Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker

• 1. The Skywalker Saga Finale

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  A year after the Battle of Crait, Emperor Palpatine sends a message of revenge to the galaxy. Kylo Ren obtains a Sith wayfinder that leads him to the hidden planet Exegol. There, Palpatine reveals himself as the power behind Snoke and the First Order. He unveils his armada of Star Destroyers and offers it to Kylo if he finds and kills Rey. Rey continues her Jedi training under Resistance leader Leia Organa. Poe Dameron and Finn deliver intelligence from a spy in the First Order that Palpatine is on Exegol. Rey reads in Luke Skywalker's notes that a Sith wayfinder can lead them there. The group travels to the desert planet Pasaana where a clue to a wayfinder is hidden. They encounter renegade stormtroopers led by Jannah who join the Resistance. Rey retrieves the wayfinder from the wreckage of the second Death Star but is confronted by Kylo. In a dying act, Leia distracts Kylo through the Force. Rey impales him then heals Kylo before taking his TIE fighter to exile herself on Ahch-To. Ben Solo discards his lightsaber and reclaims his identity as Ben Solo. Palpatine deploys his fleet to draw Rey out. Lando arrives with reinforcements from across the galaxy including Zorii Bliss. Rey hears the voices of past Jedi who give her strength. She uses Luke and Leia's lightsabers to deflect Palpatine's lightning and kill him before dying herself. Ben uses his remaining Force power to revive Rey and they kiss as he dies. The Resistance destroys Palpatine's remaining forces while people across the galaxy rise up against the First Order. As the Resistance celebrates the fall of the First Order, Rey visits Luke's abandoned homestead on Tatooine and buries Luke and Leia's lightsabers. A passerby asks her name; seeing Luke and Leia's Force spirits nearby, she responds with her full name, Rey Skywalker.

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• 2. From Trevorrow To Abrams

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  In August 2015, Colin Trevorrow was announced as the director of the film. He was to write the script with frequent collaborator Derek Connolly. Their script included elements which were utilized to some extent in the final film such as Kylo finding a Sith holocron in Darth Vader's castle on Mustafar. An original idea of Trevorrow and his design team, the First Order TIE Echelon, survived in the Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge theme park. In late April 2017, Disney announced that the film would be released on the 24th of May 2019. On the 5th of September 2017, Lucasfilm stated that Trevorrow had left the production following creative differences. David Fincher had discussions with the studio but would ultimately decline from directing the film. On September 12, it was announced that J.J. Abrams, the director of Star Wars: The Force Awakens, would return to direct the film. The story team met with George Lucas before writing the new script to help find a way to conclude the saga. Abrams co-wrote the script with Chris Terrio though Trevorrow and Connolly retain story credits. The story was rewritten to some extent before filming was completed. Terrio had written off working on larger-scale films at the time and did not socially know Abrams prior to agreeing to co-write the film with him.

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• 3. Honoring Carrie Fisher

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  Carrie Fisher died on the 27th of December 2016. Variety and Reuters reported that she had been planned for a key role in Episode IX. In January 2017, Lucasfilm stated that there were no plans to digitally generate Fisher's performance as they had for Rogue One. The following April, Carrie Fisher's brother Todd Fisher revealed that Fisher's daughter, Billie Lourd, had granted Disney the rights to use recent footage of Fisher. However, a week later, Kathleen Kennedy stated that Fisher would not appear in the film. In July 2018, J.J. Abrams announced that unused footage of Fisher from The Force Awakens would be used to help complete the story. In flashback scenes, digital de-aging was used for the appearance of Luke and Leia through the use of facial shots of both characters from the Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi respectively. In November 2019, prior to the release of the film, Fisher's brother Todd revealed that she was going to be the big payoff in the final film. He said she was going to be the last Jedi so to speak. Her character appears through the use of repurposed unreleased footage from The Force Awakens.

