In the sequel trilogy, Baker was credited as consultant for The Force Awakens; however, Jimmy Vee also co-performed the character in some scenes.

The revised Empire Strikes Back droids had fibreglass shells built by Tony Dyson and his White Horse Toy Company.

[citation needed] Lucas and artist Ralph McQuarrie also drew inspiration from the robots Huey, Dewey, and Louie from Douglas Trumbull's 1972 film Silent Running.

Leia inserts into R2-D2 an information disc containing the plans for the Death Star battle station, and encodes a distress message on the droid's holographic projector.

The droids then escape in a pod that crashes on Tatooine near Jedi Master Obi-Wan Kenobi's (Alec Guinness) desert abode.

R2-D2 and C-3PO are then abducted by Jawas and bought by Owen (Phil Brown) and Beru Lars (Shelagh Fraser), uncle and aunt of Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill).

When Owen and Beru are killed by Imperial stormtroopers, Luke is forced to leave Tatooine with Obi-Wan, Han Solo (Harrison Ford), and Chewbacca (Peter Mayhew) on board the Millennium Falcon to deliver R2-D2 to the Rebel Alliance.

On their arrival at Alderaan's co-ordinates, they are pulled in by the Death Star's tractor beam and are forced to land, but eventually rescue Princess Leia.

After Vader kills Obi-Wan, the rest of the group escapes and delivers the Death Star plans to the Rebel Alliance.

He is badly damaged during the battle between the Imperial troops and the Rebels, but is repaired in time for the celebration marking the second Death Star's destruction and the fall of the Empire.

In The Phantom Menace, set 32 years before A New Hope, R2-D2 is portrayed as belonging to the Naboo defense forces, one of three astromech droids deployed for repair duty onboard Queen Padmé Amidala's (Natalie Portman) starship as it attempts to get past the Trade Federation blockade.

R2-D2, along with Anakin and the young Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor), are awarded medals by Padmé and Boss Nass (Brian Blessed) at the end of the film.

In Revenge of the Sith, set three years later, R2-D2 helps Anakin and Obi-Wan in their mission to rescue Chancellor Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid) from Count Dooku's (Christopher Lee) capital ship, the Invisible Hand.

After Anakin falls to the dark side of the Force and becomes Darth Vader, he takes R2-D2 with him when he goes to assassinate the Separatist council, but he tells him to stay with the ship.

After Palpatine and Vader overthrow the Republic and establish the Galactic Empire at the end of the film, C-3PO's memory is erased to keep the knowledge of Luke and Leia's locations a secret from their father.

In Star Wars: The Force Awakens, set approximately 30 years after Return of the Jedi, R2-D2 is revealed to be kept in storage at the Resistance base on the planet D'Qar, having put himself in a low-power mode after Luke Skywalker's disappearance.

He then travels with Rey (Daisy Ridley) and Chewbacca to the planet highlighted on the map, where they find Luke in self-imposed exile.

He is later shown interfacing with the Falcon's computer while Rey and Chewbacca pilot the ship amid the final confrontation with the evil First Order's forces.

R2-D2 accompanies Poe in his X-wing for the final assault, and is later shown joining the others in celebrating the defeat of Palpatine and the Sith Eternal.

The revised fibreglass droids used in The Empire Strikes Back were built by Tony Dyson and the White Horse Toy Company.

The radio controlled R2 was operated by John Stears in A New Hope, Brian Johnson in The Empire Strikes Back and by Kit West in Return of the Jedi.

[33] For The Force Awakens, producer Kathleen Kennedy hired two fans, Lee Towersey and Oliver Steeples, to build new R2-D2 robots for the film, after being impressed by their working replicas that were brought to Star Wars Celebration Europe in 2013.

Ewan McGregor, who portrayed Obi-Wan Kenobi in the Star Wars prequel trilogy, said in an interview, "As soon as R2-D2 comes on the set, everyone goes a bit silly."

In the DVD audio commentary for Revenge of the Sith, George Lucas says R2-D2 is his favorite character, and that it is intentional that R2-D2 saves the day at least once in every film.

[38] In the Latin American Spanish dubbing of the Star Wars films, the name R2-D2 is pronounced as "Arturito" (Little Arthur), which sounds similar to the English pronunciation.