10 Fascinating Inspirations Behind Star Wars

10. Apple

The look of the Stormtroopers from Star Wars is extremely iconic and instantly recognisable, those surgically white uniforms providing the armour for the aimless foot-soldiers of the Empire. They are of course back for The Force Awakens, but with some subtle tweaks to their appearance. They're very clearly Stormtroopers, but have a much sleeker, streamlined, and generally more modern look about them, especially around the mouth and nose area. This was something that they were definitely aware of, with costume designer Michael Kaplan telling Vanity Fair that they needed to be different, because it's 30 years since Return of the Jedi and the returning heroes will look different, but that they still needed to obviously be Stormtroopers at a glance. For this, there was one main inspiration: "What would Apple do?" This is based around the way Apple update their products, and make them both different yet easily recognisable, as with the iPod and iPhone, and clearly something similar has been achieved with these new troopers.
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Contributor

NCTJ-qualified journalist. Most definitely not a racing driver. Drink too much tea; eat too much peanut butter; watch too much TV. Sadly only the latter paying off so far. A mix of wise-old man in a young man's body with a child-like wonder about him and a great otherworldly sensibility.