This is our obligatory breakdown of the final trailer for the ninth episode of the Star Wars saga.
To quote Christopher Lee’s Count Dooku: I’ve been looking forward to this.
The final trailer for the ninth episode of Star Wars, which aired during Monday night football on ESPN has so much fantastic stuff in it, it's hard to take it all in. But let's try and break it down, and have fun speculating. Watching a new trailer then immediately watching it again, and then locating the nearest online forum to cheer seems like something a Star Wars fan would do, so let's do just that.
In our very first shot, we see Rey training in a forest. She drops a blast shield helmet, similar to the one used by Luke Skywalker in the very first Star Wars movie, and deflects a blaster bolt from a training drone. It’s not been confirmed which planet Rey is on, but it looks to be the very same one in which she is seen hugging Leia in previous trailers.
Disney may actually be taking some inspiration from Legends material by using Yavin 4. In Legends, the forest planet that served as the Rebellion’s base was actually home to Sith temples, was cleansed by the Jedi thousands of years before the events of The Phantom Menace, and later used by Luke Skywalker as a Jedi Academy.
Couple this shot with an earlier scene in the D23 Special Look where Rey is seen splitting a tree trunk with a horizontal saber throw, and it’s clear that she’s grown more powerful. Multiple sources have confirmed that the events of The Last Jedi and Rise of Skywalker take place a year apart; time in which she may have learned much from the Jedi texts and possibly even from the ghost of Luke Skywalker. Mark Hamill is confirmed to be returning, but has yet to appear.
Rey is then seen leaping through wreckage. This is likely the wreckage of the Death Star seen in previous trailers, and a nice way to pay homage to the character’s junk-scavenging origins.
We get to see the Resistance gathering in an unknown location. The only clue we have is what looks like ocean waves outside the open wall on the left. We can see Poe on the right, Lando played by Billy Dee Williams in the centre, C3PO, and a Mon Calamari Rebel who some sources have indicated is actually the son of Admiral Ackbar, who perished in The Last Jedi.
Rose, played by Kelly Marie Tran, re-appears, alongside Carrie Fisher’s daughter Billie Lourd. Tran was famously hounded off Instagram shortly after the release of The Last Jedi, but made an appearance alongside the rest of the cast at Star Wars Celebration for the reveal of this movie. We also get a quick, blurry look at Dominic Monaghan’s new character. They seem to be in the midst of a base evacuation.
We get a quick shot of a Corellian Corvette. The most famous ship of this class is of course the Tantive IV, which appears in the opening moments of the first film, and at the end of Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.
Rey prepares to duel a soaked Kylo Ren. We’ve seen this shot in the D23 Special Look feature, but this offers us more of a look, with Rey standing next to what appears to be a rusted turbolaser. After the events of The Last Jedi, in which Rey rejected Kylo’s offer to rule the galaxy by his side, their relationship is sure to be a focal point in the Rise of Skywalker. For people who eagerly ship the two characters, this final trailer will be particularly welcome due to how much it hints at their relationship evolving. But for now, it’s highly unlikely their first meeting will be an amicable one.
TIE fighters fly towards what is implied to be a staging ground or a base for the seemingly resurrected Emperor. It’s unclear what exactly this is; an island or some kind of asteroid perhaps. The ice cold environment has led some to speculate that this is Kijimi, a frigid planet set to feature in the film.
A shot of the Emperor’s throne. IGN has helpfully pointed out that the monolithic design is based off unused concept art by Ralph McQuarrie for the Emperor’s throne room for Return of the Jedi. It’s hard not to notice a certain resemblance to the Dark Side tree on Dagobah as featured in The Empire Strikes Back, or with the Jedi library tree on Ahch-To as featured in The Last Jedi.
A Star Destroyer being raised from the earth. This is particularly notable since this is a classic Imperial Star Destroyer, used by the Galactic Empire, rather than any of the newer designs used by the First Order.
