Some time ago, in this particular galaxy, there were Star Wars films and no Twitter. So there was no way for cowards to express their disapproval of Billy Dee Williams, James Earl Jones, or even Samuel L Jackson. Now, many are exercising this newfound power in the general direction of Force Awakens star, John Boyega, and director/co-writer, J.J Abrams. For those of you that feel this way, you can seep your valves over here. Hurray for you.
Now that they’re gone, we can continue with the latest The Force Awakens updates: Poster! Trailer! Hurray for us! With December 17 fast approaching, we get a glimpse or Rey (Daisy Ridley) and Finn (Boyega) as wayward souls investigating the story up until now and finding their places in it. As in life (see above), the good comes with the bad – Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) seems to aspire to the legacy of Darth Vader. Perhaps he is the only person in the galaxy who doesn’t know his idol’s explosive secret.
This is not unlike Abram’s work on Star Trek (2009), which interweaved the new with the old, effectively updating a franchise as you’re watching it. Super 8 (2011), a Spielberg film homage about young filmmakers using that eponymous camera, is the peak of mainstream meta. It is as typical of him as his love of the Beastie Boys, enough to name a character after one of their songs. Remember this little bit of Sabotage?
Not only did the trailer break viewing records, but with tickets going on sale last week, Episode VII is already a box office smash. The demand was too much for the Australian IMAX website, which crashed, along with a number of sites in the UK. It’s the cyberspace equivalent of this.
By the way, has Luke Skywalker joined the dark side? Some are wondering because of this ten-year-old episode of Dinner for Five, a TV show where five famous people have dinner. Famous people like Mark Hamill and Abrams. Around the 12-minute mark, Hamill is pitching the idea of Luke turning evil. His character’s absence from the recent marketing has made people think that Abrams might have been listening.
And yet, he is in the new trailer. At around 1.40, he’s laying his robotic hand suggestively upon his robotic friend. It’s the same shot as the one in the second teaser. Which, by the way, is narrated by Hamill. It’s more likely that the old Jedi is out in the wilderness, like Ben Kenobi, biding his time. Waiting for a pupil, maybe.
This whole thing, when you think about it, is kind of fanatic. And this is only the first of six films currently in production. Expect no less from a franchise that has inspired this statue in the Ukraine. At least it’s not Putin.
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