What These Star Wars Movie Aliens Look Like Without Makeup

Star Wars has given us more inventive aliens than just about any other franchise out there. This is especially true, of course, because each and every character in the galaxy far, far away are technically aliens, since they aren't from our Earth. Still, labeling someone like Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) as an alien feels like cheating, doesn't it? Further, officially, they are "human," just, well, alien humans. Regardless, it's far more interesting to look at some of the seriously strange-looking Star Wars characters out there and find out what they look like without makeup. So, let's do that.

First, some ground rules: We're limiting our entries to characters who look truly "alien" instead of human-passing races who aren't wearing any more makeup than the average talk show guest. We're also disqualifying armored cultures whose faces are revealed at some point of the story. This means that folks like Jango Fett and his clone-son Boba are out, since they canonically look like their actor, Temuera Morrison. Finally, we're limiting this to movie characters, because, let's face it, we'd be here all week. With all that out of the way, let's go!

"Star Wars: Return of the Jedi" introduced us to Ewoks — the furry, primitive critters who live on the forest moon of Endor and are strangely great at fighting the Empire. The most prominent among them is Wicket Wystri Warrick, who befriends Leia Organa (Carrie Fisher) after some hesitation, becoming a handy ally for the Rebel Alliance.

Wicket's actor is completely obscured by the furry suit, but he's someone who today's audiences know very well. Warwick Davis is now famous for playing roles like Willow Ufgood in "Willow" and Professor Filius Flitwick in the "Harry Potter" film franchise, but the "Star Wars" role he played when he was a child continues to be one of his key performances — which is funny, because a lot of it hinged on the fact that he simply happened to luck out when the Ewok costumes were dealt.

"I happened to get quite a good-looking Ewok costume, just by luck again," Davis told Star Wars Insider. "He's got a little white belly and a little white on the middle of his face, you know, and he's got a nicely proportioned look to him. Second, I was able to get my own tongue through between the teeth in the head. These heads were inanimate; there was no movement. So, luckily, I could get my tongue through, which actually gave the face a bit of life and there was a little bit of movement there."

The "Star Wars" prequel trilogy has its moments that are actually good, and even though some of them might be divisive among fans, few will step up and say that Darth Maul isn't pretty cool. The Dathomirian Zabrak Sith apprentice is the central antagonist of "Star Wars: The Phantom Menace," and it's an understatement to say that he made an impact. Maul's horned, black and red look is nothing short of iconic, and his "Duel of the Fates" fight with Qui-Gon Jinn (Liam Neeson) and Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor) is one of the best "Star Wars" movie lightsaber fights ever. Though Maul doesn't seem to survive the events of the movie, later works prove otherwise and give him plenty to do.

Maul's uniquely acrobatic movements come courtesy of Ray Park, an actor, stuntman, and martial artist. He went on to become something of a specialist when it comes to agile, physical characters with heavy makeup or an obscured face. Apart from Maul, his most famous roles include Toad from "X-Men," and Snake Eyes from the "G.I. Joe" movies.

Supreme Leader Snoke is introduced in "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" as the powerful and influential leader of the First Order. Eventually, though, the dictator is disposed of rather easily. He turns out to be a genetically-engineered "strandcast" who operated under the influence of one Sheev "Darth Sidious" Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid), who's still around thanks to Sith planet Exegol's cloning technology during the events of "Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker." In other words, the role is a big old red herring, but that doesn't mean Snoke isn't an impressive character in his own right.

Technically, the "make-up" on the character is all digital here. Supreme Leader Snoke looks very different in real life, seeing as he's brought to life by motion capture expert Andy Serkis. A venerable character actor in his own right, Serkis is nevertheless best known for his stellar mo-cap acting work, which has given us characters like Gollum in Peter Jackson's "The Lord of the Rings" movies and Caesar in "The Planet of the Apes" films. Supreme Leader Snoke is a worthy addition to his résumé.

Han Solo's (Harrison Ford) growly best bud Chewbacca may not have gotten his medal in "Star Wars: A New Hope" like all the other heroes, but he's still a formidable and important member of the Star Wars main character roster. The hulking Wookiee is one of the most memorable alien characters in the Star Wars franchise, and while the films barely scratch the surface of Chewbacca's entire backstory, the furry Kashyyyk native is among the most seasoned players in the galaxy.

Chewbacca's first and best-known actor is Peter Mayhew, who died at 74 in 2021. Tall and imposing, Mayhew was a natural choice to play Chewbacca, reprising the role with gusto all the way until "Star Wars: The Force Awakens." Mayhew played a number of other characters, but Chewbacca was his first film role in 1977's "A New Hope," and the beloved Wookie was one he kept returning to.

