Of the many, many pop culture references contained within Phil Lord and Chris Miller's The LEGO Movie - from DC Comics to Harry Potter -perhaps the greatest is the quick appearance by Star Wars' Millennium Falcon and the likes of Han Solo, Lando Calrissian and C-3PO. What you may not know, however, is that early drafts of the movie actually had one of George Lucas' greatest creations as one of the lead characters.
While talking with Yahoo! UK, Phil Lord and Chris Miller revealed that early drafts of the LEGO Movie script actually featured none other than R2-D2 as one of the lead characters. While the filmmakers didn't reveal exactly what the little droids part would have been within the larger plot, they did confirm that he would have been a "Batman-level character" - which is to say that he would have been one of the most important figures (alongside Emmet, Wyldstyle and Vitruvius). The filmmakers believed that they could easily use R2 in the movie due to the fact that he doesn't actually speak - instead using a series of beeps and whistles - but ultimately the idea was shut down due to rights issues.
It does sound like this was the inevitable end to this story, as Warner Bros. doesn't really have any interest in further promoting Star Wars as long as Lucasfilm belongs to the Walt Disney Company - but that wasn't really something that the LEGO Movie writers were thinking about as they were putting together the script. Said Miller, "A kid doesn’t have lawyers that won’t allow the toys to play together." Still, the fact that Star Wars characters show up in The LEGO Movie at all feels like a big cross-studio win, and that was something that the filmmakers were definitely going for. Citing Who Framed Roger Rabbit as an influence on a certain level, Miller added, "Watching my own son play, he does put Batman on the Millennium Falcon and there’s no-one saying they take place in completely different times and galaxies."
With The LEGO Movie 2 now in the works, this news also has us wondering how the sequel can take the cameo game to an even higher level. Obviously they'll likely stick to the existing realm of LEGO sets, which offers up hundreds of possibilities, but given the success of negotiating the Star Wars appearances, what are the chances that we could wind up seeing something Marvel related? It might be a step too far given that Warner Bros. owns the rights to the DC Comics characters, which are in direct competition, but that's not going to stop us from crossing our fingers.
Do you think The LEGO Movie could have been even better with R2-D2 included in it? Tell us what you think in the comments below.
