Star Wars: Rogue One's K-2SO actor just doesn't want to be as bad as Jar Jar Binks

The actor behind K-2SO in Star Wars: Rogue One doesn't have any grand ambitions to dethrone R2-D2, C-3PO, and BB-8 as Star Wars' most beloved droids. He just doesn't want to become the new Jar Jar Binks. Alan Tudyk told The A.V. Club that he put a lot of "negative pressure" on himself to avoid the same fate suffered by the gungan goofball.

"My fear was always, 'I don’t want to go Jar Jar,'" Tudyk explained. "You didn't want to be the character that comes on screen, and you're like, 'Oh my God, kill it. Get somebody. Shoot or at least muzzle that thing'. That was the one thing in my head. It wasn't, 'Oh, I hope I’m as good as these other characters'. More like, 'Dear God, I hope I’m not as bad as that one character'.

Just like Jar Jar actor Ahmed Best, Tudyk worked on-set with his fellow actors. But where Jar Jar was a silly, slapstick character, Tudyk says K-2SO isn't "trying to be funny" - he's just a sardonic cynic with no (software) filter. Director Gareth Edwards encouraged the cast to do some improvised exchanges, and I'm sure you can guess which ones Tudyk took the most pride in: "I’m really happy to say there were several smartass comments that come from me."

Directed by Gareth Edwards and starring Felicity Jones, Diego Luna, Ben Mendelsohn, Forest Whitaker, and Mads Mikkelsen, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story is released in the UK on December 15 and the US on December 16.

Seen something newsworthy? Tell us!

Images: Disney

Connor Sheridan

I got a BA in journalism from Central Michigan University - though the best education I received there was from CM Life, its student-run newspaper. Long before that, I started pursuing my degree in video games by bugging my older brother to let me play Zelda on the Super Nintendo. I've previously been a news intern for GameSpot, a news writer for CVG, and now I'm a staff writer here at GamesRadar.

Latest in Sci-Fi Movies
Giancarlo Esposito in The Electric State
The Electric State star Giancarlo Esposito explains why adapting the bleak novel into a family friendly adventure was the right decision: "I'm going to bring my children with me"
Giancarlo Esposito in The Electric State
The Electric State may be the Russo brothers' most challenging VFX project yet, but stars Stanley Tucci and Giancarlo Esposito say it's one of the easiest films they’ve ever done
Giancarlo Esposito and Stanley Tucci in The Electric State
Stars Stanley Tucci and Giancarlo Esposito say their new dystopian sci-fi movie The Electric State is more like our own reality than we might realize
Millie Bobby Brown, Chris Pratt, and Ke Huy Quan in The Electric State
$320 million in the hole, the Russo brothers' new Netflix movie debuts to their worst Rotten Tomatoes score even though it's one of the most expensive films ever made
Zoe Saldaña in Avatar
James Cameron had "too many great ideas" for Avatar: The Way of Water, so the cut content became Avatar 3 which "will actually be a little bit longer" than its 3-hour predecessor
Robert Pattinson in Mickey 17
Director Bong Joon Ho explains his new sci-fi film Mickey 17's surprise end title card: "It's a coming-of-age-story"
Latest in News
Jordan A. Mun looks at herself in a mirror in just a vest in Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet screenshot
5 years after starting development, Neil Druckmann says Naughty Dog's new game Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet is "still evolving and changing as we're making it"
Silent Hill f
After 2 years of silence, the next mainline Silent Hill game is getting a dedicated stream this week with "the latest news"
Original Xbox console
Former Microsoft exec says the first Xbox was killed early in favor of 360 because it was "losing money left right and center," but luckily "we could afford to hemorrhage cash"
A Monster Hunter Wilds character holding binoculars.
Despite Monster Hunter Wilds suffering monstrous performance problems on PC, it still outsold the PS5 and Xbox Series X versions in the US
Jordan A. Mun looks at herself in a mirror in just a vest in Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet screenshot
The Last of Us creator Neil Druckmann says Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet will also be about "being lonely," as if his zombie apocalypse wasn’t isolating enough: "I really want you to be lost"
A screenshot of Jordan drinking a soda during the reveal trailer for Intergalactic: The Hertic Prophet.
Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet is "a game about faith and religion," which Neil Druckmann jokes will surely get less hate than The Last of Us 2