It was a template-breaking moment in Star Wars: The Last Jedi when Supreme Leader Snoke was killed off before the film had even reached its climax. When the villain was first introduced in The Force Awakens, many viewers immediately interpreted him as the Sequel Trilogy’s Emperor Palpatine equivalent, making it virtually a given that the character would be sticking around until Star Wars: Episode IX, and ever since Rian Johnson’s divisive feature suggested otherwise, fans have been scrambling for clues of Snoke’s return.
Despite such speculation, it’s looking these days like Andy Serkis’ character is probably out of the game, though the actor himself seems to be having fun toying with his fans over the possibility of coming back, telling Hey U Guys:
“I emailed [director] J.J. [Abrams] and said, ‘Let me know how things are going and how exciting it all is.’ Of course, I’m very keen to see how the family’s getting on. Who knows, Snoke might come back, I’m not saying anything. I’m only making that up. I’m totally just rumor-spreading for the sake of it, but anything can happen.”
This doesn’t sound like the most convincing of teases, but either way, you can bet that the fans will continue to spin their theories right up until the day Abrams’ trilogy-closer arrives.
The fact is that if Serkis were to come back for Episode IX, then he’d be in no position to spill the twist anytime soon, with those notorious non-disclosure agreements keeping the whole cast tight-lipped. We’ve seen this in recent interviews with Adam Driver, who’s dodged questions from journalists about the fate of Kylo Ren and even kept mum on some seemingly innocent subjects for fear of letting something slip.
Mark Hamill, meanwhile, continues to receive queries on next year’s release, and every now and then, and he likes to use the opportunity to troll his fans a little. That being said, Lucasfilm has been very upfront about Luke Skywalker coming back for Star Wars: Episode IX, and we’ll find out if any other deceased figures are slated to return when the film hits theaters on December 20th, 2019.