramatisations of The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi written by Brian Daley, played Churchill in the Netflix series, The Crown.
Gary Oldman, who was cast as the voice of General Grievous in Revenge of the Sith before he was forced to drop out in solidarity with the Screen Actors Guild, has completely transformed himself to play Churchill in the upcoming drama, Darkest Hour.
While Lithgow put in a great performance and Oldman will probably be an Oscar contender, there's only one Churchill facsimile we want to buy an action figure of, and that's Admiral Raddus.
At the very least, we know there's one thing Churchill and Raddus definitely have in common — a belief that all the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word.
Freedom.
Justice.
Honor.
Duty.
Mercy.
Hope.
Force Material is a podcast exploring the secrets and source material of Star Wars with hosts Rohan Williams and Baz McAlister. Listen and subscribe on iTunes, Spotify, iHeartRadio, TuneIn, Stitcher, PlayerFM and Castro; stay in touch with us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram; and support the show by browsing our range of shirts, hoodies, kids apparel, mugs and more at TeePublic.
