After months of trolling his fans with fake Star Wars: Episode IX title reveals and corny trailer puns, you almost have to wonder what Mark Hamill’s going to do for fun, now that the cat’s out of the bag.
As you’ve likely heard by now, the official title of J.J. Abrams’ upcoming trilogy-closer is Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. The name has already been the subject of a fair amount of speculation, mostly around the question of which particular Skywalker is being referenced. And in a new tweet responding to the film’s first trailer, Hamill was all too happy to egg on the theorists:
“It’s not #EpisodeIXFromHisNap or even my suggestion: #EpisodeIXABunchMoreStuffHappens- It’#EpisodeIXTheRiseOfSkywalker! It’s time for the 8 months of speculation to begin. Is that Skywalker KYLO? LEIA? ANAKIN? LUKE? A previously unknown SKYWALKER? Is REY a Skywalker? #CoolTitle”
“From His Nap” and “A Bunch More Stuff Happens” are just two of the fake subtitles shared by Hamill in the past year, with other examples being “Thank U, Next” and “Yoda’s Bar Mitzvah.” In the end, it turned out that the actual title is all about Luke. Or possibly one of Luke’s relatives. Or possibly a new order that’s inspired by his teachings. Again, we’re still trying to figure this one out.
In any case, while Luke himself doesn’t appear in the new trailer, he does deliver a little dialogue off-screen, leaving us to wonder whether he’s speaking as a Force Ghost or in flashback. And speaking of characters who can be heard but not seen, Emperor Palpatine managed to steal the whole trailer with the mere sound of his sinister laughter.
Ultimately, today’s reveals seem to have left us with more questions than ever. But like Hamill said, we’ve still got eight months of speculation ahead of us before Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker hits theaters on December 20th.