Don’t believe the hate.
Signing a contract to appear in Star Wars should come with a list of side effects. “Taking Star Wars will bring you fame and fortune, but you may also suffer from deleting your social media presence and contemplating taking your own life .”
There aren’t many actors who have faced as much vitriol from so-called Star Wars “fans” as Hayden Christensen, who played Anakin Skywalker in Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith, and appeared as a digitally-inserted Force Ghost in Return of the Jedi. When asked what advice he would give to Kelly Marie Tran on dealing with trolls (she went down a “spiral of self-hate” after The Last Jedi was released), he told Entertainment Tonight, “Don’t take it too seriously, because… unfortunately, [bullies] are the ones that make the most noise. But the majority of people don’t feel that way, so, keep that in mind.”
(It’s worth noting that the Star Wars community used to hate Christensen as much as Anakin hated sand. But they’ve finally embraced him.)
In an essay for the New York Times, Tran revealed that she started to believe her online harassers. “Their words seemed to confirm what growing up as a woman and a person of color already taught me: that I belonged in margins and spaces, valid only as a minor character in their lives and stories,” she wrote. Tran will reprise her role as Rose Tico in Star Wars: Episode IX, which should make only half as much money as Christensen’s next project: Little Italy.
(Via Entertainment Tonight)
