Star Wars creator George Lucas finally ends decades-old mystery

Solved a mystery, George Lucas has.

The 80-year-old Star Wars creator spoke at the 45th anniversary screening of The Empire Strikes Back at the 2025 TCM Classic Film Festival recently and explained why Yoda talks backwards in the films.

“Because if you speak regular English, people won’t listen that much,” Lucas said, according to Variety magazine. “But if he had an accent, or it’s really hard to understand what he’s saying, they focus on what he’s saying.”

“He was basically the philosopher* of the movie,” the filmmaker continued, reports The New York Post. “I had to figure out a way to get people to actually listen — especially 12-year-olds.”

Yoda is first introduced in the 1980 blockbuster The Empire Strikes Back, voiced by puppeteer* and actor Frank Oz. He returns in 1983’s Return of the Jedi, all three movies in the prequel* trilogy* of The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith, as well as 2017’s The Last Jedi.

Oz, now 80, told The Guardian in 2021 about how he originally brought the Jedi master character to life.

“I was just looking at the original script of The Empire Strikes Back the other day and there was a bit of that odd syntax* in it, but also it had Yoda speaking very colloquially*. So I said to George, ‘Can I do the whole thing like this?’ And he said, ‘Sure!’

“It just felt so right,” Oz said.

When asked if he gets tired of Yoda imitations, Oz said, “No, I’m used to it. But people don’t understand. Anyone can do a voice. It’s not the voice – it’s the soul.”

In 2018, Oz spoke to online publication Collider about the reaction on the set of The Last Jedi to him playing Yoda again.

“Well, I didn’t pay attention because I am very, very focused. I have to get the best job I can possibly get – that’s all I care about, is the quality,” he said. “But my wife was there, and she said – I guess this is true – but she said everybody was working and then when I came on the screen, everybody completely stopped working.”

“That’s kind of exciting,” Oz said, “but I didn’t notice it because I’m too involved. But that’s a wonderful feeling, I guess. If I felt it.”

A Star Wars movie hasn’t come out since 2019’s The Rise of Skywalker. But it was announced at Star Wars Celebration in Japan last week that Shawn Levy is directing Star Wars: Starfighter, starring Ryan Gosling.

The upcoming film is set five years after the events of Rise of Skywalker. It comes out in theatres on May 28, 2027.

This article originally appeared in The New York Post and was reproduced with permission.

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GLOSSARY

• philosopher: someone who studies or writes about the meaning of life
• puppeteer: person who gives shows or entertains others using puppets
• prequel: a film, book, or play that develops a previously told story by telling you what happened before the events of that story
• trilogy: series of three stories told in drama (film, plays, shows), books or even musical compositions
• syntax: how words are arranged into sentences
• colloquially: speaking conversationally, informally

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QUICK QUIZ

1. Who voices Yoda in the Star Wars films?
2. In which film of what year does the Yoda character first appear?
3. Which movies make up the prequel trilogy?
4. What is the name of the most recent film to feature Yoda?
5. Who created the Star Wars film franchise?

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CLASSROOM ACTIVITIES
1. Voiceovers
Work with a partner and make a list of some of the most famous “voices” you know from TV shows and films. List what it is that makes each voice so memorable or suitable for a particular character, like Yoda.

Time: allow 10 minutes to complete this activity
Curriculum Links: English, Personal and Social, Critical and Creative Thinking

2. Extension
As a class, watch the following video nominating the top 20 “over the top” acting voiceovers of all time. Just do top 10 or five if time doesn’t allow. Ask students to vote on their favourite, justifying their choice.

youtube.com/watch?v=WsQWUA2KZYw

Time: allow 15 minutes to complete this activity
Curriculum Links: English, Personal and Social, Critical and Creative Thinking

VCOP ACTIVITY
Stretch your sentence
Think about the character of Yoda and everything you know about him.

Add three adjectives to describe them better.

Now add a verb to your list. What are they doing?

Add an adverb about how they are doing the action.

Using all the words listed, create one descriptive sentence.