8 Things J.J. Abrams Doesn’t Want You To Know About Star Wars: The Force Awakens

6. They Used Andy Serkis€™ Studio To Create The Aliens

When Andy Serkis pulled on the spandex for his first scene as Gollum in The Lord Of The Rings he likely had no idea pulling faces while wearing ping pong balls would come to dominate his legacy. After bringing the likes of Sméagol, Kong and Caesar to unprecedented life, Serkis is the undoubted king of motion capture, In fact, he's so ahead of the rest of the industry in terms of appreciating this new performance form he's created a whole new studio to hold Hollywood's hand as they move into the future. The Imaginarium Studios has only been up and running for a couple of years, but it's already lent a hand to some of the biggest recent box office hits. When talking about upcoming projects, the studio more than happy to gush about helping James Spader get psychotic robot down for Avengers: Age Of Ultron and the vast animal cast of Serkis' own The Jungle Book: Origins, but there's one project that they're purposely coy on, never referencing it by name. And it doesn't take a detective to figure out that that film is Star Wars: The Force Awakens. The one character Serkis is playing (and contrary to rumours he is indeed playing only one) will undoubtedly be mo-cap, but the fact the studio's heavily involved suggests he won't be the only one.