REBEL MOON (2023) | Anthony Hopkins’ Robot Jimmy Is ‘On A Journey Of Self-Discovery’ In Zack Snyder’s Sci-Fi Story

At the age of 85, you still never know where Anthony Hopkins’ career is going to go next. Recently, he won an Oscar for his heartbreaking performance in The Father, and he’s playing an elder Sigmund Freud in the upcoming Freud’s Last Session. And just a handful of years ago, he was joyriding around in Transformers: The Last Knight. For his next role, he’s taking on another surprising task – not just joining a Zack Snyder movie, the multi-part original sci-fi epic Rebel Moon, but voicing one of its most mysterious characters: the robotic (occasionally antler-wearing) Jimmy.

“Jimmy, I see him as a wild card,” teases Snyder in Empire’s world-exclusive Rebel Moon cover feature. “He’s on a journey of self-discovery.” And it really is one heck of a journey. Jimmy was brought to the peaceful planet of Veldt by the Imperium – the nefarious force hoping to demand all of Veldt’s precious resources, and who get more than they bargained for when the planet assembles a handful of hardened warriors to fight back. (Yes, the inspiration is Seven Samurai.) Once upon a time, Jimmy was one of many identical ‘droids assembled to serve their king in war. Now, he’s been repurposed by the Imperium to do their literal heavy-lifting – and he’s set to undergo a significant transformation over the course of Rebel Moon Part One and Two.

For Snyder, Jimmy represents a significant tonal addition to his sci-fi saga’s more fantastical leanings – an Arthurian element to sit alongside influences ranging from Akira Kurosawa to George Lucas. “I’m a huge Excalibur fanatic,” he tells Empire. “He’s Lancelot for sure. I was thinking about him, and how Milius [another hero, played by E. Duffy and named after Conan The Barbarian writer-director John Milius, as well as filmmaker Mike Mills] is Percival.” Expect a legendary arc for a robot like no other.

REBEL MOON (2023) | Why Zack Snyder’s Rebel Moon Didn’t Become A Star Wars Movie: ‘I Knew It Was A Big Ask’

A long time ago, Zack Snyder might have joined the galaxy far, far away. As the director embarked on his tumultuous journey with DC, another possible landmark saga was calling his name – and while it never came to fruition, his idea for a Star Wars movie eventually became his upcoming Rebel Moon, an original, multi-part sci-fi epic. If it’s evolved in the intervening years since Snyder first pitched it to Lucasfilm while in post-production on Man Of Steel, the initial idea remains the same. “It was Seven Samurai in space,” he tells Empire in our world-exclusive Rebel Moon cover story. “And a Star Wars movie was my original concept for it.”

While Snyder’s conception of a Star Wars film overtly homaging the works that inspired George Lucas was a compelling concept (“I knew that the origins for George were a lot of those Kurosawa films,” says the director), there were many reasons why Rebel Moon never panned out as part of cinema’s most famous space-opera. “The sale [of Lucasfilm to Disney] had just happened,” says Snyder. “There was that window where, you know, who knows what’s possible? I was like, ‘I don’t want any of your characters. I don’t want to do anything with any known characters, I just want to do my own thing on the side.’ And originally I was like, ‘It should be rated R!’ That was almost a non-starter.”

A decade later, Snyder has developed his original tale, and is getting to make it exactly how he sees it. “I knew it was a big ask, to be honest,” he says of making the film within the Star Wars galaxy. “But the deeper I got into it, I realised it was probably never going to be what I wanted.” Instead, he’s conjuring up his own universe across multiple movies – which, after initially releasing on Netflix in family-friendly cuts, will get harder-edged R-leaning versions too. Talk about a happy ending.

REBEL MOON (2023) | Ray Fisher Has A ‘Massive’ Four-Foot Gun In Zack Snyder’s Rebel Moon: ‘It’s Almost As Big As Me’

This is how it works: if you’re in a massive-scale action movie, playing a character with a name as ridiculously amped-up as ‘Darrian Bloodaxe’, you have to have the hardware to back it up. That’s exactly the position that Ray Fisher finds himself in when it comes to Zack Snyder’s Rebel Moon – after playing Cyborg for the director in Justice League (and afforded far more depth and screen-time in the Snyder Cut), he’s re-teaming with the director for his epic new sci-fi blowout. Yes, his character is named Darrian Bloodaxe. And yes, he has a ridiculously gigantic gun. “It’s massive,” laughs Fisher in Empire’s world-exclusive Rebel Moon cover feature. “It’s four feet. It’s almost as big as me.”

As his name suggests, Bloodaxe is not to be messed with – which is handy, since the people of peaceful planet Veldt are amassing a small force of formidable warriors to try and push back against the demands of the evil Imperium. (Yes, the film was heavily inspired by Akira Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai.) With his burly exterior, his experience as a rebel leader, and his big, bold weaponry, Bloodaxe is exactly the kind of guy you’d want on your side. In bringing him to life, Fisher looked to the same sources as his director. “I pulled from the Seven Samurai of it all,” he tells Empire. “Certain postures I take with my weapon, some of them I modeled after Toshirô Mifune, who carries that katana in a very specific way over his shoulder. Sometimes what I would do, before a take would start, is whisper to myself, ‘Mifune.’”

If Kurosawa’s samurai had weaponry like Darrian Bloodaxe? Well, they probably wouldn’t have needed seven of them. Just saying.