There are so many ships in this three-second clip, it’s hard to keep track. Eagle eyed fans will spot the Ghost of Star Wars Rebels, a Nebulon-B medical frigate as seen in The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, a U-Wing from Rogue One in the centre, a Resistance bomber from The Last Jedi, plus Mon Calamari cruisers and A-Wings amongst others.
The shot of Rey and Kylo’s duel is accompanied by the quickest shot of a planet exploding.
A tiny alien working on the back of 3PO’s head. This is a new character Babu Frik, previously revealed on the Star Wars website. According to the site, Babu Frik is an Anzellan droidsmith working with the Spice Runners of Kijimi. Kijimi, a frigid planet home to Keri Russell’s character Zorri Bliss, has also been mentioned previously.
Zorri herself makes a rather low-key first appearance next to Poe.
There’s a rather cheeky Easter egg in this shot, in the form of a Clone Wars-era battle droid from the prequel films.
The Y-Wing returns, making its first appearance in the sequel trilogy. Fans criticised The Last Jedi’s opening sequence for opting to use slow-moving Resistance bombers over the iconic bomber starfighters commonly used by the Rebellion. This Y-Wing appears to be attacking a Star Destroyer with a special underslung gun.
A bunch of rebels, led by John Boyega’s Finn and Naomi Ackie’s character Jannah, riding alien horses on the side of a Star Destroyer, accompanied by none other than BB8.
Rey and Kylo meet in the wrecked throne room of the Death Star. This shot, with the tell-tale circular window behind the throne, seems to confirm that this is the wreckage of the second Death Star. While the wreckage of the second Death Star was shown in orbit of the forest moon of Endor in Star Wars Battlefront II, there are mentions in Legends material that much of the wreckage was actually scattered across the galaxy by a wormhole created by the destruction of the station’s reactor. It remains to be seen whether they are in fact on a yet-unseen ocean on Endor, or elsewhere in the galaxy entirely.
This is potentially part of a sequence together with the lightsaber duel that we’ve seen taking place on the wreckage. While the duel is undeniably a hostile encounter, this shot implies something else. It may be that Kylo attempts to parley with Rey and the Resistance, only for their discussion to break down into a duel. Alternatively, their duel might de-escalate into the discussion we’re seeing here, in which Rey still clearly has her guard up. Given the trailer shows them working together at least once, the latter does seem more likely.
Rey and Kylo smash something with their lightsabers. Where they are is unclear, as is the nature of the destroyed object, since the shot begins with it already partially disintegrated. It may be a statue of Darth Vader, with the helmet recovered by Kylo as seen in The Force Awakens. You might have spotted Rey holding a strange dagger in her other hand, which bears a striking resemblance to the Dagger of Mortis featured in an episode of The Clone Wars. This might represent Kylo seeking Rey’s help to overcome the influence of the dark side, or his obsession with continuing his grandfather’s work.
We see another shot of this epic battle. TIE fighters are chased by an X-Wing and by a B-Wing from Return of the Jedi as well, completing a set of iconic Star Wars starfighters.
Rey faces the Emperor, who appears to be very much alive and attached to some kind of machine. It’s not clear what this is, but Disney might be taking inspiration from Legends once again, in which Palpatine was resurrected in cloned bodies of himself, which rapidly decayed. This may actually be a form of life support.
A considerably spookier alternative is that Palpatine is in fact an apparition. While certain Jedi, including Obi Wan Kenobi, Yoda, Anakin Skywalker and his son Luke, learned to become Force ghosts upon their death, the technique isn’t known to the Sith, who instead have attempted to transfer their life essences into other bodies, or into inanimate objects to gain immortality. The Emperor’s essence may be tied to the object behind him, allowing him to return in spirit form.
There are still a few notable omissions from the trailers we’ve seen so far. Aside from a single still image released earlier this year, we’ve not seen Richard E. Grant’s character Allegiant General Pryde. The Knights of Ren, briefly seen in Rey’s Force vision in The Force Awakens, have also not featured in any footage, although they have appeared in another still released by Empire magazine. However, as this is the final trailer for the film, this is probably the last footage we’ll be seeing of The Rise of Skywalker until its release on the 20th of December.
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