WookieeLeaks: Massive New ‘Star Wars’ Spoilers

ScreenCrush’s WookieeLeaks is a weekly roundup of everything Star Wars! From Star Wars: Episode 7 to the upcoming spinoffs and the TV shows, if it pertains to that long ago, far away galaxy, we’re covering it here, bringing you our expert analysis. This week, we dive into one of the biggest spoilers for yet for The Force Awakens, ponder the lineage of the new cast, and figure out exactly when a new trailer will arrive.

This is a Huge Star Wars: The Force Awakens Spoiler

Last night, Star Wars: Episode 7 director J.J. Abrams hosted the Oscar Wilde Awards in Los Angeles, where Carrie Fisher was set to receive an award. But since Abrams was appearing in public, he was obligated to answer some Star Wars questions because that is his life now. After the usual pleasantries (he had a great crew, etc), Abrams took on a subject close to WookieeLeaks’ heart: spoilers and rumors. What the secret-loving, mystery-cuddling, enigma-obsessed filmmaker had to say may surprise you:

There are a ton of rumours – some true, some false. But I’m grateful for everyone who would want to read a spoiler because it means that they care and want to see the movie. I know what it feels like, as an enormous Star Wars fan myself.

So, before we delve into one of the biggest (potential) spoilers yet from Star Wars: The Force Awakens, note that Abrams totally gets it. He’s probably super-disappointed in all of us, but at least he gets it. Heck, he even acknowledges that some of the rumors floating around are true. Unless they’re all true and he’s just trying to throw everyone off the scent.

It’s now time to dive into one of the biggest Star Wars spoilers to hit the internet. We cannot confirm that it’s true, but enough people with ears in the right places seem to believe it is true. In fact, anyone with a passing knowledge of the series’ behind-the-scenes history could have told you this was going to happen. Still, if you don’t want to know anything, this is your chance to scroll on down to the next section.

Last warning. Here we go.

According to a report from folks over at Making Star Wars, a major original trilogy character bites the dust in The Force Awakens. Here’s how it supposedly goes down.

Our heroes are attempting to escape from the villainous Kylo Ren (AKA, the bad guy from the trailer who is supposedly played by Adam Driver) on the ramparts of a Sith castle. Han Solo, seeing that everyone is doomed, reveals himself to him, allowing Finn, Rey, Chewbacca and BB-8 enough time to escape. And then Harrison Ford’s iconic space smuggler is struck down. Our heroes react as you would: with a bunch of laser blasts. Kylo Ren gets away and the surviving heroes rush for the Millennium Falcon, Stormtroopers in hot pursuit.

Yep, it looks like Han Solo is playing the role of Obi-Wan Kenobi this time around. He’s the older, wiser mentor who gets killed by the bad guy so the new heroes can learn to fight for themselves.

This moment, if real (and we strongly believe it to real), is going to break a lot of hearts come December 18. But it’s also not going to come as a surprise to seasoned Star Wars fans. It’s no secret that Harrison Ford is no fan of playing Han Solo and that he was frozen in carbonite at the end of The Empire Strikes Back to give the character an escape plan if Ford decided to not return for the third film. Even after he did decide to come back, Ford begged George Lucas to kill him off in Return of the Jedi. This is why so many fans were surprised to see Ford actually sign on for The Force Awakens. His disdain for this series is legendary.

Actually, the moment he was cast, fans joked that he probably only signed on under the condition that they kill off Han Solo once and for all so he wouldn’t have to be a part of the Star Wars universe anymore. Looks like they were right. At the very least, this should prove to be a highly effective passing-of-the-torch moment. If one of our favorite characters gives his life to let the newbies live, they suddenly have massive shoes to fill. Watching them attempt to do so should be compelling.

These Are Possible Star Wars: Episode 7 Spoilers

In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Adam Driver avoids talking about anything specific (because he values his life) but he does dive pretty deep into why he loves Star Wars and why the series has struck a chord with audiences all over the world. Take this quote:

When you break all of those things down, really it’s just because someone wasn’t loved enough or felt betrayed. That’s what makes those movies so universal. I think they can get in your mind in big and sweeping ways.

Now we’re going to dive into a little baseless speculation. We’re just spitballing here, but if you’re spoiler-sensitive, you know what to do.

Can we gleam anything from this quote? Does this give us any kind of hint about who Driver is actually playing or what his character wants or desires? Everyone has essentially come to the conclusion that he’s playing the chief villain, Kylo Ren, but we know nothing about this guy (or any of the new characters). Everyone has also come to the conclusion that at least one of the new characters is somehow related to the original trilogy characters in some way. Could Kylo Ren be the link? Was he not loved enough? Did he feel betrayed?

