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Credit: LucasfilmAs per a recent report, Natalie Portman’s Padmé Amidala was totally cut from a Star Wars project.
Alongside Anakin Skywalker (Hayden Christensen) and Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor), Natalie Portman’s Padmé Amidala was one of three core characters in the Star Wars prequel trilogy.
Unlike her two companions, however, she has yet to make a reappearance in the franchise. The last audiences saw of Padmé, she had passed away at the end of Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith (2005) after giving birth to Luke and Leia in the wake of Anakin’s fall to the Dark Side.
Prior to this, Portman had portrayed the character through her rise from the young Queen of Naboo to a senator trying to cover up a secret relationship with Anakin, who was prohibited from engaging in a romantic connection due to his role in the Jedi Order.
Recently, Anakin Skywalker made his return to the Star Wars franchise in two projects for Disney+: Obi-Wan Kenobi and Ahsoka. According to a report from Jeff Sneider, Padmé Amidala was also supposed to make a cameo in Obi-Wan Kenobi until being cut by Lucasfilm.
Sneider appeared on John Rocha’s The Hot Mic, where he claimed that Portman previously shot “some stuff for the Obi-Wan [Kenobi] show” while filming Thor: Love and Thunder (2022) for the Marvel Studios (which, like Lucasfilm, is also owned by The Walt Disney Company).
She previously did shoot some stuff for the ‘Obi-Wan [Kenobi]’ show while working on ‘[Thor]: Love and Thunder,’ but it didn’t make the final cut, so it’s too early to know…
Obi-Wan Kenobi premiered on Disney+ on May 27, 2022, while Marvel Studios’ Thor: Love and Thunder – where Portman returned as Mighty Thor – debuted on July 8, 2022. Production likely overlapped for both projects.
Considering the recent demand for Portman to return to the franchise, it’s surprising that Lucasfilm decided to scrap the cameo. However, this wasn’t necessarily our last chance to see Padmé Amidala back in action, with recent rumors claiming that the character is set to reappear in the second season of Ahsoka.
As Inside the Magic recently reported, Lucasfilm is allegedly (emphasis on “allegedly”) in talks to bring Padmé back for the show’s second outing, in what we can only assume will be through the World Between Worlds (as Anakin previously appeared in the first season).
While these reports were quickly denied, we wouldn’t be totally shocked if Padmé did pop up sometime soon. Not only have fans been eager to see the character return – perhaps even for some sense of closure after her tragic ending – but Portman herself seems open to the prospect. In 2023, she claimed that “no one’s ever asked me to return,” but “I’m open to it.”
Would you like to see Padmé return to Star Wars?