The new Star Wars: The Force Awakens trailer is here, and you know what that means: We’re breaking it down! And it’s important both for what we see, and what we don’t.
Also interesting is the structure of the trailer and who it focuses on: We get three distinct introductions to Rey, Finn, and Kylo Ren. Rey kicks off the trailer as she goes through that wrecked and abandoned Star Destroyer. If you pay close attention in this series of shots, you’re going to notice a lot of props and setpieces from A New Hope. Not just that, but notice that the shots echo certain shots of the Death Star sequence in that movie:
Equally of interest is the voiceover in these shots. Rey is just somebody who wants to live in solitude on a desert planet. Hmmmm. Sounds familiar!
Just to underline how long it’s been, there’s a rusted-out prop and a ship we see flying away in the distance. Something Rey seems to long for, oddly:
Next, we meet Finn, a stormtrooper who, in his own words, doesn’t have anything to fight for. And who, also, appears to get stuck on Jakku thanks to either Imperial malice or bad luck when the TIE fighter he’s flying crashes:
Again, we have the echoes of A New Hope; but instead of a droid in an escape pod, it’s a stormtrooper in a TIE fighter… and one he may have used to trash a hangar before he left, if you remember the previous trailer. Anyway, he crashes on Jakku:
Where, of course, he’s going to meet Rey. But we move on to Finn’s nominal boss, Kylo Ren. Who is all about Vader, something the trailer emphasizes right from the first shot, and has him explaining to Vader’s melted face mask that he’ll finish what Vader started.
Aaaaand then we’re introduced to Poe Dameron in a torture scene:
Of particular interest, Kylo makes the famous “These aren’t the droids you’re looking for” gesture, implying he’s either got the Force to some degree, or is faking it quite effectively. Either way, it fades right into this:
From what we see later in the trailer, those of you who called the movie taking place at least somewhere on Yavin seem to be right. It looks quite a bit like Kylo’s still upset over that skirmish with the Death Star.
That segues right into that dogfight on Jakku that filled so many of us with joy in the first trailer, and Rey asking Han if the stories about him were true. Which puts Han in the odd position of being the old man with a wild story… and also seems to rule out the rumors that Rey is Han’s daughter, because neither of them seem to know each other that well.
From there, we go to the Knights of Ren preparing for battle:
A lakeside battle with X-Wings attacking a First Order position:
Finn and Rey nearly getting blown up:
A visit to a Rebel base:
And then we segue to the one shot of Luke we get in the entire trailer:
But that’s not what’s interesting. What is interesting is that the next few shots, including one with Captain Phasma, seem to take place on the same planet:
We see other shots with similar lighting and environment as well, so Kylo and his buddies might be trying to kill Luke. That’ll end well, we’re sure. We have a few more action and reaction shots not worth breaking down here, and one particularly interesting dogfight shot:
That sure looks like the Starkiller we saw on the poster that was released last weekend. You’d think the First Order would learn from the Empire’s mistakes and not use trenches. We’d also be remiss if we didn’t note Leia’s one shot:
And a final moment that really needs a GIF:
See you all Dec. 18.
