HOLY NUGGETS!

Ok, so the second Star Wars Ep 7 trailer…

Well, I’m going to preface this rant by saying that I am not following any production information, no set photos,
no rumours, no leaked details. I am sticking entirely to the officially released info like the trailer and whatever
comes directly from JJ Abrams himself.

Now… Where to begin?

I have gone through this before, but it definitely bears repeating because it’s just so damn true… Star Wars: The
Force Awakens has, just, the best team working on it you guys. Just the fucking BEST team in the world. This second
trailer, without a doubt, is the coolest thing I have seen on a TV screen since… Well, forever.

So, let’s run through it, shall we?

Firstly, I don’t know if it was purely anticipation, but even the title screen gave me goosebumps…

Whoo, yes please. More of that.

We open similarly to the first trailer, but WAY more badass and OT style:

Oh man, the ideas this conjures up… The possibilities… What an amazing opening shot for the trailer! It just
emanates danger, hope for the rebellion, past battles paving the way for the completely changed galaxy we now live
in. Beautiful. Plus, we’re treated to the first bit of dialogue: “The force is strong in my family.”

YES. Luke Skywalker’s famous talk to Leia from Return of the Jedi, very very cool! This is an amazing way to join
the new movies to the OT as they follow on from Episode 6, and this is one of the pivotal scenes towards the end of
the film. Awesome.

And then, oh man… And then:

HOLY FUCK!

Seriously, I was completely speechless at this point. I was just gaping at the screen like a 2 year old tasting
candy for the first time. This is just the most powerful imagery they possibly could have created. Again, a strong
and meaningful connection to the original trilogy shown in a new and amazing way. We see more and more in this
trailer that the new Star Wars galaxy is it’s own rich setting, with a true weight to it, things are actually
following on from Return of the Jedi, we are witnessing the fallout of the original trilogy, not just a new story
set in the same world but that world continuing to grow and evolve. ARGH, I can’t stand how amazing this is!

And, of course, the next bit of Luke’s dialogue: “My father has it.”

This is interesting, they actually have not changed the present tense to past, despite the fact that everyone knows
Darth Vader’s demise occurred in the last movie. I’m thinking it’s just a flashback, and it doesn’t mean anything in
terms of Darth Vader being alive or anything. But seriously, that screenshot is insane. So much power, so much
weight.

YES!

Don’t get me wrong, the soccerball droid is growing on me and I can’t wait to see it in action, but R2 is a whole
other level, guys. Seeing R2 is like seeing a beloved family member after ages of no contact. You just wanna give
the adorable little droid a hug! And that mechanical hand, holy hell yes! We have to assume this is Luke, but you
never know (considering the sheer amount of hand-cut-off-ness that occurs in the Star Wars universe) and I love
wondering. But then again, the next bit of well-known dialogue jumps in right as we see this shot: “I have it.”

So… Yeah, we just saw Luke… But is it just me, or did that figure have a somewhat youngish vibe? I don’t know
why, but I just get the feeling that it’s either not Luke or there are going to be some epic flashback scenes to
somewhere after Luke got his hand severed and before TFA. Or maybe I’m just straight up wrong. Y’know, it does
happen sometimes.

THEN:

“My sister has it.”

WOO! We see our favourite, original lightsaber, being handed to some unmistakably feminine hands just as Luke
mentions Leia… Fuck yeah! This is so damn cool, I feel like the passing of the baton onto the new cast of Star
Wars characters is both metaphorical AND literal with the inclusion of this saber. This means that the saber that
started with Anakin, and was passed by Kenobi onto Luke, is now going to be in the hands of a new generation of
Skywalker Jedi. Brilliant. It also might mean that Leia has by now started using the force properly like in the EU,
which is incredibly cool.

