ILM's Hal Hickel Explains How 'The Mandalorian and Grogu' Brought Stop-Motion Back to Star Wars

Industrial Light & Magic animation supervisor Hal Hickel guided every visual-effects choice on Jon Favreau's "The Mandalorian and Grogu" with a deceptively simple question: "What would Phil do?" The Phil in question is stop-motion pioneer Phil Tippett, whose work on the original "Star Wars" trilogy shaped everything from lumbering AT-AT walkers to hand-animated giant droids. Hickel, who just marked 30 years at ILM, laid out the process at View Conference in Turin on Thursday.

The film mixes digital animation with physical sets, mechanical rigs and traditional stop-motion. Hickel also revealed he returned to Tippett's Berkeley stage to animate a shot himself.

How did the team rebuild the AT-AT battle?

For the movie's opening walker assault, Hickel revived animation tests originally developed for "Rogue One." Those earlier tests inserted computer-generated walkers into footage from the original trilogy to study its lighting, textures and stop-motion feel.

The new walkers moved even more slowly than before, emphasizing their enormous weight. A full-sized interior set extended through a walker's neck into its movable head. An exchange of gunfire between characters riding on two walkers was filmed but ultimately cut.

What did it take to make Rotta the Hutt likable?

Rotta, voiced by Jeremy Allen White, demanded a bigger departure from familiar "Star Wars" imagery. Instead of Jabba's sedentary bulk, Rotta needed to move like a powerful fighter while staying sympathetic. Legacy Effects built full-size physical references. ILM developed a digital muscle system and studied the movements of elephant seals and sumo wrestlers.

After shooting, though, Favreau worried the original design looked too much like "Battletoads." "He just didn't feel Hutt-y enough," Hickel said. "And he didn't feel like his father's son." The team revised Rotta's face and coloring to bring him closer to Jabba while refining his muscular build. "We want you to like him, care about him, root for him," Hickel explained.

Rotta also had the second-largest amount of dialogue after Mando. That volume prompted a decision: he speaks English rather than forcing younger viewers to read extensive subtitles.

The characterization even included an homage to Hayao Miyazaki's "My Neighbor Totoro." Dave Filoni drew Grogu asleep on Rotta's chest during a production meeting. "That's a 'Totoro' moment, for sure," Hickel confirmed.

Why did Favreau want 'less James Bond, more Jackass'?

The smaller AT-RT walker presented its own challenge. Animators studied ostriches, then fed those digital movement curves into a six-axis mechanical rig carrying the performers. Initial tests shook the contraption so violently that Hickel joked, "Poor Grogu. He was not going to survive."

Favreau wanted the vehicle bouncy, but not too fast or implausibly smooth. His broader direction for Mando's action, Hickel recalled, was "less James Bond, more Jackass" — perilous escapes that appear perpetually on the edge of disaster.

What happened on Tippett's stage?

One sequence turned the holographic chess monsters from the 1977 "Star Wars" into full-sized combatants. Tippett and fellow animator Jon Berg had originally created the miniature figures under intense deadline pressure. ILM preserved their recognizable silhouettes while inventing more realistic anatomy, movement and fighting styles. Second-unit director Peter Ramsey worked alongside stunt performers, and some creature interactions relied on surprisingly simple physical stand-ins. "Low tech. Sometimes it's the best tech," Hickel quipped.

The most direct tribute to Tippett came in the battle against two giant droids guarding an overlord's chamber. "We did an actual stop-motion sequence in this film at Tippett Studios," Hickel said. Working with Tippett's animators, Favreau and the editors, he expanded a few script sentences into a complicated fight. "The action math on this was surprisingly complicated," he admitted. "It kind of bent my brain at times." Tippett's team animated physical puppets; ILM handled compositing plus digital fire, smoke and explosions.

Hickel also found himself back behind the camera, moving a puppet frame by frame. "They made me take a shot myself," he recalled. "I was reluctant, but I did it."

The experience now carries extra weight: Tippett Studio has left its longtime Berkeley facility, though the company continues operating elsewhere. "Sitting on the Tippett stage, which we all know now is no more, doing stop-motion on a 'Star Wars' film will probably be forever the pinnacle of my career," Hickel said. "And I don't mean that lightly."

What does this change for visual-effects craft? It shows a franchise built on digital scale deliberately reaching back to hands-on techniques — and suggests the hybrid of puppets, rigs and pixels may outlast any single method.