James Jesse, The Flash
Imagine taking a C-list comics villain and having such a fun performance with it that you get to play him across the decades in three different TV shows. Hamill first played the Trickster in the ’90s Flash live-action show, before coming back for an animated appearance in Justice League Unlimited and then reviving the character again in the CW’s own Flash show. Hamill’s Trickster, like so many of his most beloved roles, really manages to balance the zany over-theatricality of a comic book baddie (even if Jesse is hardly the fiercest of Flash’s rogues), while giving the character a wonderfully human side too in his appearance in Unlimited. The 2014 Flash iteration definitely leans a bit more on the gag side of things, but it’s well worth revisiting his ’90s turn, considering it’s what purportedly played a key role in him landing the role of Joker.
Skeletor, Masters of the Universe: Revelations
It might be controversial to say, given any performance of He-Man’s antagonistic foil has to walk in the shadow of Alan Oppenheimer, but Hamill’s turn in Kevin Smith’s rebooted take on Masters of the Universe is a very fun take on the character, giving Skeletor a gruffness that lends him an underlying menace even when he leans a bit more into the character’s classic camp.
Christoper “Maverick” Blair, Wing Commander
Okay, sure, we can’t put one hotshot sci-fi piloting hero on this list, but there is another! Hamill played Wing Commander protagonist Maverick, aka Christopher Blair, in the FMV live-action cutscenes used in the third and fourth games in the series, Heart of the Tiger and Price of Freedom, giving the series’ previously unnamed protagonist a stronger depth of character, a more seasoned starfighter pilot on the front lines of a long and bitter conflict with the lion-esque aliens known as the Kilrathi. And as Hamill’s voice acting career took off, he even returned to the animated prequel spinoff Wing Commander Academy to reprise the role.
Mervyn Pumpkinhead, The Sandman
The Dreaming’s resident grumpy janitor (and sentient pumpkin-headed scarecrow), Hamill burns briefly but brightly on Netflix’s Sandman adaptation, with Mervyn providing a touch of charmingly abrasive levity to the climax of the first season. Thank god he recovered from his fight against the furies in the show’s sophomore season!
skekTek the Scientist, Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance
Sometimes you’ve just gotta lean all the way in, and when given the role of the Skeksis’ chief scientist in the incredible Dark Crystal prequel show, Hamill goes all out. He’s cackling, shrill, and just delightfully, ruthlessly over-the-top in his portrayal of skekTek’s otherwise logically cold evil, really selling you on just what wretched delight skekTek takes in the cruelty he enacts in his experiments.
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