Oh yes, oh yes. If you’ve read my rant about the first teaser you already know how I feel about these new X-Wings.
But I’ll say it again: These things ROCK. They are beautiful, they are amazingly new but still look like they come
from the Star Wars universe. They make a great homage to the classic X-Wing look but with an awesome new visual
design and, I’m just gonna say it outright, these things are better looking than the classic X-Wings. I was talking
with a good friend of mine and he mentioned that he feels that way, he sounded a bit nervous when he said it so I
think he was expecting me to be all OT purist, and spit righteous anger at him for daring to admit anything is
better that the classic designs. But honestly, I agree with him. They are just beautiful machines.

I think it’s around this point that we hear some more amazing dialogue frrom Luke: “You have that power too.”

Amazing. As my aforementioned friend said in our long chat about the trailer, this sentence is incredibly powerful
for several reasons. Firstly, it means that there is definitely a younger Skywalker, and like I said, they will
most likely receive the beloved Skywalker family lightsaber in this movie. Secondly, the screen is blank when Luke
says this line, where every line before this corresponded with an image that could match perfectly with his
statement. The fact that this line is accompanied by a blank screen is a huge and amazing message from JJ Abrams:

YOU have that power, too. You, the audience member watching this trailer. You, who have watched Star Wars and
wished to be a young Skywalker thinking you are nothing and going nowhere, introduced to the force and the Jedi and
becoming one of the most powerful beings in the galaxy. Yes, you!

YOU have that power too.

Then, we get a shot of the new crew, the younglings joining the fray:

Now, the three characters we saw in the first trailer are all together! That’s cool. Our new, ragtag group of
unlikely heroes has found each other and is… Running for their lives. I like this a lot, I really enjoy the fact
that this trailer really conveys a sense of danger and foreboding. It’s really well done, and it shows us that this
movie (and JJ) is ready to deal with heavier issues, like the aftermath of Episode 6 and how killing the evil
dictator doesn’t destroy all of the evil dictator’s followers. I’m loving this feeling of danger, and we get that
feeling ratcheted up about 15 notches with the next shot:

WOW. Now we’ve gone from just seeing the back of a shadowy figure in a dark forest, to seeing this sith lord face
to face. I love the camera work here, the sudden zoom just as he turns his head to the audience. Great reveal, and
the lightsaber is definitely now accepted by me as being awesome. This shot is amazing.

Holy shit, what I said before about the Emperor being dead not affecting the rest of the Empire… Wow. They are
alive and well, and apparently going absolutely Nazi all up in this bitch. I mean, Stormtroopers were always a
fictional mirror of the nazi soldiers, right up to the name, but this is on a whole new level. We can see in the
distance a similar uniform to the Imperial Commanders from the OT, but I can’t really tell if he’s supposed to be
the leader or not… Maybe just in charge of the battalion we’re seeing? Or maybe the leader is just about to
arrive, a la Return of the Jedi where the Emperor arrives, greeted by a giant host of perfectly-lined-up
stormtroopers… But this time, it’s not the Emperor. I’m trying not to speculate on who it might be, because other
than the trailers, I’m really hoping to see this film with a blank slate, and no prior expectations or knowledge of
what’s about to happen. I want to feel the same way the audience would have felt seeing the Original Trilogy at the
cinema. In those days, there was no internet to ruin the story before it came out. There weren’t any way’s to
instantly broadcast a secret leak of plot details. It was all speculation, all guessing or just waiting. That’s
what I’m trying to emulate, that sense of not being able to know one way or the other what a movie will be until
you see it. Whoo, anyway, that was a bit of a digression, my bad. Onto the next scene!

Oh man, I don’t know about anyone else but this immediately reminds me of the Battlefront 2 hangar battles that you
could join after flying a fighter from one command ship to the enemy’s and getting out to attack it from the
inside. Obviously Battlefront wasn’t this epic but it definitely put me in that mindframe, and I can’t wait to see
this scene play out. Very cool.

