When I first noticed that Snoke looked so different in The Last Jedi, I thought I was imagining things. But after rewatching The Force Awakens, it was obvious – his face had changed in ways that didn’t seem random. Did something happen to him between movies? Or was this just another case of Star Wars doing its thing?
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It’s Just Better CGI, Not a Hidden Plot Twist
The biggest reason Snoke looks different? Better CGI. That’s it. In TFA, he’s seen only as a giant hologram, which naturally makes him look less detailed and a bit distorted. Holograms in Star Wars have never been the most reliable representations of reality. They flicker, they glitch, and sometimes they even make people look different.
When TLJ came around, Snoke was finally seen in person, and the CGI team updated his model to look more detailed and expressive.
This isn’t even the first time Star Wars has done something like this. If you go back to The Empire Strikes Back, Palpatine’s first hologram looked nothing like the version of him we saw in Return of the Jedi.
So yeah, Snoke looking different? Nothing new in Star Wars.
Snoke’s Role Changed Because the Sequel Trilogy Had No Plan
Now, here’s where things get a little messy. The reason Snoke’s design wasn’t locked in from the start? Because his character wasn’t either.
When TFA introduced Snoke, he was this mysterious, all-powerful figure. Nobody knew where he came from, and the movie didn’t tell us much. That led to all kinds of speculation – was he Darth Plagueis? Some ancient Sith? Something even crazier? But when TLJ rolled around, Rian Johnson went in a different direction. Instead of diving into Snoke’s origins, he killed him off, shifting the focus to Kylo Ren as the real villain.
This sudden shift meant that Snoke wasn’t really a priority anymore. His design was updated because he was finally appearing in person, but the filmmakers weren’t too concerned about making him look identical to his hologram form in TFA. If Snoke had been planned as the big bad for the entire trilogy, his design probably would have been more consistent.
And then The Rise of Skywalker came along and revealed that Snoke was just a clone created by Palpatine, with multiple versions floating in vats on Exegol. And that definitely wasn’t planned from the beginning. It was a last-minute retcon to justify Palpatine’s sudden return, not a carefully thought-out explanation for why Snoke looked different in TLJ.
Star Wars Has a History of Changing Character Designs
Even if the sequels had a perfect plan, Snoke’s evolving look still wouldn’t be surprising. Star Wars characters have been redesigned between movies since the beginning.
Darth Vader’s helmet? It changed between A New Hope, TESB, and ROTJ. Palpatine’s entire face and voice changed between TESB and ROTJ.
Kylo Ren’s scar? It moved between TFA and TLJ because Rian Johnson thought it would look better in a different spot. Even Wedge Antilles was played by two different actors in A New Hope because of a mid-production casting change.
One of the biggest examples is Yoda. In The Phantom Menace, they used a puppet version of Yoda that looked weirdly different from his Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi look. Fans didn’t like it, so by Attack of the Clones, they switched to a CGI Yoda, which became the standard going forward.
So yeah, Snoke looking different in TLJ? Not unusual at all.
Fun Fact: Palpatine’s TESB Hologram Was a Woman with Chimpanzee Eyes
Now, if you ever want a really bizarre Star Wars fact, here’s one: The first time we ever saw Emperor Palpatine in TESB, it wasn’t Ian McDiarmid. It was actually a woman named Marjorie Eaton, wearing heavy makeup, with chimpanzee eyes superimposed onto her face using special effects. They wanted him to look creepy and otherworldly, so they went with that weird combination.
Later on, George Lucas decided to replace that version of Palpatine with Ian McDiarmid in the 2004 DVD release to make it more consistent. This just goes to show – Snoke’s changing look isn’t even close to being the weirdest visual retcon in Star Wars history.