Gwendoline Christie: Fans won’t be disappointed by Episode VIII
As we get excited for the unveiling of Rogue One, somewhere in Disney’s top secret post-production editing and visual effect bays are prints of year’s top-secret Episode VIII – which completed principal photography all the way back in July and won’t be released until another date that’s far, far away (December 15, 2017).
Entertainment Weekly recently spoke to Gwendoline Christie, who reprises her role as chrome trooper Captain Phasma in the film, and asked if there were any vague teases she could give fans.
“No,” she said.
Please?
“I don’t think anyone’s going to be disappointed,” she added, and then she made this remarkable expression – her eyebrows shot up, her eyes got wide, and she clamped her lips shut as she smiled, as if thinking about some intensely exciting secrets she’s just bursting to reveal … but absolutely positively will not.
One big question, of course, has been if/when her character will remove her helmet so we can get a look at the real Phasma – though Christie has also defended Episode VII’s choice to keep her appearance mysterious. “I thought it was a really interesting opportunity to play a female character where we formed an opinion of her based on her actions rather than the way she has been made flesh,” Christie told us. “And that concept within a Star Wars movie, a mainstream phenomenon, was very modern and interesting and exciting. I made no secret of the fact I wanted to be in the film, I campaigned hard to be in the film. But to be in it as that kind of character – she’s a woman, she’s in armor, the armor isn’t sexualized, and in the film we don’t see the actor’s face – I thought that was an exciting, modern concept.”
Before Episode VIII comes out, however, Christie will be back in HBO’s Game of Thrones, which returns for its seventh season next summer.