STAR WARS EPISODE VIII Might Have itself a Villain

Unfortunately we don’t know which villain, but we do know the name of an actor who may potentially end up playing said villain. That’s exciting too, right? RIGHT?!

You’ve probably guessed by now thanks to the image that I’m talking about the Collector from Guardians of the Galaxy – or, more specifically the actor behind the crazy get-up, Benicio del Toro. The Wrap is reporting that Disney and LucasFilm are looking at the guy to play the main villain in Star Wars Episode VIII, in a somewhat surprising turn of events. I say this because we have a villain for the new trilogy – two, in fact. Adam Driver is playing the main villain in The Force Awakens, Kylo Ren (the guy with the crossguard lightsaber), and Andy Serkis is playing Supreme Leader Snoke, a motion-capture character, but we really know nothing about him other than he could be the leader of the First Order, although I’m just basing that off of his title.

It’s still early days but apparently execs are super-hot for del Toro right now – who wouldn’t be? Variety brings the report further by cementing that Disney must be searching for a really, really good actor, as they have also met with friggin’ Joaquin Phoenix for the role. There’s no way he’ll do it but the prospect alone is exciting.

The interesting thing is, the site notes that he isn’t just a villain in the movie but rather the villain. Does Kylo Ren die in the first movie? I doubt it, and I wouldn’t be surprised if both he and Snoke still played important roles in the sequels but del Toro’s character will simply be joining him for the ride. After all, we do have two more villains in The Force Awakens (Domnhall Gleeson’s General Hux and Gwendoline Christie’s Captain Phasma) so it isn’t too far-fetched to imagine that there will be more villains to come. It does, though, raise a ton of questions about who he’s playing and where he fits in. A Sith? A First Order official? Some evil alien? The guy is such a versatile and great actor that he could play any number of roles, and I think he would fit in well in a galaxy far, far away.

Star Wars Episode VIII is being written and directed by Rian Johnson and it’s out May 26th, 2017.