Luke Skywalker’s Notorious Milk Bottle Was CGI, Apparently

One of the most memorable parts of Star Wars: The Last Jedi involves not lightsabers or space battles, but simply Luke Skywalker milking a grotesque sea creature and guzzling the eerily green yield as if he were auditioning for a Gatorade commercial. While some fans clearly hated this moment, arguably the scene is an important one, underscoring Luke’s metaphorical regression from Jedi Knight back to his colored-milk-filled adolescence. Or it's just a fun scene with a freaky alien. Either way.

Amazingly though, as we have now learned from visual effects artist Andrew Hodgson on Twitter, the scene utilized some movie magic most of us likely didn’t even notice. It turns out that Luke’s trusty reusable bottle was entirely CGI -- meaning that it will probably be replaced with a new and enhanced milk bottle for the eventual Special Edition.

Which is especially funny considering that director Rian Johnson was insistent that the “Thala-siren” itself be a practical effect, rather than a computer-generated one. Which wasn’t exactly easy since it required wrapping a puppet the size of a refrigerator in what looks like a giant black garbage bag and helicoptering it to a remote island off the coast of Ireland.

Why would they use computer technology to fabricate a simple bottle when the production literally airlifted a rubber monster to the set purely for the sake of realism? According to a response from Lucasfilm’s Phil Szostak, the CGI bottle did replace an “existing physical one,” which was probably changed either because of how the original bottle looked, “or the way it was performed.” Sure enough, in the behind-the-scenes footage, you can plainly see that not only is the bottle different, that milk hits its target with all the accuracy of a toddler learning to use the toilet for the first time.

So thanks to digital wizardry, Luke didn’t have to spend the remainder of the film stinking up the joint in milk-stained pants. 

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Top Image: Lucasfilm