Some fans think Daisy Ridley’s Rey is the secret daughter of Han Solo. Others think Domhnall Gleeson is playing the son or Luke Skywalker (or, as we talked about last week, the son of Grand Moff Tarkin). The crazy thing about Kylo Ren is that different rumors have pegged him as the son of Luke Skywalker or Han Solo, with both options offering opportunities for juicy drama.

Of course, not all of that speculation can possibly be true. If all of the new characters are the children of original trilogy characters, then we are looking at the smallest galaxy ever. But if Driver was hinting at something in that interview and not just talking for the sake of talking then maybe, just maybe, he’s our link to the OT characters.

Meanwhile, Making Star Wars has published a series of emails that claim to be chock-full of spoilers. Some sound legit and others directly contradict other things that we’ve heard. Some of it lines up with everything we’ve already talked about in this week’s column (including the BIG spoilers from the top). A lot of it feels like a clever combination of other rumors, collected into one place. Since Making Star Wars won’t fully vouch for it, we won’t either, but feel free to read through it at your own discretion.

When Are We Seeing the Next Trailer, Exactly?

According to an announcement on StarWars.com, J.J. Abrams and Lucasfilm honcho Kathleen Kennedy will be attending this year’s Star Wars Celebration in Anaheim this year. The news itself shouldn’t raise too many eyebrows (of course they’re showing up to sell the movie they’re making), but the way it is presented should. The original post says that the duo will “kick off the show in a big way” and that “this will be a day long remembered.”

C‘mon, we all know what this means: the next Star Wars: Episode 7 trailer will be debuted to an audience of passionate fans on April 16. It will then arrive in theaters a few weeks later with Avengers 2. There is literally no better place to get the positive buzz rolling for your Star Wars movie than a Star Wars convention. There is literally no better way to keep that buzz growing than attaching the new trailer to 2015’s other big nerdy event movie.

Oh, Lucasfilm/Disney. You’re predictable ... but only because you are very, very smart.

Gary Whitta and Jony Ive and Greg Grunberg

Screenwriter Gary Whitta may have departed Gareth Edwards’ Star Wars spin-off, but the (amicable) departure hasn’t lessened what sounds like a pretty incredible experience. In a new interview, he discussed what a huge deal it was for him to work on this project. Like every person of a certain age, getting an opportunity to contribute to Star Wars lore is a literal dream come true:

It was absolutely surreal. I loved every minute of it ... Star Wars was undoubtedly one of the most important formative influences on me as a child. It’s absolutely one of the main reasons why I became a writer and pursued a career in film, so to have had an opportunity to contribute something to the next chapter of its on-going legacy is just insane. I feel incredibly privileged to have worked on it.

Speaking of people very excited to be involved in Star Wars, Greg Grunberg chatted about his experience on the set in a recent interview. Who is Greg Grunberg, you ask? He’s only an incredibly likable character actor who you have seen pop up all over the place ... who also happens to be J.J. Abrams’ best friend since childhood and tends to pop up in all of his movies. Here’s a relevant quote:

I am so excited to even be in the movie! It’s going to be amazing. I can’t say anything about it, J.J. [Abrams] always has this thing about the mystery box. But he has given out a little hints via charity. That’s really great. I am a huge Star Wars fan so to be in the movie was such a thrill.
The weird thing is, while we were shooting, they had these drones taking pictures overhead. They were taking pictures of these vehicles we had, which were in the first Star Wars! And we were like, really, what’s the sneaky need for those pictures then? I mean it’s cool to see where we were shooting, I guess. But I said to J.J., what kind of scoop are they getting if this was already exposed back in the 1970s?

We already knew that Grunberg was going to be in the movie, but we had assumed it was going to be a small cameo. However, Grunberg says in the full interview that he worked on the film for six weeks, which leads us to believe that he may have a larger role that previously suspected. Or he’s just a random Rebel Alliance X-Wing mechanic who’s always hanging around in the background.

Finally, those fans who hate Kylo Ren’s lightsaber have someone new to blame: Apple senior vice president of design, Jon Ive. According to a new article, the man behind the the modern look of your iPhone screen chatted with J.J. Abrams at a party, where he threw out some ideas for a new lightsaber:

Ive sat next to director J.J. Abrams at a dinner party in New York, where the pair got chatting about Star Wars. At the dinner party, Abrams told Ive that he was working on Star Wars, and Ive came back to him with some “very specific suggestions” about how the movie’s lightsabers should look.
“It was just a conversation … I thought it would be interesting if it were less precise, and just a little bit more spitty … [a lightsaber should be] more analog and more primitive, and I think, in that way, somehow more ominous.”
We don’t know exactly what Abrams did with Ive’s advice, but it’s possible that it resulted in the unusual lightsaber seen being wielded by villain Kylo Ren in the movie’s trailer.