Watch Star Wars Celebration Europe's Rogue One: A Star Wars Story Panel Live

Star Wars Celebration Europe day one capped the day in spectacular fashion with a panel dedicated solely to Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. The December 2016 release is the first of the new standalone films in the Star Wars family, and the Celebration Stage room was packed with 4,000 fans desperately seeking the newest information. You can watch the livestream of the panel yourself above starting around 11am EDT/8am PDT, and refresh for the latest updates from the panel in our liveblog below.

The panel started with the opening crawl of A New Hope, the inspiration for the film. It started to stutter, though, with chatter from the trailer, and the Death Star's alarms going off. Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.

Gwendoline Christie was brought out on stage as the special guest host of the panel. She started with an enthusiastic welcome, but offered a moment of silence for the victims in France. After a moment, some French fans in the audience started singing their national anthem.

President of Lucasfilm Kathleen Kennedy, Director Gareth Edwards, Head of Story Group Kiri Hart, and EP John Knoll took to the dais first, though about seven or eight more seats were up on the stage. Kennedy noted that it's 40 years since A New Hope was shot, largely here in London, to much applause.

"A Star Wars Story is an amazing opportunity to tell stories inside this incredible universe," Kennedy explained. "These standalone movies can explore different characters, different places, different times, different everything."

She explained what she loves about Gareth Edwards' style, the way that he directs making a very "immersive experience" for viewers.

Edwards watched A New Hope so many times that he wore out his Betamax tape. "It's unbelievable to know that I'm up here on this stage right now." Describing a particularly big day for him, Mark Hamill came on set to visit, and wore a Godzilla shirt at the same time. "I have no idea what I was saying to him, but I was just looking in my peripheral vision saying please, God, let someone be taking a picture of this!"

Knoll, CCO of ILM, said that he had the general idea of this film back when the live-action TV show was in development, but it was dropped because it didn't fit the timeline (the TV series, of course, never came to be). "Finally, I made this informal pitch to a friend of mine, and he said I needed to make a meeting with Kathy and Kiri to pitch it."

Concept art was shown, with a group that was originally going to include a large green alien creature - he didn't make the cut of the team.

"It's grounded in this piece of history that every fan knows happened," Kiri Hart said of the reason this particular story was picked as their first standalone film. "There are story elements that feel really connected and familiar to Star Wars fans."

A planet called Scarif was revealed - that's the paradise world they filmed in the Maldives. Several members of the Maldivan Army played Stormtroopers for them.

A new poster was revealed, and then the cast took the stage: Diego Luna, Riz Ahmed, Felicity Jones, Donnie Yen, Jiang Wen, Alan Tudyk, Mads Mikkelsen, and Forest Whitaker all came out, the whole principal cast! Ben Mendelsohn then came out in full costume as the villain Director Krennic, flanked by Deathtroopers.

The clip was shown next, showing quick shots of all the principal characters, and a behind-the-scenes look. Stormtroopers, some with new helmets and visors, and tons of incredible actually-built sets - and then the feed broke, and Christie had to vamp a bit.

A new action figure for Jyn Erso was revealed, and presented to Felicity, who was very excited about it, then the individual characters were spotlighted.

Cassian was first up, with Luna talking about the character, a Rebel whose best friend is K-2SO, the Imperial droid reprogrammed by the Rebellion and played by Alan Tudyk.

Tudyk took over, and he did the entire film in mocap suits. He narrated a B-t-S clip of Kaytoo being handed a pack by Jyn, and dropping it, showing his attitude a bit. When Tudyk met Anthony Daniels at the Force Awakens panel, he said, Daniels asked "Are you in a suit, or CGI?" "I'm CGI," Tudyk replied. "You shit," Daniels replied.

Tudyk also told a story about swimming in the Maldives with a whale shark, whom he named Karen.

Edwards talked about filming in Canary Wharf, where they had only four hours to shoot long chase scenes, and did it all in one night.

Riz Ahmed was next, talking about how "these films attract the best talent across the board, and also Alan" to lots of laughs. His character Bodhi is wearing an Imperial patch in his photos. "Bodhi is a pilot, and he works for the Empire to earn a living. You know, people work for big organizations and don't believe in everything they do! He's kind of questioning things. The planet that he's from is an occupied planet, and it makes him question his career counselor."

Bodhi's home planet, Jedha is where we'll meet Wen and Yen's characters as well. Jedha is home to new characters who are essentially Force religion fundamentalists. Chirrut, played by Yen, is a blind warrior, the "baddest" of them. Baze, played by Wen, "has a gun." After lots of laugh, he said, "his weapons are very huge." The characters are partners, but Baze is not a believer in the Force, while Chirrut is. "He's a thinker, I'm a doer."

Whittaker talked next about Saw Gerrera, a character that first debuted on Star Wars: The Clone Wars. He's the leader of an extremist group of Rebels, "who will by any means necessary save the world." Whittaker watched Gerrera's appearances on The Clone Wars to prep for the role.

George Lucas also visited Gareth Edwards and the set, saw a cut of the movie, and gave him some great feedback. "I want to say, none of this would have happened if not for George Lucas," Edwards said to great applause. "I challenge you to have a more surreal experience than showing George Lucas your Star Wars film."

Galen Erso, played by Mads was next, saying, "He's a scientist who at one time invented something so beautiful it might change the universe."

Mendelsohn returned to the stage, saying, "I'd love to answer your questions, but I've been in communication with the Emperor, and the Sizzle is back online."

The full reel played this time, which you can see on the site as well. Edwards was literally hands-on with some of the cameras at times. "We're making a film that's right touching my favorite film of all time," he said in the clip. New aliens and creatures and droids were revealed, as well. It ended with Jyn Erso saying, "May the Force Be With Us!"

Krennic is "smarter, I think, than most of his predecessors, more inventive."

Of course, Darth Vader is also in the film. "I got a very early Christmas present. We finished filming in December, and I went to New York to do a voiceover recording with a gentleman called James Earl Jones," Edwards said. He joked that he "can't tell you who he plays." In the recording booth with Jones and Skywalker Sound's Matt Wood, when Jones said "Power" he and Wood had "a nerdgasm."

Kathleen Kennedy remained on the stage when everyone left. She offered "a little glimpse of what's coming." Of course, technical glitches being what they are, the same video from earlier in the panel was shown again. Then, the real clip came.

It starts with Jyn as a little girl running. "There's not much time. Every day, we grow weaker, while they grow stronger. This is our chance" she says in narration "To make a real difference." During the narration, we see many scenes of battle and the Empire's tyrrany. We see new locations, an X-Wing flying on a forest-heavy planet, new aliens, new shuttle craft, more Deathtroopers, the Death Star... And then suddenly it cuts to... VADER, BREATHING, STANDING OVER A DISPLAY. The clip ended there, with Vader's reflection on the panel (presumably on the Death Star), and his breath echoing.