It’s sometimes tough to tell when Mark Hamill is just having fun with the fans or giving away potential spoilers.
Considering the lengths the people making the Star Wars movies go to in the name of secrecy, you wouldn’t expect one of the franchise’s major stars to drop random spoilers into interviews concerning the fates of their characters.
And yet that’s exactly what Mark Hamill has done. Maybe.
As Movie Pilot explains, Hamill was part of an event to celebrate The Kinks this weekend in London. When asked what was coming up for him, he said the following:
"I finish Episode VIII, and then I’m out of work."
Clearly, at least part of that was a joke. Hamill is as in demand as ever for his voice work in animated series and video games — he’s definitely playing the Joker again in the upcoming Justice League Action series — and he’s got a recurring role as the villainous Trickster on The Flash.
He could also have been having some fun in a more broad sense, as in, “I guess we’ll see if this Episode VIII flick leads to anything.” But what if he wasn’t joking?
There’s at least a chance that Luke Skywalker isn’t going to survive through Episode VIII, and that qualifies as major Star Wars news. It seems unlikely someone as experienced as Mark Hamill would let something like that slip, unless it’s one of those sly, “I told you exactly what was going to happen” deals.
Luke famously had zero spoken lines in Star Wars: The Force Awakens. We’re assuming that he has more to say and do in Episode VIII, probably right from the start of the film. But if this is the last time we see Luke Skywalker … well, don’t say Hamill didn’t warn us ahead of time.