Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker Originally Had Luke Skywalker in a Bigger Role

Star Wars fans had a metric tonne of information dropped on their heads this week as one of Colin Trevorrow’s original script for Episode IX leaked to the public. One of the most interesting additions that fans might want to take note of is how much more Luke Skywalker fans would have gotten in this version of the story. First off, Luke’s force ghost would have haunted Kylo Ren over the course of the movie. His visit to Mustafa, in particular, would have been a point of emphasis for the film’s treatment of the Jedi master. Another interesting tidbit would be that force Luke legitimately trains Rey in this version of the story. Something people really wanted out of the second installment of the trilogy but didn’t unfold how the fanbase would have liked.

Rey also ends up having a bit of a heated argument with Luke about balance as it relates to the Force. She calls into question how the light is ever supposed to stand a chance when it is swallowed by the dark over and over again. The biggest change present might be that Rey doesn’t end up being a Palpatine at all. Leia and Rey confront the idea of her being a nobody and she is fortified in her decision to embrace being the first of her kind by the general in a touching moment. J.J. Abrams has been quick to defend the film and his process.

“When Larry Kasdan and I were writing The Force Awakens, we had many discussions about what we thought might happen down the line, but we were just scrambling to get that film on its feet,” Abrams explained to BBC Radio’s Simon Mayo. “And then Rian Johnson came in and did Last Jedi — I’m a big fan of his — and he did his film and we, obviously, over the years [had discussions]. I was not supposed to do Episode IX at that point, so I was just the audience. And I was watching it and loving it. And then Kathy Kennedy called and said, ‘Will you come back and do Episode IX?’”

“A lot of what we ended up doing were things that we had been discussing, a lot of things we had not discussed, and we assimilated and sort of synthesized what Rian had done,” Abrams continued as he spoke about how the process unfolded. “So it was a combination of an ongoing conversation, things that we had been thinking about for years. And also, suddenly it wasn’t far away, it was now. And we had three fewer months to make this film than Force Awakens, so from the beginning of it, it was a bit of a trot.”

Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker is now in theaters.