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• 4. Production Challenges And Reshoots

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  Principal photography began on the 1st of August 2018 at Pinewood Studios in Buckinghamshire England. Filming also took place in Wadi Rum Jordan. Oscar Isaac stated that Abrams was allowing more improvised acting than in the previous two films. Due to the tight schedule some editing took place on set. The crew on The Rise of Skywalker had three fewer months than they had to work on The Force Awakens leading to Maryann Brandon being sent in to cut on a third of the way through production. Scenes detailing Palpatine's return were altered and changed during production as they were felt to go off topic. The scene where Ben is dying and he and Rey kiss was filmed with and without the kiss. It was going to be excluded from the film until Abrams decided to include it at the last minute. Principal photography wrapped on the 15th of February 2019. Footage from the film was shown at The Walt Disney Company's annual shareholders meeting on the 7th of March 2019. Two weeks of reshoots took place at Pinewood involving Hamill Ridley and Isaac in July 2019. Another round of reshoots took place at Bad Robot between late September and mid-October. Abrams stated that the film had fewer reshoots and story adjustments than Episode VII.

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• 5. John Williams Final Score

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  In January 2018 it was confirmed that John Williams would return to compose and conduct The Rise of Skywalker. The next month Williams announced that it would be the last Star Wars film for which he would compose the score though he would later return to compose the theme music for the Disney+ miniseries Obi-Wan Kenobi. In August 2019 it was revealed that Williams had written about 35 of an expected 135 minutes of music for the film. According to Williams' brother Don this would incorporate all of the major themes of the Skywalker saga. Scoring began in July 2019 with Williams and William Ross conducting and orchestrating the sessions over the course of six months. The official soundtrack album was released by Walt Disney Records on the 20th of December 2019. Williams cameos as Oma Tres a Kijimi bartender during production.

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• 6. Mixed Critical Reception

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  The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported an approval rating based on reviews. The website's critical consensus reads that The Rise of Skywalker suffers from a frustrating lack of imagination but concludes this beloved saga with fan-focused devotion. Metacritic assigned the film a score of 53 out of 100 based on 61 critics indicating mixed or average reviews. As such The Rise of Skywalker holds the lowest approval rating among the nine main movies of the three Star Wars trilogies both on Metacritic and on Rotten Tomatoes. Richard Roeper reviewing for the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film three stars out of four writing that it rarely comes close to touching greatness but is a solid visually dazzling and warmhearted victory for quality filmmaking. The A.V. Clubs A.A. Dowd gave the film a C+ stating that the film is so freighted with obligation that it almost groans under the weight flashing a weak smile as it vaguely approximates the appearance of a zippy good time. Michael Phillips for Chicago Tribune wrote that the film does the job wrapping up the trio of trilogies begun in 1977 in a confident soothingly predictable way doing all that is cinematically possible to avoid upsetting tradition-minded quadrants of the Star Wars fan base.

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• 7. Box Office Legacy

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  The Rise of Skywalker grossed $515.2 million in the United States and Canada and $561.8 million in other territories for a worldwide total of $1.077 billion making it the seventh highest-grossing film of 2019. Deadline Hollywood calculated the net profit of the film to be $300million when factoring together all expenses and revenues. Pre-sale tickets went on sale on the 21st of October 2019 and the film sold more tickets in their first hour of availability on Atom Tickets than the previous record-holder for ticket sales Avengers Endgame. It became Atom Tickets' second-best first-day seller of all time behind Endgame selling more than twice the number of tickets as The Last Jedi sold in that same timeframe while Fandango reported it outsold all previous Star Wars films. The film made $89.6 million on its first day including $40 million from Thursday night previews the sixth-highest opening day of all time. It went on to debut to $177.4 million which was the third-highest opening ever for a December release and the 12th-best of all time. In its third weekend the film made $34.5 million remaining in first before being dethroned in its fourth weekend by newcomer 1917. On the 14th of January 2020 the film crossed the $1 billion mark at the box office becoming Disney's seventh film of 2019 to do so.

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