Chewbacca is such an important character in the Star Wars franchise that we're devoting two separate entries to him in order to cover both actors inside the costume. After "Star Wars: The Force Awakens," Peter Mayhew stepped down from playing Chewie, and the role was recast with the Finnish Joonas Suotamo. A former Penn State basketball player, Suotamo started his Wookiee tenure as a Chewbacca double for "The Force Awakens," and later inherited the role entirely.

Apart from Chewbacca, Suotamo is known for playing Lurch on Netflix's "Wednesday," Chewie's fellow Wookiee, Master Kelnacca, in the Star Wars Disney+ show "The Acolyte," and The Scourge in the "Willow" Disney+ TV series.

While Suotamo currently holds the Chewbacca torch, he has nothing but respect for the man who played the role first. "Chewbacca is one of the most iconic characters in the history of film," Suotamo wrote on Instagram in 2017. "And Peter's development and portrayal of this beloved Wookiee has spread so much joy across the globe. Peter's guidance and kindness have been invaluable gifts which warmed my spirit and prepared me for this journey. I aspire to make Peter proud and bring Star Wars fans the Chewie they know and love."

Jar Jar Binks spent some time as the most reviled character in the prequels. The affable but bumbling Gungan's reception was so bad that actor Ahmed Best was never the same after playing him.

"It's hard to have this idea that the thing you've been working all your life for, you finally get it and you're finally in the big leagues and the highest level of the game, and you hold your own," said Best, describing the Jar Jar backlash in an interview with People. "[...] And then all of a sudden people pull the rug out from under you. And I was just like, 'What is happening now?' My career began and ended. I didn't know what to do, and unfortunately there was really no one that could help me, because it was such a unique position; it had never happened before in history."

Best is correct in saying that his position was without precedent. Think of Jar Jar what you will, but he was the first live-action main character created with mo-cap. Best did the trailblazing work he was given well, and took the fallout by his lonesome. Perhaps because of this, Best's acting and voice acting roles outside Jar Jar have been largely journeyman variety — a voice role here, a guest star turn there. Fortunately, time has been kind to both Best and his Star Wars character: There's a popular fan theory about Jar Jar Binks being a secret Sith Lord, and Best himself got his Star Wars flowers by playing the ultra-capable Jedi Master Kelleran Beq on "The Mandalorian." It's an object lesson on being kind to actors, regardless of how you feel about a character.

In "Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, Tion Medon is a Pau'an administrator on Utapau, where General Grievous' (Matthew Wood) forces have established a base without entertaining the locals' opinions. As Obi-Wan Kenobi visits the planet, Medon stealthily reveals the situation to him, allowing the Jedi to confront and take down Grievous. The role is somewhat small, but Medon's imposing design is among the more memorable ones in the movie, especially since he turns out to be a good guy. Interestingly, Star Wars later used the Pau'an character design for more ominous purposes with The Grand Inquisitor (voiced by Jason Isaacs), a major antagonist in Dave Filoni's "Star Wars Rebels." 

Medon is portrayed by Bruce Spence, a prolific New Zealand actor whose screen credits date all the way back to the 1970s. You might not know it looking at Tion Medon, but Spence was already a known operator on the sci-fi front — its dystopian side in particular — decades before he joined the Star Wars fray. In 1981, he played Max's (Mel Gibson) uneasy ally, the Gyro Captain, in "Mad Max 2," which is arguably the best-known pre-"Fury Road" installment in the film series. He returned for "Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome," playing a similar aviator character called Jedediah.

Outside Star Wars and the Mad Max franchise, Spence has made himself a fairly robust "that guy" career in various genre movies. Keep your eyes open, and you will spot him in projects that range from "The Matrix Revolutions" to "Pirates of the Caribbean: Salazar's Revenge."

Rebel Alliance Fleet Admiral Gial Ackbar will forever be known for his ability to correctly identify enemy ruses as they happen, but the meme-worthy "It's a trap" line doesn't make the Mon Calamari a joke character by any stretch of imagination. The touching meaning behind Admiral Ackbar's character design was to create a good guy who wasn't traditionally good-looking, and Ackbar's many Star Wars adventures — both canonically dubious and fully verified — confirm that he's one of the Rebel Alliance's best and brightest.

