One of the most controversial steps that Disney took in acquiring Lucasfilm was erasing the Star Wars Expanded Universe from existence. Hundreds of post-Return of the Jedi stories were dismissed as “legends” in one fell swoop as the Mouse House sought to fill in its own canon beyond the fall of the Empire. This bold move was made more egregious by the fact that Disney proceeded to stumble through the creation of that new canon with no forward planning or imagination, and a lot of last-minute decision-making.
A key driving factor behind the decision to disregard the EU was that, in the EU, Chewbacca got squished to death by a moon and Disney wanted to keep the fan-favorite icon alive. This logic checks out, but the studio went on to do next to nothing with Chewie in the new movies. They resurrected the beloved Wookiee just to sideline him like most of the other legacy characters. He’s basically just a presence in the sequel trilogy, with the occasional sight gag like the Porg BBQ.
In the original trilogy, Chewbacca has an endearing established dynamic with all the other characters. He’s introduced as Han’s best friend in the original 1977 movie, but by the end of Return of the Jedi, Chewie has become just as close with all the other characters. The iconic Wookiee is the focus of plenty of great moments throughout the trilogy. In the original movie, while posing as a prisoner, he scares away a mouse droid. In The Empire Strikes Back, he finds C-3PO being scrapped by some Ugnaughts on Cloud City and bundles up his parts and repairs him on the Falcon. In Return of the Jedi, he teams up with a couple of Ewoks to commandeer an AT-ST during the Battle of Endor.
Chewie’s only major scene in the sequel trilogy is his tedious fake-out death in The Rise of Skywalker. As the Wookiee is captured by the First Order and taken away on a transport, Rey tries to use the Force to stop the transport from leaving and accidentally shoots out lightning that blows it up. Seemingly, Chewie is dead and Rey has to live with the guilt. However, seconds later, it’s revealed that Chewie was on a different transport and he’s fine. The grief over Chewie’s death is gone because he’s not really dead and the emotional weight of Rey’s guilt is gone because Abrams gave away the twist immediately.
There’s also a blatant pandering moment of fan service in the final scene as Chewie is given an arbitrary medal for his role in the Battle of Exegol. This moment was completely pointless, because anyone who cared that Chewie was snubbed for a medal after the Battle of Yavin was already given a satisfying explanation decades ago: medals are meaningless to Wookiees.
Chewie had more to do in his cameo appearance in Revenge of the Sith, where he helped Yoda escape from the Great Jedi Purge, than he did in the entire sequel trilogy. In the sequels, he’s mostly involved in space battle sequences, which made use of his skills as a pilot, but didn’t amount to much character-wise since he’s just relegated to a few insert shots of the cockpit amid a flurry of CGI spectacle. There’s a deleted scene from The Force Awakens that demonstrates the Wookiees’ fabled ability to rip off people’s arms as Chewie does just that to Unkar Plutt in Maz Kanata’s castle. While this scene might’ve set off alarm bells at Disney, at least it would’ve given this fan-favorite character another memorable moment to justify tarnishing the legacy of the original trilogy with a follow-up.
It’s not just the movies that sideline Chewie; he’s largely ignored by the other characters, too. After Han is killed by his own son, Leia doesn’t hug Han’s best friend, who’s also been one of her own best friends for decades – she hugs Rey, a random person she just met. When Rey brings Chewie along to Ahch-To, Luke barely acknowledges reuniting with one of his oldest and dearest buddies. Finn and Poe have a friendship with Chewie in The Rise of Skywalker, but by then, it was too little too late.
While Peter Mayhew was able to perform some of Chewbacca’s scenes in The Force Awakens, his body double Joonas Suotamo took over the role full-time in The Last Jedi, on which Mayhew is credited as a “Chewbacca consultant.” Working with Mayhew, Suotamo developed a take on Chewie that seamlessly carried the torch from the character’s original performer. Any fan who went in without realizing Mayhew wasn’t reprising his role as Chewie could have easily been fooled. Suotamo’s spot-on portrayal of Chewie is just yet another aspect of the Star Wars sequel trilogy with a ton of potential that was ultimately squandered in the bungled execution of the movies.