L’adorable look aux oreilles larges de Baby Yoda a été « sans vergogne » et « complètement volé » à Gremlinsdit Joe Dante, réalisateur de la comédie d’horreur phare de 1984 et de sa première suite.
Dante a fait l’observation pas si bouleversante à propos de Le Mandalorienla mascotte qui vole la scène lors d’une interview avec le Chronique de San Franciscoavant la projection spéciale Golden City de ce week-end des deux premiers Gremlins films, au Théâtre Castro.
« Je pense que la longévité de [the Gremlins films) is really key to this one character (Gizmo), who is essentially like a baby,” Dante said. “Which brings me, of course, to the subject of Baby Yoda, who is completely stolen and is just out-and-out copied. Shamelessly, I would think.”
Of course, The Empire Strikes Back‘s OG (and less-cutesy) Yoda predated the first Gremlins movie … which was loosely based on a 1940s Roald Dahl book that featured quite dissimilar-looking creatures.
Baby Yoda aka The Child aka Grogu was quite famously the big surprise coming out of the very first episode of The Mandalorian, Disney+’s first live-action Star Wars series, instantly becoming a pop culture sensation while launching 1,000 memes.
Early concept art for the character showed that it almost was much, much uglier. And though Baby Yoda wound up sufficiently cuddly, TV franchise boss Jon Favreau was wary of Mando’s sidekick being too cute.
“I was worried about what we called ‘Bleep Syndrome,’” Favreau said in May 2020, referring to the sidekick from Josie and the Pussycats in Outer Space, an animated 1970s series. “We wanted to make sure the Child wasn’t just going to be a comic relief.”
“Even with the merchandising, they were always trying to soften the rough edges on him,” Favreau recalled. But he and fellow exec producer Dave Filoni “really tried to look at how much we could ugly up all the different individual features,” including the “weird little hairs growing out of him.”
Who gets your vote for cutest critter of unusual origin?