Admiral Ackbar is played by Tim Rose, an actor and puppeteer whose résumé is one for the ages, as sci-fi and fantasy projects go. For "Return of the Jedi," he also provided the puppetry for Jabba the Hutt's weaselly jester Salacious B. Crumb. He has worked as a puppeteer on a number of other projects as well, including Star Wars projects "Rogue One: A Star Wars Story" and "Solo: A Star Wars Story." He was also involved in puppeteering the titular character in "Howard the Duck" and the clockwork warrior Tik Tok in "Return to Oz."

Had the First Order never attacked the Niima Outpost and Rey (Daisy Ridley) never managed to leave Jakku, the reprehensible Crolute junk boss Unkar Plutt might well have remained the key antagonistic force in her life. "The Blobfish" controlled much of the outpost's food and water, which put him in an excellent position to get the finest goods that the area's scavengers could discover — and to shortchange them when the opportunity presented itself.

Plutt is portrayed by a man who's better known from the Star Trek side of the sci-fi franchise divide: Simon Pegg, who's known for playing Scotty in the Kelvin Timeline Star Trek films — along with, of course, a great many other characters, including the main ones in each installment of Edgar Wright's Three Flavors Cornetto Trilogy.

"Unkar was an interesting role for me, because it was a fully synthetic fat suit, silicone mask, with CG-augmented features," Pegg described his Star Wars experience in an interview with GQ. It was a tough call because I was in the deserts of Abu Dhabi in 50 degree heat, and then in Pinewood Studios in similar heat, because we were in a studio."

You might not immediately recognize the name Oola, but every "Star Wars: Return of the Jedi" fan knows the character. She's the green-skinned Twi'lek dancer whose unfortunate role it is to demonstrate Jabba the Hutt's brutality when the Hutt grows tired of her resistance and unceremoniously drops her into the rancor pit.

The comparatively small but extremely memorable role of Oola was played by Femi Taylor, whose best-known screen acting work remains this role. Taylor also made her mark on the stage, though, and in a far bigger way. She's a bona fide "Cats" legend, who played Tantomile in the original 1981 London version of the stage musical, and later changed to the more central role of Bombalurina. In honor of her work with the musical, the 1988 film adaptation of "Cats" created the cameo character Exotica specifically for her.

Captain Phasma is one of the First Order's heavies, alongside Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) and General Armitage Hux (Domhnall Gleeson). The first high-ranking female antagonist in a Star Wars movie, she looks as calm and imposing as they come in her silvery chrome Stormtrooper armor.

It's up for debate whether the sequel trilogy actually uses the character well, but that's not on Phasma's actor, Gwendoline Christie of "Game of Thrones" fame. In an interview with USA Today, Christie noted that she focused on body language while playing the character, and also discussed the way the armor affects the character wearing it. "I put the costume on and I realized that this armor is quite something," she said. "It's very high-functioning, it's very imposing and it's not malleable at all. I thought, well, anybody who wears that every day, it must inform their character. Those were some things that I took on board as characteristics."

Apart from her "Game of Thrones" and "Star Wars" roles, Christie is a common sight in prestigious sci-fi and fantasy shows. From playing Lorne on Apple TV's "Severance" and appearing as Principal Larissa Weems on "Wednesday," to playing Lucifer Morningstar on "The Sandman" and Commander Lyme in "The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2," she keeps turning up in major projects and elevating them with her presence.

Force-sensitive sequel trilogy pirate-slash-Resistance member Maz Kanata is another character whose makeup is digital instead of physical, which allows for a truly surprising actor to tackle the role. Famously named the most beautiful woman in the world by People in 2014, Academy Award winner Lupita Nyong'o might not be the first name that comes to mind when casting actors to portray a wizened, turtle-like alien. As it happens, though, the opportunity to play a performance capture character who is physically far removed from herself was precisely why she embraced the challenge.

"Motion-capture is something that I've had my eye on ever since seeing Andy Serkis in 'Lord of the Rings,' and then going on to see Zoe Saldana do it, and Benedict Cumberbatch, and folks like that," Nyong'o told Refinery29. "It looked like an opportunity to really play as an actor, because you're not limited by your physical circumstances."

The character Nyong'o plays is truly unique, even by Star Wars standards. Maz Kanata is an ancient traveler who roams the galaxy and influences events when necessary — gifting lightsabers here, aiding the Resistance there. An adventurer and an artist at heart, she isn't an antagonistic figure, even though she doesn't hesitate to punish those who cause trouble under her umbrella of influence. In other words, Maz is precisely the kind of character you'd want an Oscar winner to portray, and Nyong'o delivers with skill.