Yoda

• 1. Introduction

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  Yoda, the small green Jedi Master of the Star Wars films, dies at the age of 900. That is not the end of his story. His voice returns decades later, and he keeps turning up in new tales. He is tiny and elderly, and he arranges his words in an unusual order. He does not look like a hero at all. Yet audiences have loved him for more than forty years. Where did such an odd character come from? How do filmmakers build a wise alien out of puppetry and, later, computer graphics? And why does a mentor introduced for a single sequel keep returning?

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• 2. Origins of a Mentor

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  George Lucas had planned for Obi-Wan Kenobi to keep training Luke Skywalker in the sequel to the 1977 film Star Wars. Then Lucas decided that Obi-Wan would die in that first film. The sequel needed a new teacher. The first version of that teacher was a diminutive, frog-like creature called "Minch Yoda".

  The final name came from an image in Lucas's mind. He pictured the character as a "little Dalai Lama" and wanted an "Eastern-sounding" name for him.

  Lawrence Kasdan, one of the screenwriters on The Empire Strikes Back, said Yoda was based on Shimada. Shimada is the lead samurai in Akira Kurosawa's 1954 film Seven Samurai. Lucas gave the design a purpose as well. It was meant to teach Luke "to respect everybody and pay attention to the poorest person". He also wanted Yoda to be the "exact opposite" of what audiences would expect.

  Joe Johnston, the film's visual effects art director, sketched hundreds of different versions. The design Lucas chose was, in Johnston's words, a mix of a leprechaun, a troll and a gnome. The speech pattern came from a separate instinct. Lucas felt Yoda needed a manner of speaking more dramatic than an accent, so he reversed the character's word order. Turning those sketches into a living creature fell to a puppet team that included Stuart Freeborn and Wendy Froud.

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• 3. Puppet to Pixels

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  The crew on The Empire Strikes Back weighed several ways to bring Yoda to life. They considered stop-motion animation. They also considered putting a monkey, a child or a dwarf in a costume. In the end they chose a sophisticated puppet, built by Stuart Freeborn and Wendy Froud.

  Freeborn modeled the puppet's face on his own features and on those of Albert Einstein. He hoped the Einstein resemblance would make Yoda look intelligent.

  Lucas first asked Jim Henson, the creator of the Muppets, to perform the role. Henson was busy with another project. He recommended Frank Oz instead.

  Oz slid his hand inside the puppet's head to move the mouth and brow. Kathryn Mullen, Wendy Froud and David Barclay handled the eyes, ears and other body parts. They used cables, strings, hydraulics and electronic mechanisms. A separate radio-controlled puppet appeared whenever the Jedi Master rides on Luke's back. Lucas had first meant to hire a different actor for the voice. He changed his mind and decided Oz was the best performer for it.

  When The Phantom Menace arrived in 1999, a new puppet played Yoda in all but two shots. Those two wide shots used computer-generated imagery. The puppet was later replaced by a digital Yoda in the 2011 Blu-ray release and the 2012 theatrical 3D release.

  In Attack of the Clones in 2002 and Revenge of the Sith in 2005, Yoda is entirely computer-generated. The digital version can do what a puppet cannot, such as fight with a lightsaber. Revenge of the Sith also shows his face in several close-ups, which demanded especially detailed digital work.

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• 4. Critical Reception

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  Vincent Canby of The New York Times called Yoda "delightful" and "the hit of the movie" when he debuted in 1980. Canby added that the character succeeded only when used sparingly.

  Joy Gould Boyum of The Wall Street Journal praised the "exquisitely constructed" puppet. She said Oz "so finely put together the character... as to make us wonder continually if he isn't real." Arthur Knight of The Hollywood Reporter and Gary Arnold of The Washington Post also found Yoda strikingly lifelike. Arnold compared his face to that of a human actor.

  Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune named Yoda the highlight of the film. People magazine called him a pivotal character. Roger Ebert reviewed the 1997 re-release of The Empire Strikes Back and praised the range of emotions Yoda conveys. He said the acting might be the best in the whole film.

