The new 'Star Wars: The Force Awakens' trailer is epic
Posted Monday, October 19, 2015 at 10:14 PM Central
Last updated Friday, October 23, 2015 at 3:44 PM Central
by John Couture
Finally, the trailer that some of us have been waiting over 30 years for has arrived. The last trailer for Star Wars: The Force Awakens debuted last night during the Monday Night Football (MNF) game on ESPN and it has set off quite a disturbance in the Force.
This is the first trailer to feature most of the principals both visually and verbally and what they say and do tells us volumes about what to expect for the upcoming Star Wars film. And yet, what exactly do we know, really?
Before we get into it too much, it's probably better to make sure that you have actually seen the trailer. If you haven't watched it yet, here it is. If you've already seen it, why not watch it 10 more times?
First, my colleague Tim was skeptical of the trailer's debut during MNF claiming that it seemed like the first misstep in an otherwise perfect marketing plan. On the contrary, I find the choice to debut the trailer in this fashion to be quite inspired. Think about it. The main complaint from the prequel trilogy was the over-the-top pandering to young kids. So much so, that in many ways, the true spirit of Star Wars was lacking in these films.
By making a conscious choice to debut the trailer late during a football game, your targeted audience is exactly those young kids who grew up on the original films and are now diehard sports fans in their middle age. This is not a film shamefully masquerading as just another marketing tool to get you to fork out more money for sub par offerings.
Also, by debuting the trailer at night with the call to action at the end that tickets are on sale now, it creates a massive impulse to purchase tickets right then and there. So much for the days of camping out in front of a theater for months just to be the first fan to witness the atrocity that was Jar Jar Binks. Was it effective? Well, demand was so great last night that it crashed several ticket-selling sites, including the behemoth Fandango.com.
Things look to be back to normal, smooth operations this morning as I was just able to secure my marathon ticket for December 17. Yes, that's right, I'm going to sit in a theater for nearly 20 hours to watch all seven Star Wars films back-to-back. Don't worry, I'm sure that I'll live-tweet the experience (in between movies or during bathroom breaks) for everyone to enjoy.
As for the trailer itself, there's so much going on that we need to break it down to properly digest it all. It's clear that this film is going to be a story that follows Daisy Ridley's Rey and John Boyega's Finn. In the latest trailer, Rey is the first character on screen and really dominates the action in the entire thing. That's a nice symmetry to Finn popping up in the first trailer (quite literally) and kicking off the action in that trailer.
I think it's clear that these two are destined to come together and go on a quest of some sort together. Rey is a scavenger and it's clear that BB-8 is her droid. There's a nice shot of her tinkering and looking off longingly to a ship departing the planet. If that doesn't scream a parallel to Luke and his desire to be a part of something bigger at the start of Star Wars, then I'd eat a Tauntaun.
FEMALE (possibly Leia/Maz Kanata): Who are you?
REY: I'm no one.
A shot of the First Order, what is presumed to be one of the last and probably largest remnants of the Empire in the galaxy. Much like the events portrayed in the book STAR WARS: AFTERMATH, it's clear that the Empire didn't just roll over and relinquish control over to the rebels. Here we meet up with Finn and it's clear that he's a stormtrooper that is wavering with his allegiance to the First Order. His tie-fighter is shot down over a desert planet, most likely Jakku, and he crash lands on the planet.
FINN: I was raised to do one thing... but I've got nothing to fight for.
Now it's time to meet the main adversary to our heroes, Kylo Ren. If there were any doubts that Adam Driver was perfectly cast as the villain, they are vanquished in the next 30 seconds. Finn is seen holding the melted mask of Darth Vader and talking to it in a creepy tone.
KYLO: Nothing will stand in our way. I will finish what you started.
Next up, Kylo is seen reaching out towards a very upset Poe Dameron who may have just been tortured. It's clear that he's captured at some point by the First Order and/or Kylo Ren.
There's a brief shot of some sort of weapon being used to completely devastate a forest. Trees are being uprooted and it's not difficult to imagine that the weapon is the one from the new poster (see above to the right) that looks like a modified Death Star.
