Star Wars: Will Poe Replace Leia as the Leader of the Resistance Following 'The Last Jedi'?

Given Carrie Fisher's untimely passing at the end of last year, Star Wars fans have been left wondering how filmmakers will say goodbye to the character and what that will mean for Episode IX. When speaking with USA Today, The Last Jedi writer/director Rian Johnson teased that it could be Oscar Isaac's Poe Dameron who takes a leadership role in the Resistance going forward.

"He's also got some growing to do. Poe's got to grow," Johnson shared about the pilot's leadership abilities. "[Leia] definitely saw that potential in him and in The Last Jedi, we dig into that more. We've seen how heroic he is and now we're going to see him challenged in terms of stepping up to the next level. It takes more than heroics to be a leader, or so I'm told."

While Johnson might seem confident about Poe's abilities, new character biographies on the film's official Japanese website hint that Poe might not be entirely ready to take on the responsibility.

"Now that the conflict between the First Order and the Resistance has escalated into total war, Poe is a shining as a leader of a courageous flying battalion," Poe's biography reads. "But while he is brave and a skilled pilot, both the First Order and the Resistance alike are starting to fear his dedication to the war effort."

The character's skills aren't under criticism with these details, but this new information also implies that the pilot could take some risky maneuvers that might expose the Resistance's weaknesses to the First Order, while the First Order seemingly is fearful of the pilot's ruthlessness.

Poe isn't the only character poised to take leadership of the Resistance, as The Last Jedi will also introduce audiences to Vice Admiral Holdo, played by Laura Dern.

"The secrecy does have a purpose in that part of the fun with Laura's character, with Admiral Holdo, is figuring out what her relationship is to everybody as you go along through the movie," Johnson told Entertainment Weekly earlier this year about how little we know about Holdo.

The director continued, "I don't want to tip the hat too much, but I will say that the heat is immediately turned up on the Resistance."

"Everybody is put in a pressure cooker right away, and relationships crack and strain under that pressure," Johnson pointed out about potential conflicts between characaters.. "That was really interesting to me, the notion of putting this small army under a lot of external pressure and showing some of the results within the Resistance itself."

We'll find out more when The Last Jedi hits theaters December 15.

[H/T USA Today]