Here’s Why Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker Cut the Eye of Webbish Bog Scene

Ahead of the release of Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, rumors emerged that a sequence in the film would include a spider-like creature, only for the theatrically released film to be devoid of such a beast, though creature and special make-up effects creative supervisor Neal Scanlan confirmed that the monster was created and a scene was filmed featuring this “Eye of Webbish Bog,” but it was ultimately cut out due to the film’s run time. The sequence won’t entirely be erased from the history of the franchise, as it can be found in the official novelization of the movie, but with the film’s home video release not including any deleted scenes, viewers might never get to see the live-action sequence.

“I think it maybe was too lengthy an explanation for something that [director J.J. Abrams] was able to explain in the movie much quicker, eventually,” Scanlan confirmed with Collider. “J.J.’s movies move very quickly don’t they, and it was all part of Kylo Ren’s journey and I think he just felt that there was too much time being spent on something which he explained much quicker. So that’s all it was, really. Run time is always my biggest fear on any movie. So much of what we do, so much of what we shoot — and I’m sure this is the same for every department — you invest so much time and love in it and you hope it’ll make the final cut, but it doesn’t always do that because the movie would be four hours long. Which would be great! (laughs).”

The creature lived on Mustafar, which is where the film’s opening scene was set, which is a detail that most viewers were completely oblivious to, given how different the planet looked from how we last saw it in Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith. Despite the beast not being seen in the finished film, Scanlan is hoping it could somehow be repurposed for another corner of the galaxy far, far away.

“I hope that we can maybe bring that back in some way shape or form on the TV series [The Mandalorian] or that we can revisit that character in some way, because it was a haunting image and a very unusual image,” Scanlan confessed. “But one which I think was incredibly Star Wars. So yeah, somewhere there’s footage of that.”

Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker lands on Digital HD on March 17th and on 4K Ultra HD, Blu-ray, and DVD on March 31st. Season Two of The Mandalorian is currently in production for an October release.

Do you hope we get to see the creature at some point in the future? Let us know in the comments below or contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter to talk all things Star Wars and horror!