How Star Wars Stormtroopers Influenced One Of Apple's Biggest Products
The stormtroopers of "Star Wars" are named for soldiers who fought for Imperial Germany during World War 1 — though the Galactic Empire they serve has a lot more in common with the German government of the Second World War.
Rather than the brown and green cloth uniforms the historical stormtroopers wore, those in "Star Wars" wear white polymer armor with face-concealing helmets. It's easier to make the costumes when you only need multiple copies of one design and in-universe, the uniformity reinforces the Empire as a military dictatorship.
The stormtroopers' look is one of the most well-remembered parts of "Star Wars" — it's up there with lightsabers, Darth Vader, and the Millennium Falcon. The prequel and sequel trilogies only touched up the designs for the stormtroopers and clone troopers, opting not to reinvent the wheel. It's not just the films where their influence reigns either; Jonathan "Jony" Ive, chief design officer at Apple, looked to them as well.
Speaking to The Wall Street Journal in 2017, Ive revealed that he "had the look of the original stormtroopers in mind" when he designed Apple's AirPods. These wireless listening earbuds and their square casing (first released in 2016) have a sleek white shell, much like the stormtroopers' costumes. It's easy to assume this is just brand consistency (white is Apple's favorite color), but Ive let his nerd flag fly too. The AirPods are one of Apple's most successful products, going on for almost 10 years now, so Ive wasn't the only fan of the look.
Created to market
The creative relationship between Apple and the stormtroopers goes both ways. In 2015, "The Force Awakens" costume designer Michael Kaplan told Vanity Fair how he and director J.J. Abrams renovated the stormtrooper look. Their design ethos was "What would Apple do?" Hence, the stormtroopers' smoother and shinier helmets.
Here's where things get a bit icky though. "Star Wars" pulls from the Nazi propaganda film "Triumph of the Will" in how it shoots the Imperial characters, i.e. wide shots of soldiers marching or standing in formation. This evokes feelings of oppressive power — like a boot reaching from the screen to stomp on the viewers' necks. "The Force Awakens" makes it more blatant than ever with General Hux's (Domnhall Gleeson) speech on Starkiller Base; legions of identical soldiers stand shoulder to shoulder and listen to a fascist screech on stage.
However, "Star Wars" has always been a commercial franchise as much as a cinematic narrative. George Lucas built the "Star Wars" media empire on merchandising, from action figures to Halloween costumes. That meant making the stormtroopers look cool and, thus, merchandisable; Kaplan's goal of making them look even cooler speaks to that. Ive's affection for their slick white armor is just one piece of proof this succeeded.
Video essayist/critic Lindsay Ellis discussed this conundrum in her 2018 video, "The Ideology of the First Order," where she ultimately concluded they have none, to make merchandising Kylo Ren and Captain Phasma less queasy.
To make meaningful design choices, you can't stop at only the surface level.