Star Wars Episode VII News: Week 38

Character Names Revealed

     After the trailer dropped two weeks ago, more people became aware of the existence of The Force Awakens, and therefore, more speculation and more rumors. I've already examined many rumors, including ones that are very vague, and ones that are extremely detailed. During this time, many rumors ultimately contradicted themselves, or actual leaks disproved them, or even official releases by Lucasfilm disproved them. However several rumors still loom, including the MSW rumor.

     Another such rumor emerged last week in a series of 4Chan posts, collected on Reddit by a self-proclaimed "Spoiler Man", claiming to be a Lucasfilm employee with insider knowledge. According to "Spoiler Man", TFA takes place 30-40 years after RoTJ (no surprise there). The Empire and the New Republic have settled into a war of attrition. Daisy Ridley plays Kira (a name mentioned by MSW) who is Han and Leia's daughter. She lives with Max von Sydow. Boyega plays a Force sensitive Stormtrooper who defects to Tatooine. Interesting plot stuff happens. Luke is introduced. Presumably Han Solo dies. Oh yeah, Chewbacca has a robot arm. The plot sounds very similar to the MSW version. The third act remains "unspoiled" by Spoiler Man, because he is a very courteous person who presumably just spoiled two-thirds of the movie.
     Here's what Mark Hamill had to say about spoilers in an interview with IGN:
     "To tell you the truth, I’m one of those people that… I like being surprised. I don’t want to read spoilers and I hate it when I go see a trailer and you see this thing and you go, “Gee, that’s pretty much the whole movie.” They set up the premise, they show the conflict, they show partial resolution. The only thing they don’t show is the end credits. Where’s the thrill in that?...I just don’t understand the motivation for people wanting to ruin it for people but that’s the world we’re living in. It’s based on clicks on websites to see if they can get information out there. I’ll be surprised if they don’t leak the whole script between now and next year. But I hope not!"
     I hope not, either. But luckily, it seems that "Spoiler Man" and Making Star Wars both got it wrong, thanks to a very important clue.
     Entertainment Weekly reports that Lucasfilm just released the names of all the characters in the 88-second teaser. The names were put on mock-ups of trading cards, which were very popular in the 1970s after Star Wars came out. Shots from the trailer are put on a red or blue background, with a short description of the name of the character and what they are doing. Without further ado, here are the names of some of the characters in The Force Awakens:

     So Oscar Isaac plays X-Wing pilot Poe Dameron, Daisy Ridley plays Rey, John Boyega plays Finn, and an unnamed actor (Adam Driver?) plays Kylo Ren. Also the soccer ball droid is BB-8. These names may or may not have greater implications for these characters. For example, Kylo Ren, who is obviously a bad guy, unless he is a good guy with a red lightsaber (plot twist!), but let's assume that he is a bad guy. Shouldn't he have a more villainy name? I mean, Kylo Ren is great and all, but it sounds like a subordinate bad guy, someone that may give the main characters a lot of trouble in the first movie, but the real master is revealed in the subsequent films. Maybe this villain will make the name awesome, through actions, but it doesn't feel like a very evil name. Granted, maybe at first Darth Vader didn't either. Poe Dameron, and X-Wing pilot. Could his name have any connection to Edgar Allen Poe? This could mean that this character has a dark side (much like the real Poe). Or it could mean nothing. As for Finn, it's okay, I guess. Kind of boring. But Rey is the real kicker. Sure, it may be another boring, alienish name, but it proves one thing: the spoilers floating around recently are badly discredited. Both the Making Star Wars and 4Chan stories have Ridley's character as "Kira", not Rey. If the spoilers were true, wouldn't they have gotten right what the name of a major character was? And if that isn't true, how can you trust the rest of the story? Rumor busted!

Star Wars Episode VII News: Week 37

The World Reacts

     Last Friday, the world witnessed for the first time, a glimpse of The Force Awakens, and went wild. The new trailer went on to top the most popular trailer beforehand, Avengers: Age Of Ultron, in terms of views in the first week. The Force Awakens trailer currently has around 42,189,995 views and counting. It has also divided many, partly due to it's vagueness (it is a teaser trailer, after all; The Force Awakens doesn't come out for over a year.), and partially due to other factors that will be explained shortly. Without further ado, an analysis of the Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens trailer.

     It begins with a shot of sand dunes on a desert planet, which is Tatooine, because what other desert planet could it be? Then creepy Andy Serkis says, "There has been an awakening. Have you felt it?" Then a black Stormtrooper (John Boyega) pops up in a jumpscare, looks around a bit, and turns around, out toward the desert. A probe droid is heard in the background. Most likely he is being tracked for defecting, since it is an Imperial probe droid. The next shot is of a tiny droid that looks like a soccer ball grew a head is rolling around. Following this are two shots of a new and improved brand of Stormtroopers, about to invade some place, possibly Tatooine. Cut to Daisy Ridley on a land speeder of some kind. She goes off in some kind of a hurry. Oscar Isaac debuts, in an X-Wing, skimming along the water. And finally, a cloaked figure stumbling through the wintry woods, and Andy Serkis narrates, "The dark side... and the light." The figure activates his red lightsaber, and two little hilts of red light come out of the sides. Cut to black for a few seconds, and with full John Williams fanfare, on bursts the Millennium Falcon, flying upside down in the desert, and taking on two TIE fighters, before STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS comes onto the screen. That's it. Eight shots, eighty-eight seconds long--but it was enough. Onto the reactions.

     The first thing that people complained about was the black Stormtrooper. Some were prequel purists, who insisted that all Stormtroopers were clones of Jango Fett, who was white. However, in Star Wars, Luke is disappointed that he can't go to The Academy, meaning the Imperial Academy, where young men train for the military, for positions such as officers, gunners, or Stormtroopers. The clone thing was just added on after Lucas ran out of ideas. Those group of people actually had a reason to be confused; but some people were just plain racist. And to those people, John Boyega himself responded to them on Instagram:

     "To whom it may concern:

      Get used to it. :)"

     

     Well said.

     The second thing people found odd was the new Stormtrooper design. It looks sleeker and easier to see out of. But why are there still Stormtroopers? Wasn't the Empire defeated after Return of the Jedi? Apparently not. I hope they can actually aim this trilogy.

     One of the biggest problems many had with the trailer was the sheer impracticality of the new lightsaber. The two hilts could easily sever the hand off of the user, and a well aimed blow from another lightsaber could cut through the cross guard, severing another hand. However, Stephen Colbert expertly countered by saying the two little blades are directly attached to the large blade, eliminating the possibility of another lightsaber cutting through. The design is a little weird, but it could be completely awesome.

     All in all, the trailer excited many fans, gave valuable insight into the film, and will probably be the only trailer of The Force Awakens for six months, until it is released with Avengers 2 in May.

     Until then...

     Watch it again.