Carrie Fisher didn’t just attend press tours for The Force Awakens. She consumed them. She lit up every room, leaving a trail of wit and warmth that journalists and fans alike couldn’t get enough of. We documented it. We wrote about it. We anticipated her next move with genuine excitement.
Then December 2016 happened.
Her death left a vacuum during the The Last Jedi press cycle. An empty chair at the international press conference. A silence where her laughter usually lived. But her castmates refused to let that space remain just empty. They filled it with memory. With reverence. With the kind of talk that turns a standard PR event into a tribute.
Anthony Breznican from Entertainment Weekly opened the floor by addressing the elephant in the room. He joked about her spirit giving everyone the finger from above. A classic Fisher. But his question was serious. He asked the women in the film about Princess Leia’s impact on young girls. Specifically, how significant it was for them to have a character who defied the homogenized view of womanhood in the original trilogy.
Gwendoline Christie, who plays the terrifying Captain Phasma, didn’t hesitate. She talked about being six years old. Watching A New Hope. Seeing Leia and thinking she was different.
“She’s really interesting. She’s really smart. She’s really funny,” Christie said.
It wasn’t just about being cool. It was about autonomy. Christie noted that Leia didn’t care what people thought. She wasn’t prepared to be told what to do. For someone who didn’t fit into traditional boxes of femininity, that was huge. It was inspiration. It proved you could be successful without making a terrible compromise. Without giving yourself over to someone else’s script.
Laura Dern, who steps into the role of Vice Admiral Amilyn Holdo, focused on Fisher’s lack of shame. It wasn’t just the acting. It was the sharing. Fisher shared her story. Her pain. Her chaos. And she expected nothing less from everyone around her.
Dern described watching Rian Johnson capture that grace in a “pure performance.” But she also saw the friction. The “irreverent subservience.” The dance between Fisher and her character. It moved her. It’s rare to see an actor so fully inhabited by their role while simultaneously fighting against it.
Kelly Marie Tran, who plays Rose Tico, brought it back to personal courage. She admitted she didn’t realize how hard it was to be truly yourself on a public platform until recently. Fisher was unapologetic. Open. Tran is trying to do the same. It’s hard. Really hard.
Then there’s Oscar Isaac. He was the one who worked closest to Fisher during The Last Jedi. They’d dance during downtime. Actual, real dancing. But his take on her importance was more structural.
“For me, the most formative people in my life have been women,” Isaac said.
That shaped his destiny. And seeing that reflected in the films? It’s beautiful. It’s true to life. Women shape you. They always have. The films finally caught up to that reality.
Now Fisher is gone. Her work on The Last Jedi was completed before she died. The studio hasn’t confirmed how Leia’s storyline will be handled in the yet-to-be-titled ninth installment. Shooting starts soon. The answers are still buried.
But there is a small, strange piece of her that made it onto the screen.
Rian Johnson created Space Gary. Carrie Fisher’s dog. He appears in the Canto Bight sequence. A tiny, furry ghost in the background. A nod to the woman who made Star Wars feel less like a sci-fi epic and more like a family drama with lightsabers.
Did you ever wonder how much of an actor’s personality bleeds into the final cut? It’s usually subtle. Usually invisible. But in Fisher’s case, it’s everywhere. Even in the dog.