  Brandon Katz of Observer has called Yoda an icon of cinema. Empire magazine ranked him the "most beloved" character in the franchise after the droids C-3PO and R2-D2.

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• 5. The Swamp Teacher

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  On the swamp planet Dagobah, Luke Skywalker goes looking for a powerful Jedi Master in The Empire Strikes Back. A Force spirit has urged him to go. Yoda lives there alone. He does not tell Luke who he is and instead tests the young man's patience by provoking him. Luke is stunned to learn that this small, eccentric creature is the Master he came to find.

  Yoda judges Luke impatient and undisciplined and hesitates to teach him. He agrees only after talking with Obi-Wan. Luke then leaves Dagobah before his training is finished, hoping to confront Darth Vader and help his friends in Cloud City. Yoda and Obi-Wan warn that he is not ready. When Obi-Wan laments that Luke is their "last hope", Yoda answers that "there is another".

  In Return of the Jedi in 1983, Yoda is sick and frail. He tells Luke that the training is complete. Luke will not be a Jedi, though, until he confronts Darth Vader. Yoda confirms what Vader had claimed in the previous film, that Vader is Luke's father. Yoda then dies peacefully, his body vanishing as he becomes "one with the Force". His last words leave Luke with the knowledge that "there is another Skywalker." Obi-Wan's spirit later helps Luke realize the other is his twin sister, Princess Leia.

  In the film's final scene, Yoda's spirit appears on Endor beside the spirits of Obi-Wan and Anakin Skywalker.

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• 6. Master of the Council

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  Thirty-five years before The Empire Strikes Back, the prequel trilogy shows a younger Yoda who leads the Jedi High Council. In The Phantom Menace in 1999, Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn brings the young Anakin Skywalker before that Council. Qui-Gon believes the boy is the "Chosen One" of prophecy, destined to bring balance to the Force. He asks that Anakin be trained.

  Yoda senses deep fear in the boy, especially around his attachment to his mother, Shmi. He foresees "grave danger" in training him. The Council, led by Mace Windu, rejects the request. Qui-Gon is then mortally wounded in a duel with the Sith Lord Darth Maul. His dying wish is that his apprentice Obi-Wan Kenobi train Anakin. Obi-Wan tells Yoda he will do it even without approval, and Yoda reluctantly gives his blessing.

  Attack of the Clones in 2002 is set a decade later. Yoda is now Master of the High Council and also holds the position of Grandmaster. He and other Jedi worry about the Confederacy of Independent Systems, a secessionist movement that wants to leave the Galactic Republic. After the first attempt on Senator Padmé Amidala's life, Chancellor Palpatine suggests that Obi-Wan protect her. At the climax, Yoda rescues Obi-Wan and Anakin from the Separatists. He also defeats his former apprentice, Count Dooku, in a lightsaber duel.

  When the Clone Wars break out, Yoda becomes a general in the Republic's army and commands several legions of clone troopers.

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• 7. Order 66

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  In Revenge of the Sith in 2005, the Jedi Council is hunting a mysterious Sith Lord called Darth Sidious. Chancellor Palpatine has gathered near-dictatorial emergency powers and begins meddling in Jedi affairs. The Council tells Anakin to spy on Palpatine, whom Anakin regards as a friend and mentor.

  Anakin brings Yoda a troubling problem. He has visions that someone close to him will die. Yoda does not know the vision concerns Padmé. He advises Anakin to train himself to let go of everything he fears to lose. Unsatisfied, Anakin turns to Palpatine, who reveals himself as Darth Sidious. Sidious manipulates Anakin into becoming his apprentice by suggesting that the dark side of the Force can save Padmé.

  Sidious then turns the Republic into the Galactic Empire and names himself emperor. He orders the clone troopers to kill their Jedi generals. Through the Force, Yoda feels each Jedi die as the troops betray them. He kills the clones sent to assassinate him and escapes with the Wookiee leaders Tarfful and Chewbacca. Back on Coruscant, he and Obi-Wan fight into the Jedi Temple. Every Jedi inside has been slaughtered, children included.

