Star Wars: Age of Resistance Special Explains Controversial The Last Jedi Moment

Fans were looking forward to Star Wars: The Last Jedi as it marked the return of Luke Skywalker after Star Wars: Return of the Jedi. Rather than the film delivering the storylines and themes that many audiences were expecting, the film circumvented those expectations, as it attempted to reinvent elements of the saga in order to push the franchise forward. Fans who didn’t enjoy the movie fixated on the various new elements of the franchise as evidence of why it was a failure, including a moment in which Vice Admiral Amilyn Holdo (Laura Dern) used a Resistance ship to eviscerate a First Order fleet. The new comic Star Wars: Age of Resistance Special explains how Holdo may have conceived the idea.

WARNING: Spoilers below for Star Wars: Age of Resistance Special

The issue consists of three stories, which focus on the different adventures of Maz Kanata, BB-8, and Holdo. In Holdo’s story, her Resistance ship comes under attack, resulting in higher ranking officials being killed or otherwise incapacitated, putting the pressure of leadership on Holdo. Holdo’s plan involves using the ship’s cannons to fire into a First Order Star Destroyer’s docking bay to damage it enough to allow her ship to fly right through it.

While the story doesn’t directly connect this event to what would happen in The Last Jedi, it does demonstrate Holdo’s quick-thinking and penchant for unconventional attacks, while also drawing a distinct connection to Holdo being aware that flying your ship through an enemy’s vessel could cripple it.

In addition to some fans disliking Holdo’s entire character, her specific decision to sacrifice herself in The Last Jedi didn’t sit well with some viewers, as the maneuver’s effectiveness might have been useful at other times in the history of the galaxy far, far away. According to writer/director Rian Johnson, the moment in the film was meant to serve as a callback to a line Han Solo delivered in the original trilogy.

“I’m sure that a lot of fans had thought ever since Han was talking about how if you don’t get the calculations right you could go through [a star],” Johnson explained to the Empire Film Podcast. “I always wanted to see what that would look like and the guys at ILM at some point, somebody hit upon that exposure idea of everything going silent. Because we were struggling with how do we make this visually impressive and when somebody hit on that, and that came up on the screen, we were just like, ‘Ohhh, this is going to be cool.”

Star Wars: Age of Resistance Special is on sale now.

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