Test 2

The Force Dyad appears to be an entirely natural phenomenon. According to Charles Soule's tie-in comic The Rise of Kylo Ren, it first manifested when Ben Solo began to surrender to the dark side. He was locked in a duel with the leader of the Knights of Ren, and abandoned himself to the darkness for the first time; far away, on the desert planet of Jakku, a young desert rat named Rey suddenly felt cold. It's clear, then, that the Dyad was created by the express will of the Force itself, rather than from intervention by any third party.

The Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker Visual Dictionary stresses the Dyad can be cultivated. That happened years later, when Kylo Ren captured Rey in Star Wars: The Force Awakens, and attempted to probe her mind. This fits perfectly with Jason Fry's novelization of Star Wars: The Last Jedi, in which he explained this was how Rey learned so much about the Force so fast.

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It's telling that, immediately after the Dyad had been cultivated, Rey was able to use a Jedi mind trick to escape her cell on Starkiller Base; shortly after, she was able to match Kylo Ren in a duel.

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The morality of Star Wars is usually quite simple, with a strong dichotomy between light and dark. The Jedi are seen as servants of the light side of the Force, while the Sith are of the dark. But it's increasingly becoming clear this is a perversion of the original Jedi teachings; Star Wars: The Last Jedi featured a mural showing the Prime Jedi, and it showed a teacher whose philosophy was very different. Light and dark were given equal prominence in the mural, with the Prime Jedi representing the darkness in the light, and the light in the darkness. This was supported by Cavan Scott's audiobook Dooku: Jedi Lost, which revealed the ancient Jedi treated balance as a separate aspect of the Force, like light and dark.

Rey and Ben Solo both know the light and dark sides of the Force. However hard Rey attempts to commit to the light, there is still anger and pain bubbling up within her - explosively so, when she unleashed Force Lightning in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. Ben Solo, meanwhile, has never been able to quiet the siren song of the light side of the Force. Palpatine intended Han Solo's murder to push Kylo to the dark side beyond the point of no return, but Han sabotaged it by his willingness to die for his son, unwittingly ensuring Ben never truly committed to the dark side. Like the Prime Jedi, both Rey and Ben are the light in the darkness, and the darkness in the light. The more they grew in the Force, the stronger their Dyad bond became.

Mandalorian armor is famous in the Star Wars universe. The armor plates themselves can withstand blaster shots, as we see in The Mandalorian, and can even protect the wearer from the glancing blow of a lightsaber — which can be seen in the Legacy of Mandalore episode of Star Wars: Rebels when Gar Saxon is disarmed. Despite this impressive protection, the armor also remains surprisingly light, allowing the wearer to remain agile and maneuverable. In some cases, the strength of the metal could lead to sets of Mandalorian armor that lasted hundreds of years. In Star Wars: Rebels, Sabine Wren’s armor is 500 years old.

The unique properties of the armor are due in large part to the Beskar metal that it’s made with. Beskar, also known as Mandalorian iron, is one of the toughest and rarest metals in the galaxy. In The Mandalorian’s first episode, we get a brief glimpse of Beskar in the form of the metal bar that the Mandalorian hands the Armorer. The Armorer takes the bar and turns it into a new pauldron for the Mandalorian. With Beskar more rare, and many Mandalorians spread out across the galaxy, it seems that not even the Mandalorian’s armor is quite complete.

Beskar is extremely rare. While we don’t have the details in the official canon anymore, the pre-Disney “Legends” stories explained that it could only be mined on Mandalore, the home planet of the Mandalorians, or its moon, Concordia. According to the Armorer, the metal was likely taken during the Great Purge — also known as Order 66, Chancellor Palpatine’s directive to the clone army to kill all Jedi.

The first live-action Star Wars series will take place a few years after Return of the Jedi. Whoever the Mandalorian is under his mask, he’s no friend of the Empire. The trailer shows the Mandalorian methodically making his way through former Imperial soldiers. He also has an on-board carbon freezing chamber to deal with his targets. That makes things a lot easier when turning them in for bounties.

As is the case with all new Star Wars movies pre-release, there are more questions than answers about The Rise of Skywalker. Is the Emperor really back? Will this story retcon the details about Rey’s parents that we learned in The Last Jedi? Is Rey going to the Dark Side? Will Rey and Kylo finally stop fighting and start smooching, as so many internet fans want? How does Luke, who technically died in the previous film, figure into things? And just what the hell does that title mean? These answers will presumably be answered this December, but for now, let’s all sit back and enjoy this trailer.

credit: Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times

I am so thankful I did the build a lightsaber experience. It might be my most favorite part of Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge honestly. It can best be described as an almost religious experience for Star Wars fans. From the moment you show up at Savi’s and the gathers show you the different pieces available for your construction.

[...]

Savi’s would be amazing for a kid but is even more powerful as an adult fan. You feel strangely at one with the force and the small group of heroes (and villains) who participated in the experience with you.

But you can’t even partake in the experience unless you first purchase “the scraps” available inside Savi’s, and that isn’t the price of a cheap toy but $200 plus tax (no annual pass or castmember discounts allowed).

There are many theories for why ‘Solo: A Star Wars Story’ failed at the box office but it really came down to the marketing of the film. The film failed to sell to audiences why they should watch the origin of Han Solo, a character they recently saw die in ‘The Force Awakens’, over films such as ‘Deadpool 2’ and ‘Avengers: Infinity War’. The film needed to stand among the large competitors however the marketing did not tell audiences why they should go to the cinema to watch the film.

