A new piece of concept art for Star Wars: The Force Awakens shows Luke Skywalker cradling Darth Vader's helmet. Luke was of course one of the main heroes from the original Star Wars trilogy. Mark Hamill didn't appear in the prequel trilogy since the films focused on Luke's father, but he did return for all three of the sequel trilogy films. Luke didn't have any lines in his cameo appearance in The Force Awakens, but had a much bigger role in Star Wars: The Last Jedi. Luke again appeared in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker as a Force ghost, but his role was again rather small.

While fans love Luke Skywalker, many didn't care for the way his character was handled in the sequel trilogy. Fans couldn't complain about his portrayal much in The Force Awakens since he only appeared briefly, but many fans had an issue with Luke in The Last Jedi, starting in the first scene where he throws his lightsaber over his shoulder. Many claimed the series ruined his character by turning him from a loyal optimist to a hermit whose seemingly given up. Mark Hamill even agreed with this point, but would later take back his criticism of The Last JediAs for The Force Awakens, new concept art teases a bigger role for Luke.

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Christian Alzmann, who is a concept artist and art director at Lucasfilm, recently released a never before seen piece of concept art of Luke holding Darth Vader's charred helmet. Luke's mechanical hand, as well as his full Jedi robes, were included in the piece. Alzmann's artwork can be seen in his Instagram post below.

While The Force Awakens no doubt went through several different ideas during the development of the film, the final entry of the sequel trilogy received a lot of backlash for the changes made in the film. Colin Trevorrow was originally supposed to direct The Rise of Skywalker, and his script for Star Wars: Duel of Fates would have been much different than what ended up on screen. The main changes were that Kylo Ren would have remained the main villain, with the Force ghosts of Luke, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and Yoda helping Rey defeat the leader of the First Order. Unfortunately, partly due to the backlash of The Last Jedi, Disney had J.J. Abrams retcon many elements that were set up in its predecessor.

With Luke having possession of his father's helmet in the above concept art, it's a mystery how (or if) Kylo Ren would have come to acquire it. J.J. Abrams originally wanted to include Palpatine in The Force Awakens, but it's unknown if this concept art was at that stage of the development or not. Needless to say, if this concept art had been made into a scene in the movie, Luke likely would have had a slightly bigger role to play in The Force Awakens.

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Source: Christian Alzmann