Most people remember Star Wars: The Force Awakens ending with Rey discovering Luke Skywalker, extending her lightsaber-holding arm toward him. It’s one of the more memorable moments, but Rian Johnson, director of Star Wars: The Last Jedi, said there was an important part of the scene in question that he asked director J.J. Abrams to change.
Rey wasn’t alone, though; she was accompanied by R2-D2, Luke’s right-hand droid. Johnson told Entertainment Weekly that Abrams originally had BB-8 accompany Rey to go find Luke. When Johnson found the information out, he personally asked Abrams to switch the droids around.
“The big [favor] was, I asked if R2 could come with Rey, and if BB-8 could stay behind with the Resistance,” Johnson says. “Originally it was BB-8 who went with Rey, which makes sense for the story in a way. But I asked, ‘Can you do me this solid and switch the droids?’”
As a result, BB-8 remained by Finn’s side while he lay comatose at the Resistance’s base while R2-D2 was reunited with his closest friend. Johnson added that when he sat down to start planning The Last Jedi, his primary concern was always Luke. Having the character reunited with R2-D2 helped to create the setting.
“Why did Luke Skywalker go off to this island?” Johnson said. “That was the starting point, and that’s what the entire movie explores … There has to be a good reason that makes sense to him [to run away] — and to some degree makes sense to us.”
Johnson and the cast of The Last Jedi debuted the first trailer for the movie at Star Wars Celebration last month. The film will be released on Dec. 15.
Comments
So he got involved early enough to make the change that R2 goes with Rey at the end instead of BB-8, but didn’t think to have them change Kylo’s face wound before the film came out?
By JohnGreenArt on 05.05.17 11:06am
One is a potentially momentous story point while the other is a nit-pick.
By Jigabachi on 05.05.17 11:33am
Right. At the same time I can imagine that if the whole scene knowledge came by him reading the script, then that battle scene read vague enough that he didn’t know the far-reaching implications of what it would mean for him visually. Imagine seeing:
Kylo staggers to his feet and latches onto Rey’s wrists, pushing her saber upwards into the air. She struggles to find her balance, then throws her weight into Kylo’s wrist plunging his saber into the snow. Kylo watches in disbelief. Rey frees her hand and slashes Kylo’s face, knocking him on his back into the snow. He gasps in agony as the scar burns onto his face.
He probably had no knowledge what it looked like, the size of it, etc.
By DigitalKitsune on 05.05.17 12:35pm
Actually the script was probably much more sparsely written than this.
By Lurg on 05.05.17 5:37pm
Yeah. Scripts are written in a very particular way, with a lose goal of each page representing one minute of film time. Of course, the process of translating that script into a film ends up throwing that ratio off pretty often.
By gameryamen on 05.05.17 10:13pm
If it were a nit-pick then they wouldn’t have needed to change it.
By benoit93 on 05.05.17 9:42pm
Probably depends on when they shot the various scenes, and who was available for reshoots (as well as what sets were available). It would have been hard to reshoot the Kylo Ren injury if they didn’t have that forest available for reshoots. The droid switch could have been handled mostly with CG and film editing.
By MDaniels5 on 05.05.17 12:06pm
Is that surprising? As I remember, he said they changed Kylo’s scar after trying out the original location and seeing it looked weird. Which would imply it happened after filming began. The droids thing sounds like it happened while they were still just planning episode 8 and episode 7 was still in the works.
By MarcusMaximus on 05.05.17 12:12pm
Honestly why does anyone care exactly what Kylo’s face wound looks like? Makes no meaningful difference to the plot whatsoever.
By joemitz on 05.05.17 12:43pm
what gets me is that everyone’s crying about the scar forgetting that if they used a bacta tank to heal his wounds from the fight, pretty sure a blast from a bowcaster would need bacta to help heal it, that it reduces scarring by a considerable amount.
By spriggsy93 on 05.05.17 1:30pm
I didn’t even THINK about Luke reuniting with R2D2 but now I want it so bad.
By adubyawubya on 05.05.17 11:06am
Interesting that this even needed to be a switch, BB-8 is Poe’s droid anyway so it makes sense he would stay with the Resistance. Why would he suddenly follow Rey around?
By sharkfood on 05.05.17 11:17am
Because, if I remember correctly, BB-8 spends most of the movie closer to Rey than Poe. I think that to the viewer, BB-8 and Rey might "feel" closer than BB-8 and Poe, even if it’s clearly not the case if we look at the bigger picture.
By Blamwellamum on 05.05.17 12:04pm
Rey saved BB-8.
It’s similar to what happened with R2-D2. Leia had some ownership of R2, but in the ensuing adventure to reunite R2 with Leia, R2 becomes Luke’s droid.
By Lurg on 05.05.17 5:40pm
Nobody cares
dr
By Vince604 on 05.05.17 11:17am
Don’t worry, I care enough for both of us.
By Otakusensei on 05.05.17 11:27am
It makes sense for Rey to bring both the lightsaber and R2D2 in order to convince Luke that she is someone who should have his attention.
Besides, it is still unclear if Rey is connected to Luke in some other way.
By Lerkero on 05.05.17 12:24pm
A force user who was mysteriously abandoned by her parents on Tattooine? Yeah, I feel like they are linked in some way.
By owarren on 05.06.17 8:21am
You know, now it makes sense. I always wondered why BB-8 stayed behind but always thought exactly the point though, Rey is finding Luke and R2 is his droid.
By Blue 100612 on 05.05.17 1:46pm
Well, of course. R2-D2 is the main character of Star Wars.
By PraxJarvin on 05.06.17 12:29am
and it was R2 who was brought to Ben Kenobi by Luke
By Gloot on 05.06.17 4:42pm