As I’ve done with past epic movie trailers, here is the 3rd set of original screengrabs from the final trailer #3 for STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS!Vol. 3: The Rest Of the Best.
As I’ve done with past epic movie trailers, here is the 2nd set of original screengrabs from the final trailer #3 for STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS!Vol. 2: Old School Ships: New Combat… And A Classic Face!
It’s here! The final poster for J.J. Abram’s trip to a galaxy far, far away has hit the internet by storm! The Star Wars: The Force Awakens poster even includes the 1st image of some fan favorites from the classic trilogy!
Waste no time and take a gander. Then we’ll talk about what you see!First off, who’s missing?
Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) of course! Luke is now the classic character most shrouded in mystery as the poster does offer our first look at Carrie Fisher as Leia (Solo?)! Why won’t they show us anymore than Luke’s metal “Winter Soldier” arm?
Front and center are the three new, younger cast members that will likely drive the movie forward (a character’s size on a poster can be very telling of their importance…), Daisy Ridley as Rey, John Boyega as the lightsaber weilding/possible Stormtrooper Finn, and the Darth Vader inspired Kylo Ren played by Adam Driver.
Below that, the whole gang’s here from classic droids C-3PO & R2-D2 to the brand new rolly polly B-88. Han Solo (Harrison Ford), Leia, and Chewbacca share a small space next to the droids, as does Oscar Isaac’s hot-shot X-Wing Pilot Poe Dameron. There’s even a new, mysterious alien hanging with the old crew; an alien whose importance was never hinted at in any of the promotional material… including the toys!
You’ve got your baddies on the very bottom; a legion of Stormtroopers led by Captain Phasma (Gwendoline Christie). No sign of Domhnall Gleeson who we’ve already seen as General Hux in promotional images, and Andy Serkis’ CGI “New Order” (formally “The Empire”) Supreme Leader Snoke remains just as mysterious as Luke Skywalker’s face.
It’s hard to miss the classic X-Wings. Tie-Fighters, and, of course, the Millennium Falcon, but what is more interesting is the Death Star looking ship in the top right corner behind Finn. That isn’t a starship, or a small moon, it’s an Arctic planet, turned into the “Starkiller” base/weapon capable of wiping out a star system. (Fun fact: in early scripts Luke Skywalker was Luke Starkiller…)
Death Star 5.0!
It needs to be mention, though the poster does recall Star Wars posters past, it is not drawn by the incomparable Drew Struzan.
With a trailer dropping tomorrow on ESPN during Monday Night Football, things are about to get really Star Warsy up in here!
Star Wars: The Force Awakens hits US screens on December 18th!
Good God, ya’ll! We’ve got a plethera of “teaser” trailers today, but of all today’s goodness, the 2nd trailer for Star Wars: The Force Awakens takes the cake!
Let’s watch it before I spoil it.
Boom! A crashed Star Destroyer and X-Wing? Check!
Melted Vader helmet? Check!
Luke’s lineage, including perhaps a child of Leia? R2-D2 and Luke’s now fully metallic fake hand? Check for both.
Who’s that in charge of that battalion of Storm Troopers? Who runs The Empire Now?
Who’s the Sith looking fellow in the mask? His name is Kylo Ren, but who is the man, behind the mask?
And who is this incredibly important looking Storm Trooper?
Further Empire development since we last saw them… thirty years ago.
And why are Han Solo and Chewbacca finally home? Is it a homecoming on the Millennium Falcon, because that sure looks like her interior.
“Fast ship? You’ve never heard of the Millenium Falcon? It’s the ship that made the Kessel run in less than twelve parsecs.”
Lot’s here to process, so let’s take a moment to enjoy it all… especially the first appearance of Han Solo and Chewbacca after so many decades!
Wow! In the past month we have been blessed with trailers for ‘Avengers: Age of Ultron,’ ‘Jurassic World,’ and NOW, ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens.!’
I honestly don’t know which movie to look forward to the most!
The new ‘Star Wars’ trailer has everything you’re looking for; fore-boarding narration (I could have sworn the opening voice-over was Benedict Cumberbatch)! New land-speeder from ‘A New Hope’ crossed with ‘Return of the Jedi’s speeder-bike! Cool new droids! A new kind of lightsaber in the hands of a possible villain on what also looks like a new planet! Stormtroopers old an new (that aren’t clones)! And the planet that started it all; Tatoonie !
Lots of classic fighters in this trailer.
Most importantly, we see the next evolution of Star Wars space-ship battles. The prequel trilogy was vastly short on fighter-ship on fighter-ship action, whereas this was the original trilogy’s bread and butter from the original Death Star run to the final… Death Star run.
J.J. Abrams and his team have revolutionized the look of classic ships flying, whether it be three X-Wings skimming across water (with a much more intense cockpit shot than we are used to), or an almost go-pro shot of the Millennium Falcon vs. classic Tie Fighters in an action scene with crazy awesome camera moves that looks unlike anything we have seen in a ‘Star Wars’ movie or even J.J.’s two ‘Star Trek’ films. It’s almost like the fluid camera that follows Spidey when he web-slings in ‘Amazing Spider-Man 2,’ which may have been a disappointing movie but had the most impressive web-slinging to date.
Revolutionary combat shots above the surface of Tatooine.
Watch the trailer now!
See! It looks like real ‘Star Wars.’ (Yet, we were all burned by ‘Phantom Menace’ which also had a great teaser.)
All it is missing is the classic team of Han Solo (Harrison Ford), Leia (Carrie Fisher), Luke (Mark Hamill), and Chewie (Peter Mayhew). And the droids! No R2-D2 or C3P-O in this trailer, yet they have been a big part of all the preceding films.
We’ll see all these old friends in the movie, but the trailer is smart to give us first glimpses of the new characters, as it seems they will be leading the show with the old cast serving as supporting actors.
That being said, maybe it is Luke in that snowy Forrest with that cross-joint lightsaber (you know… the joint from ‘Pineapple Express’). Either Luke has turned to the Dark Side, or it could be a completely different, new villain like Darth Maul. But in classic Abrams fashion… we really have no idea what is going on yet, in this scene or the rest of the trailer. All I know is it looks like classic ‘Star Wars’ made in the 21st century with ships we recognize; not the shock of the prequels with almost no familiar elements).
Luke, or not to Luke?
I also saw no CGI character that Andy Serkis may play. This is the teaser-trailer though, my friends. The movie is a year away so there will be many more trailers before December 2015.
The final interesting choice is one I noticed when the title logo was unveiled; the new film is not being called ‘Star Wars: Episode VII: The Force Awakens’ at this moment. Rather, Disney and Abrams seem to be avoiding putting the episode number in the title at all, thus far. This may get confusing with all the solo-movies coming out alongside the new trilogy, unless, perhaps, they are meant to blend together and the numbers no longer matter?
I do have faith in Abrams. I refer to him as the franchise savior as he has brought the ‘Mission: Impossible’ and ‘Star Trek’ back from the grave. I’ll let him have a get-out-of-jail-free card for the very disappointing, but still fun, ‘Super 8.’
Speaking of ‘Mission: Impossible’ we’ll have a fifth one of those December 2015 also; a movie promising a stunt that will make Dubai Tower look like breaking into Langley!
Time to get excited, geeks!
2015 is my childhood in a bottle, with new ‘Jurassic Park,’ ‘Star Wars,’ an epic comic-book film in the form of ‘Avengers: Age of Ultron’, and some more of the aforementioned ‘Mission: Impossible.’
The biggest year of geek is coming my friends. Make sure to pack an extra pair of undies.