There's a quick shot of the Millennium Falcon in a dogfight with a few Tie Fighters. This leads to a shot of Han with Rey and Finn on board the Falcon with a fancy hologram map between them showing some planets seemingly floating in mid-air.
REY: There are stories about what had happened.
HAN: It's true... all of it.
There's so much going on in these 10 seconds. First, it's clear again that the overall theme from STAR WARS: AFTERMATH continues through the intervening 25 years or so. We accept everything from the original films because we saw them and we were on that same journey with Luke, Leia and Han, but they were only three people in a galaxy full of billions of people and creatures. Again, it wasn't a simple transition of power and there was as much misinformation going around as real news. For someone from the backwoods planet of Jakku, it was simply hearsay and at the end of the day, she's probably more concerned about her own personal survival than intergalactic politics.
Then you have to take a step back and realize what is being said and where. In practically the same location where Han was quick to dismiss the Force as simply being a hokey religion in Star Wars, here he is affirming everything to a new batch of true believers. That makes for quite the satisfying little arc for those of us who grew up on the original films and always knew that Han would be able to move beyond his rogueish ways to grow into the antihero we always hoped that he would become.
The Millennium Falcon goes into hyperspace and the words "This Christmas" appear on the screen. What follows is a quick splicing of shots. First Kylo Ren is standing in the rain with his lightsaber drawn and ignited. There appear to be others standing behind him who dress in much the same fashion as Kylo. Are these more Knights of Ren?
X-Wing ships are flying over a lake headed into battle with stormtroopers who are assuming an attack position in the ruins of a base (?) that they just destroyed. Finn and Oscar Isaac's Poe Dameron share a moment amid the chaos of the aftermath (or buildup) to that same battle. There are a lot of Resistance fighters and X-Wings.
HAN: The Dark Side... The Jedi, they're real.
There are shots of Finn and Rey running on Jakku with explosions. Han is leading Rey, Finn and BB-8 up to a temple of some sort with many several colorful flags hanging in the courtyard. They pass a large droid that catches Finn's attention. A shot of Luke (presumably) reaching out his robotic hand and placing it on R2-D2 while a fire roars just off screen. A ship lands at night in the middle of a chaotic First Order battle. We get our first shot of Captain Plasma.
Kylo Ren is striking his menacing lightsaber toward an unseen opponent. There's a quick cut to a crying Rey who looks up and it would appear that she's just lost everything that she's ever cared about.
The next scene moves across Finn, Chewbacca and Han who are being held as prisoners by the First Order. Their arms are up, but they are all looking into the sky and slowly they are bringing their arms down as if their salvation has just arrived.
LEIA/MAZ KANATA?: The Force. It's calling to you.
A shot of BB-8 in Poe Dameron's X-Wing as a massive squad of Tie-Fighters is closing on their position dissolves into a shot of Poe in the cockpit. Various battle scenes close out the trailer including more X-Wing and Tie-Fighter battles and First Order stormtroopers leading a ground assault. There's a great action shot of a pissed off Rey firing a modified blaster that looks like a sawed-off shotgun.
There's a great scene of Leia hugging Han while they are surrounded by the regiments from the Resistance. The last shot features Kylo Ren and Finn getting ready to have a lightsaber battle in that snowy forest.
LEIA/MAZ KANATA?: Just let it in.
There's so much to like about this trailer, but the biggest takeaway for me is that J.J. Abrams is basically saying, 'hey remember all that Midichlorian crap from the prequels? Yeah, you can throw all of that into the trash.' It's clear to me that the last two lines from Leia show that the Force is mystical again and it's something that can call to people, but they must be willing to let it in.
I'm sure we could get into a semantical debate about how the Force can both be a physical manifestation and a mystical state, but that misses the point. This trailer shows that these films are fun again. More than that, they are not just films aimed at selling toys or launching the franchise with a new generation. This looks to be another epic adventure between good and evil, just like the film that kicked this entire beast into motion.
At this point, the December 18 release of Star Wars: The Force Awakens seems a few parsecs away. While we wait, enjoy the reactions of Daisy Ridley and John Boyega when they first saw the trailer last night via their respective Instagram accounts.