Lucasfilm and Disney offered their official presentation in Hall H at San Diego’s annual Comic-Con tonight. As I’m not there personally, I’ll be filing this report based on information from reporters Big Shiny Robot! has inside of Hall H, as well as other online and social media coverage of the event.
In the moments leading up to the panel, Gwendoline Christie, who is playing Captain Phasma announced her own twitter emoji by using the #phasma. #KyloRen got an emoji earlier in the day, leading people to speculate that villains would be the focus of this Hall H presentation.
- JJ Abrams reports that he has a cut of the film completed, but that he’s “fine-tuning” it.
- Abrams confirms that he’s shown scenes and sequences of the film to John Williams for scoring.
- The aim of JJ Abrams was to do “what delights us.”
At some point, Bobbajo, the trader from Jakku, was brought out onto the stage.
Abrams then promised that there would be no full trailer until the fall, but offered a making of documentary instead. Mark Hamill seemed to have the most take away quotes from it. Here is a rundown of some of the things people there saw in the video:
- There were shots of Kylo Ren coming down on a lander
- Shots of Poe Dameron being taken to a prison (?)
- Flametroopers flaming buildings
- Simon Pegg as a creature in the film
- Han and Rey in the cockpit of the Millennium Falcon
- Leia with braids
Then Boyega, Ridley, and Issac took to the stage. Ridley set out to discuss all of the training she’s done for the film.
Oscar Issac related a story about asking Harrison Ford for tips on piloting in “Star Wars” and Ford told him, “It’s fake. And also it’s in space, so the same stuff doesn’t apply.”
Kathleen Kennedy, after a fan question, committed to more diversity in “Star Wars.” Then Abrams commented that “Star Wars” isn’t “simply an intellectual property, but a story. These are characters we love.”
John Boyega said his favorite story from the set was bringing Harrison Ford to a Nigerian restaurant. Someone came up and asked, “Are you Harrison Ford?” To which Ford replied, “I used to be.”
Then Adam Driver, Domnhall Gleeson, and Gwendoline Christie take the stage.
- Gleeson is playing a bad guy named “General Hux”
- Driver insists that Kylo Ren is “right” but not evil.
- Gleeson on his character, “I’m British, so he’s evil.”
- The base General Hux commands is referred to as “The Starkiller Base”
- Christie found it “exciting that underneath that armor was a woman.”
- JJ Abrams shoots down rumors of Darth Plaugeis appearing in the film.
Carrie Fisher was then brought out onto the stage and commented that returning to a “Star Wars” set was like an acid flashback.
Then Mark Hamill was brought out:
Hamill then offers an appreciation of the fans. “Without you, we’re nothing.”
And of course, Harrison Ford came out and offered Carrie Fisher a kiss.
When asked what it felt like returning to the set, Ford said it should have felt ridiculous, but it actually felt great. “The company was the right company, the director was the right director, Larry wrote a great story… I was proud and grateful. It’s a natural progression from the stories we told in the first three.”
He also spoke about how well written the script was and got emotional thinking about the first “Star Wars” which was the start of his working career.
The panel ended with JJ Abrams telling everyone in Hall H that they’re leaving the Hall and going to a “Star Wars” concert. It seemed as though new music from “The Force Awakens” would be debuting.
Oh, and here’s the behind the scenes reel: