Star Wars: The Force Awakens - Let's Analyze Those New Entertainment Weekly Photos

Are those some rumors I see being confirmed?

Even though we got a new image of the film yesterday, it seems now we’ve got many more. Entertainment Weekly’s coverage of The Force Awakens has been fantastic and today is no exception. They’ve posted new photos, along with a behind the scenes story that sheds some light on the film’s creation. Here, we’re going to pour over the pictures they’ve posted and their captions to see what we can discover.

Alright, let’s see those pictures:

First we have Rey and Finn running for their lives as First Order stormtroopers chase them on Jakku. There’s not much new here, as we already knew TIE Fighters would be shooting down at them later as seen in the trailers:

It also stands to reason that this is the first part of their escape from Jakku, as they will probably board the Millennium Falcon and get into a chase with that TIE Fighter:

Here we have another fantastic shot of Kylo Ren with his lightsaber drawn. Not the snow and trees, which means that this shot takes place in the same area as this iconic shot from the first trailer:

The big question is whether the second shot takes place at a different time of day (it’s much darker), or this new Entertainment Weekly shot doesn’t have the same color correction. Also, the picture’s caption confirms some of our long held speculation that his lightsaber is, in fact, homemade.

Here we finally have confirmation that it was Finn crashing that TIE Fighter we saw in the Comic Con trailer and the leaked artwork. That also means it must be him shooting up that First Order hanger in the shot we saw before:

Here, it seems BB-8 has a debut very similar to R2-D2 and C-3P0 in A New Hope. It appears as though Rey is acquiring him from a junk dealer on Jakku. However, if you take a close look at BB-8 he seems very clean… which means he only arrived on the desert recently. Perhaps he arrived with Finn?

Here we have C-3P0 and R2. 3P0, red arm aside, looks very much like his scuffed Return of the Jedi appearance. R2 also seems to have a little weathering, but is overall in very good condition. They both seem to be on Yavin IV base.

This is definitely from those fiery shots in the trailer, but the caption confirms that the burning of a village takes place on Jakku.

Here’s the Comic Con picture of General Hux released in all its clarity. He’s either on a Star Destroyer or Starkiller Base. Notice the way he wears his general’s coat, which seems to recall old British naval admirals.

A great medium shot of Captain Phasma, which shows she actually has some scuff on her armor. The captain also says her name has an unexpected origin, which may mean one of two things: Either her name has an unexpected in universe origin or an unexpected real world origin. We’re curious to hear the story behind it.

J.J. Abrams and Lawrence Kasdan working on the script at Starkiller base. Notice the Imperial style lighting on the wall and the polished floors. It also seems to be this same moment captured in the Comic Con trailer:

Here’s that first still we saw of Poe Dameron at Celebration Anaheim. The caption tells us that there’s a reason the X-Wing is black and speculates it may be some sort of stealth tech. We’re inclined to agree.