15 Things We Learned From “Star Wars: The Last Jedi” Trailer

The new trailer has been released for the eighth movie in the Star Wars series, Star Wars: The Last Jedi, so it’s time to break it down. Here are just a few things to point out about the trailer.

[Warning: This post may contain spoilers for Star Wars: The Last Jedi.]

First, if you haven’t seen it, here’s the full trailer released earlier during Monday Night Football.

1. The Gorilla Walkers

Here we see an attack on a distant planet with Kylo Ren’s shuttle flying over the return of the AT-AT walkers…oh, wait, no we don’t. This time around, the walkers are AT-M6, which have larger “feet” and the front legs are arched so they look more like gorillas than dogs. Hopefully, the new walkers will have gotten rid of that pesky rope-around-the-legs thing.

2. Snoke in the Flesh

In The Force Awakens, we saw Snoke strictly in the form of a hologram. In The Last Jedi, it looks like we’ll get to see him in-person. And man, does he look horrible. I mean, that collar is just so retro and the color doesn’t suit him at all. Also, his face is all messed-up. It seems like he’s back to carry out his evil in person, which is a lot like how the Emperor showed up in hologram form in The Empire Strikes Back, and appeared in person in The Return of the Jedi. Here’s hoping he kicks butt.

3. Captain Phasma Gets Something to Do

After all the build-up in the casting of Gwendoline Christie and her awesome chrome armor as Captain Phasma, some fans were disappointed with her small role in The Force Awakens – getting held captive, forced to drop the shield on the Starkiller Base, and dumped into a garbage chute. It looks like she’s going to get more to do in The Last Jedi, starting with fighting Finn. That’s a good start.

4. Finn Has a Baton

It looks like Finn didn’t get to keep a lightsaber or get a lightsaber of his own, but he got a Z6 riot-control baton as a consolation prize. The baton was able to stand up to a lightsaber when it was used by a stormtrooper in The Force Awakens (“Traitor!”), so it seems to be a formidable weapon. We’ll have to see if he wins the fight against Phasma, but it looks to be epic.

5. Meet the New Ewoks: The Porgs

When Return of the Jedi came out, Star Wars fans were horrified by the Ewoks, cuddly teddy bears designed to sell toys that derailed the story in favor of cute antics. Now there are fears among fans that a new creature could do the same thing with the introduction of the porgs. The porgs were apparently inspired by penguins, and are clearly a big part of the movie since one ends up on the Millenium Falcon. Here’s hoping the porgs won’t be destroying any Imperial walkers and stormtroopers in the new movie. If this porg suddenly takes over the controls of the Falcon and blows up a Star Destroyer, we are done with Star Wars.

6. Luke is Scared

At one point, we hear Luke say, “I’ve seen this raw strength only once before. It didn’t scare me enough then. It does now.” We have no idea what that means, but here’s our spoilery idea. Luke is reacting to Rey’s power when he tries to train her. When he mentions how he saw that power once before, it seems the raw power he saw was in Kylo Ren, who ended up betraying Luke to the Knights of Ren. That’s when Luke refuses to continue training her. Possible? Maybe, maybe not. But it’s tantalizing.

7, Kylo Ren’s Scar

This is a minor point, but important for those who like to nitpick like us: Kylo’s scar has moved. In the original movie, the scar ran along the bridge of the nose, dividing his face. It’s been moved more to the left. Director Rian Johnson admitted they caused the continuity error on purpose because Johnson thought the scar looked goofy. Deal with it, fanboys.

8. Kylo Tries to Kill Leia

In one moment, we see Kylo piloting a fighter against a battleship. We don’t know for sure, but the way the trailer is edited strongly implies that General Leia is aboard the battleship. It looks like Kylo is going to try to kill his mother the way he killed [SPOILER ALERT] his father, Han Solo. Will he succeed? Is this how she gets written out of the next movie? Who knows.

9. Will Rey Join Kylo?

Kylo offered to train Rey in The Force Awakens. Will Rey take him up on the offer in The Last Jedi or will she turn him down again? Certainly, the trailer at the end seems like he is, but we don’t know if that’s the actual flow of the scene in the movie or just how the trailer is edited to throw us off. From a narrative perspective, it doesn’t make sense to have him make the offer again, only for her to reject the offer again. That’s why we’re leaning towards the idea that she accepts this time. If that’s true, though, this is the biggest spoiler in the movie revealed in the trailer. That would suck.

10. Rey Gets Tortured

It looks like Snoke is in the background while Rey is being forced into this uncomfortable pose. This scene reminded us of the torture of Luke by the Emperor in Return of the Jedi. Will he be trying to force Rey into becoming his apprentice? If so, will Kylo rise up to the Light Side and save her, like Darth Vader did to his son? Is The Last Jedi really going to copy the original trilogy that much? We hope not.

11. The Fall of the New Jedi

In The Force Awakens, we saw a brief glimpse of Luke’s encounter with the Knights of Ren, presumably when they destroyed his Jedi order. We get more of that in The Last Jedi, apparently with a decent amount of footage. In this shot, it seems to be Luke and R2-D2 watching his Jedi temple burning. Tragic but certainly a lesson that Luke has learned from.

12. Kylo Rejects Vader

In one scene, Kylo Ren seems to be smashing his Vader-styled helmet as the voice-over says, “Let the past die.” It seems like Kylo is going to be letting go of his Vader fanboy ways, turning away from Darth Vader’s mask and cape to become his own man. This could be better with Kylo moving away from the Sith or it could be worse with Kylo becoming a bigger monster than Vader ever was.

13. Poe Dameron Returns

Poe Dameron is back, and he’s leading the Resistance. We guess. It’s good to see him back and we hope to get more of his fighter piloting in the new movie since he was out of action in most of The Force Awakens. We also got to see BB-8 in the back of Poe’s ship, just like R2-D2. It also looks like Carrie Fisher’s daughter is in the background, but that’s just a guess.

14. Finn in First Order Gear

It’s also important to note that Finn is wearing a First Order uniform which might be because he’s in disguise, trying to infiltrate the First Order or maybe he’s captured and forced to put on the uniform. Either way, it’s a clue about what he’s going to be doing during The Last Jedi, since he’s not with Rey during her training.

15. The Final Word

“This is not going to go the way you think.” If there’s one line in the entire trailer that tells us about The Last Jedi, it’s this one. It’s almost as if the movie is talking directly to us, the audience. We all have ideas about how the story will go down, based on the last six movies. The last time Star Wars really shocked fans and audiences was in The Empire Strikes Back with the reveal of Darth Vader’s identity. We really hope The Last Jedi manages to surprise us by overturning all our theories and traditions.

And here’s the official poster for Star Wars: The Last Jedi:

Starring Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher, Adam Driver, Daisy Ridley, John Boyega, Oscar Isaac, Andy Serkis, Lupita Nyong’o, Domhnall Gleeson, Anthony Daniels, and Gwendoline Christie, Star Wars: The Last Jedi arrives December 15, 2017. Get advance tickets now at Fandango.

What else did you see in the trailer? What do you think?

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