Again, another Star Destroyer, reminding us that though the Emperor himself is gone, he left behind a galaxy-wide
legacy of destructive power and loyal followers. Those are not a good mix when the leader holding them all together
is suddenly wiped from existence. This Star Destroyer makes me think of Grand Moffs and High Commanders taking
whatever chunk of the Imperial Army they had under their control as soon as they received word of the Emperor’s
death and using it to acheive their own ends. Obviously that is just my own interpretation, but I feel like there
would be just as much fighting between the fragments of the Empire’s semi-disbanded army than there would be
between the Empire and the Rebels. Fun to think about.

Holy balls, this guy looks BADASS! That is some rad-looking armour, I am incredibly excited to see this character
in action. I’m left wondering though, is this just an elite version of the stormtroopers, or something much more
than that? Because other than the black colour and the cape, this armour is identical to the standard stormtrooper
armour seen so far. There’s no exotic weapon, no hint of any other abilities or info on rank. Obviously it’s
supposed to be a mystery, and they’ve done a damn good job of creating hype around a new character in my opinion.

Now this shot is great, firstly because I am 100% certain that that ship is the Falcon, but also because this shows
an adorable personality for the new droid. Very cute, and of course lots of merchandising possibilities. That last
sentence came off a little cynical, but seriously, Star Wars makes most of its money from merchandising, and that
is an obscenely, brain-meltingly vast amount of money. It stands to reason that there will be about five thousand
toy versions of this adorable little droid; and no, before you say anything, that’s not a bad thing.

Now we get some proper teamwork from the new crew, as brief as it may be, that shows that they are working together
and are on the same side. This may be obvious, and it may be a small point, but I think this shot is great and it
shows a bit of humanity in the trailer that doesn’t need to be inferred by the audience.

Now THIS is awesome. Not only is there a battle at the site of a massive shipwreck, and not only is the Falcon
making another appearance, but seriously guys, THEY’RE FLYING INTO THE FUCKING ENGINES OF A WRECKED SHIP! How
fucking cool is that!? I love it that there’s actually no space-based battles in either trailer. All of the battles
are either in a planet’s atmosphere, or in an enclosed place like the hangar. I said this in the previous rant, but
I absolutely love this decision, as it lends even more danger to an already excessively dangerous activity.
Dogfights through the engine of a giant wrecked ship are just the fucking coolest. I can say that with certainty,
despite not having actually seen the full fight scene. This is going to be one of those amazing scenes where you
feel compelled to lean away from obstacles approaching the Falcon in a subconscious effort to help it along its way.
That’s great storytelling.

We also see what the new pilots look like, which I really like. I feel like JJ Abrams is giving the Imperial
soldiers a lot of screen time, which to me means that they are looking at these soldiers as human beings and not
just faceless embodiments of an evil Empire that can be gunned down like targets at a shooting range. I also think
that seeing John Boyega’s character in uniform could be a further exploration of what it means to be a
stormtrooper. I think and hope that JJ Abrams is going to be looking into morality a lot here. Morality has always
been a huge theme in Star Wars, but the previous movies were all very black-and-white, showing that the Empire is
evil and anyone who is with them is evil, period. This trailer (and the previous one), by showing a lot of “bad”
characters, and getting up close to the stormtroopers and showing things from their perspective, may hopefully be
allowing for the fact that just because you work for someone/something perceived as evil, it does not mean you are
yourself. I know that’s a lot to surmise from a few second-long shots of bad guys, but I’m very excited about this
anyway.

AND THEN… Seriously, are you guys ready for this? Because I sure as hell wasn’t.

The screen goes dark and quiet, and we know most of the trailer is over, so we’re thinking maybe they’re just going
to do the fanfare and the Star Wars logo and then –

Wait…

“Chewie…”

Oh my god…

“…We’re home.”

… HOLY FUCKING FUCK!

WHAT!?

Seriously, holy shit you guys, this is just the fucking greatest thing to ever happen.

ARGH!!! FUCK!

This is definitely, without a doubt, my favourite movie of all time. I don’t need to see the rest of it (but I
will, 6 or 7 times at least, in IMAX) to know that I love this movie more than anything. It’s going to be a REAL
Star Wars movie, guys. A real, proper, powerful, meaningful, life-changing experience.

I can not fucking wait.