Following this, things went dark on the ‘Obi Wan’ movie whilst the ‘Boba Fett’ film hired director James Mangold (‘Logan’, ‘The Wolverine’) who was subsequently let go when it was announced by Kathleen Kennedy (via Erick Weber) that the film would not be going forward. It was theorised that this was because Jon Favreau’s ‘The Mandalorian’ was pushed into development for Disney+ and Lucasfilm did not wish to have two similar properties running at the same time.

However, this posed a interesting question, although the ‘Boba Fett’ film was canned, ‘The Mandalorian’ follows a similar type of character and as time went on, people begun to theorise that the ‘Obi-Wan’ film would also get transformed into a Disney+ series.

StarWarsNewsNet then released a report stating that they had been told that a ‘Obi Wan’ Series was in development for Disney+. When discussing with our sources, we were told their report was accurate regarding a ‘Obi Wan’ series likely being in early development for Disney+. It is currently unknown who will make up the writing staff, as well as who will be the showrunner. However we do know, like with all current Star Wars projects that Kathleen Kennedy will executive produce. The series is expected to be limited and only be between 6-8 episodes rather than have multiple seasons. Filming is planned to take place in Pinewood Studios, UK similar to where the film was eyed to base production.

Disney+ is gathering up a lot of interesting projects including a wave of Marvel Studios produced shows that include Loki, Vision & Scarlet Witch, and a series that would see Bucky and Falcon teaming-up.

Lucasfilm is no different they’ve already lined up two shows for the streaming service with Jon Favreau’s The Mandalorian (recently wrapped) and Diego Luna’s Cassian Andor prequel series is next up. It sounds like they’re not stopping with the two shows we’ve already heard about.

We’ve now got our hands on a list of potential Star Wars shows that could be put into development. The five shows on the list our source provided us includes streaming series focusing on characters such as Princess Leia (young), Captain Phasma, The Knights of Ren, Rose Tico, and the big standout that caught our eye was one for Sith Lord Darth Bane.

To be crystal clear this is very very early days and these are not shows about to go into production these are just ideas they’re considering internally at Lucasfilm/Disney.

There are some things here that are evident. Star Wars titles love to be the “something of the something.” We’ve had three “something of the something” titles in the first two trilogies alone: Return of the Jedi, Attack of the Clones, and Revenge of the Sith. But we’ve yet to get a “something of the something” title from this last trilogy. This has led a lot of fans to speculate that this last title could be something of that angle.

Here are some predictions:

• Rise of the Jedi: This would give us a “something of the something” title for this trilogy, and is an echo back to Return of the Jedi, a film that Abrams is likely emulating for this final chapter.
• Rise of the Resistance: Many fans are suggesting this title, but it’s already the title of one of the rides in Star Wars Galaxy’s Edge. I’m not sure I like it because it sounds more like a middle chapter, not a conclusion.
• Fall of the First Order: Seems a bit on the nose.

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Admittedly, I tried to guess the title of Episode 8, and I was very, very wrong. So I wouldn’t listen to me when it comes to this…but here are some guesses at the title for Episode 9:

• A Last Hope: I like this idea the most as it would be a good bookend to A New Hope. Rey is the last hope in the Galaxy. From what I understand, Abrams is not just ending this trilogy with this film, but trying to bring the entire nine movie arc full circle. So this title could work for that. Jacob Hall, my editor, has suggested it could also be A Final Hope or The Last Hope, although I kind of doubt they would use the word “The” at the beginning of every one of the titles in the sequel trilogy.
• The Resistance Strikes Back: This feels like something George Lucas may have created, but not Abrams. Also, it’s another title that sounds like a middle chapter of a trilogy.
• The Final Order: A suggestion from weekend editor Brad Oman, who argues that The First Order will be the last order when they are defeated and also that it could have layers to it, like a final order from Kylo Ren to stand down, and maybe it’s also the last Jedi Rrder, too.
• A Title Hidden in One of the Previous Films: Adam Frazier speculates that just as The Last Jedi was hidden in the opening text crawl in The Force Awakens, maybe the title for Episode 9 is hidden somewhere in the previous two movies: THE DARKNESS RISING, A NEW ORDER, SON OF DARKNESS, THE LAST HOPE, A SPARK OF HOPE, THE REBELLION IS REBORN.
• Ashes of the Empire: One Reddit thread agrees with Frazier’s theory and thinks it could be these words that appear a couple of lines above The Last Jedi in that original Episode VII crawl (see the image above).
• Spark of Hope: This is another idea based on something from The Last Jedi, suggesting that the galaxy hearing about Jedi Master Luke Skywalker’s return would restore a spark of hope to the fight.
• The Knights of Ren: While I do think Abrams will follow-up on this angle from The Force Awakens, I don’t think the Knights of Ren are enough to make the title for the last and final chapter.

I'm honestly not sure I love an of these ideas outside of "A Final Hope."

It feels impossible, but today wrapped photography on Episode IX. There is no adequate way to thank this truly magical crew and cast. I’m forever indebted to you all. pic.twitter.com/138AprtFuZ

— JJ Abrams (@jjabrams) February 15, 2019

Disney just bought Lucasfilm for $4 billion.

Announcing the news, Disney also said it will release a new Star Wars movie in 2015.

The movie is currently titled Star Wars: Episode 7.

That means it will take place after Return Of The Jedi.

From a press release: “Star WarsEpisode 7 is targeted for release in 2015, with more feature films expected to continue the Star Wars saga and grow the franchise well into the future.”

Traditionalists are going to scream in horror at this news, but there is a silver lining. The new films will not be produced by George Lucas – who lost his touch a long time ago.

• They really do start them young at the Jedi Academy.
• And I thought that I was a nerdy parent.
• Man, that kid must be LOADED with Midi-chlorians.
• That baby is a better actor than Jake Lloyd...