J.J. Abrams "Gasped," "Fanboyed" During Star Wars: The Force Awakens Production

In a new interview with The AP, J.J. Abrams talked generally about Star Wars: The Force Awakens and fighting back his own fanboy tendencies during production of the epic. The interview didn't offer any new clues for fanatics looking for any bits of information, but Abrams did acknowledge those special Star Wars fans, saying that while they add stress to his process, he "would never complain about or look at as a negative" their "excitement and anticipation and passion." It's something he relates to, as well, as that's why he got involved.

As for his own fanaticism, he pushed it down, though it was hard to fight at times that other fans can probably imagine with the same ease as they did when pretending a mop handle was a lightsaber as kids.

"When you're on the set of the Millennium Falcon or staring into the eyes of C3PO giving direction, it's pretty easy to have that fanatic part of you bubble up. But our job was to be there to tell this story, not to be a fanboy," Abrams said.

Even Abrams had his moments, though, including seeing how Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, and Mark Hamill "easily flipped back into these roles." He explained that while he know "Harrison Ford was going to be in this movie," he couldn't know until seeing him act "that Han Solo would be."

Abrams also continued to focus on the practical effects used in filming, a frequent talking point at conventions, press conferences, and interviews. You get the idea that if you were to sit at Abrams' dinner table, he'd probably mention that as much of The Force Awakens as possible was shot directly on camera using real sets, vehicles, prosthetics, make up, and other classic special effects, with CGI only used as a supplement. He said it lends a sense of realism that can't be matched digitally.

"I can't think of something that we did that doesn't look and feel more authentic that I wish we had done differently. Wherever possible, whenever possible, we tried to do things as much in camera as we could. And that meant that a lot of artists on that side of things were building things not with pixels but with wood and paint and foam and actually constructing sets that we could have done in post. It gave the actors the actual location, the actual sunlight or stage light something to bounce off of, and the movie a feeling of being in an actual location and not an artificial one."

Star Wars: The Force Awakens kicks off a new sequel trilogy of Star Wars films on December 18, 2015. See when the other Star Wars films fall on our full schedule of upcoming genre and franchise films.