In one interview at StarWars.com, Hickel spoke of a letter hanging on his office wall at Industrial Light & Magic, from "The Star Wars Corporation", dated March 15, 1978. "I was around 12 years old," explained Hickel. "I think there was already news that George Lucas was starting work on a second Star Wars movie, and I thought if I write him a letter, because I've got a lot of great ideas for a sequel, maybe I can work on it." Hickel wrote a letter to Lucasfilm, outlining his ideas for a sequel to the original Star Wars movie (now known as Star Wars: Episode IV A New Hope), and received a polite rejection letter from producer Gary Kurtz' assistant, Bunny Alsup. "So, I was crushed and excited at the same time," smiles Hickel. "Though, I can't remember for the life of me what the story idea was." Twenty years later, Hickel found himself working on Star Wars after all, as a lead animator on Star Wars: Episode I The Phantom Menace.
In addition to his visual-effects work on the prequel trilogy, Hickel worked on The Mandalorian and The Book of Boba Fett.
In 2007, Hickel won the BAFTA and the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects along with John Knoll, Charles Gibson and Allen Hall, for Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest. He also received an Academy Award nomination for his work on Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.