  A recording shows that Anakin, now called Darth Vader, was the killer. Yoda decides to face Sidious himself and sends Obi-Wan to kill Vader. When Obi-Wan protests, Yoda tells him the Anakin he knew no longer exists. Yoda and Sidious duel in the Senate. Neither can win, and Yoda has to retreat.

  After Padmé dies in childbirth, Yoda recommends hiding her twin infants, Luke and Leia, from Vader and Sidious. He sends Leia to Alderaan and Luke to Tatooine. In the film's final moments, Yoda is revealed to be studying the secret of immortality under Qui-Gon's spirit and passing it on to Obi-Wan.

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• 8. Afterlives and Spin-Offs

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  Thirty years after Yoda's death, The Force Awakens in 2015 brings his voice back. The scavenger Rey has a Force vision and finds Luke's lightsaber, and she hears Yoda speak. Oz plays the role again in all three sequel films, as both puppeteer and voice.

  In The Last Jedi in 2017, Yoda appears to an older Luke as a Force spirit. Luke is considering burning a tree that stores sacred Jedi texts. Yoda reminds him that a Jedi must always be sure of his path. When Luke chooses to burn it, Yoda calls down a lightning bolt and sets the tree ablaze. Luke is suddenly alarmed about the lost texts. Yoda assures him they held no knowledge that Rey does not already have. Yoda's voice is heard again in The Rise of Skywalker in 2019, among the deceased Jedi who speak to Rey as she fights the resurrected Darth Sidious.

  The 2008 animated film The Clone Wars and its television series star Tom Kane as Yoda's voice. In the film, Yoda assigns Anakin an apprentice, Ahsoka Tano, believing the duty will help Anakin grow and mature. In season five, Ahsoka is framed for a crime she did not commit, and Yoda and the Council hand her over to the Republic military. Anakin exposes the real culprit, the fallen Jedi Barriss Offee, before a verdict is read. Yoda, Anakin and the Council invite Ahsoka back into the Order, but she refuses.

  Season six sends Yoda to Dagobah after he hears the voice of the deceased Qui-Gon Jinn. Spirit priestesses test him, including with an illusion of the ancient Sith Lord Darth Bane. His final test is to resist Sidious and Dooku, who try to pull him to the dark side. The struggle turns out to be a vision, and the priestesses say his training will resume in time.

  Star Wars Rebels, which ran from 2014 to 2018, brings Yoda into the episode "Path of the Jedi". There he speaks telepathically with the apprentice Ezra Bridger and his master Kanan Jarrus. In "Shroud of Darkness", he appears to Ezra in a vision. In two episodes of Tales of the Jedi in 2022, Yoda has no dialogue. He attends the funeral of Jedi Master Katri and watches Ahsoka train.

  After The Walt Disney Company acquired Lucasfilm in 2012, most licensed Star Wars novels and comics from 1977 to 2014 were rebranded as Star Wars Legends and declared non-canon. In the 2004 Legends novel Yoda: Dark Rendezvous by Sean Stewart, Yoda sends an impersonator of himself to negotiate a treaty with Dooku. A Legends animated series called Clone Wars aired on Cartoon Network from 2003 to 2005, with Tom Kane again voicing him. Its finale shows Yoda and Mace Windu defending Coruscant from the Separatists. They realize too late that the attack was a distraction while General Grievous kidnapped Palpatine. That series was removed from the official canon in 2014.

  Outside the films, John Lithgow voices Yoda in radio dramatizations of The Empire Strikes Back in 1983 and Return of the Jedi in 1996. Yoda also features in the audio drama Dooku: Jedi Lost and the novel Master and Apprentice, both from 2019. In 2012 he starred in a series of Vodafone commercials broadcast in the United Kingdom. He makes a non-speaking cameo in the final episode of The Acolyte in 2024, and he appears in the children's series Young Jedi Adventures, which began in 2023 and is still running.

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