Originally published August 9, 2016. Updated November 30, 2022.
With a new trailer set to arrive this week, Gareth Edwards has been speaking to Entertainment Weekly about Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, with the director offering up some insight into the planet Jedha, which is set to feature heavily in the film and is described as a “holy land” for those who follow the Force.
“The Force is basically in Star Wars like a religion, and they’re losing their faith in the period that we start the movie,” states Edwards. “We were trying to find a physical location we could go to that would speak to the themes of losing your faith and the choice between letting the Empire win, or evil win, and good prevailing. It got embodied in this place we called Jedha.”
“It’s a place where people who believe in the Force would go on a pilgrimage,” he continues. “It was essentially taken over by the Empire. It’s an occupied territory… for reasons we probably can’t reveal. There’s something very important in Jedha that serves both the Jedi and the Empire. It felt very much like something we could relate to in the real world.”
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The article goes on to speculate that Jedha could be a source of kyber crystals, Force-attuned minerals used by the Jedi and the Sith in the construction of lightsabers – and, perhaps, the Death Star’s superlaser.
““Within Jedha, even though there’s the oppressive foot of the Empire hanging over them, there’s a resistance that won’t give up and our characters have to go and meet people there to try and secure a person from this group,” added Edwards, who revealed that the planet is also home to Chirrut Imwe (Donnie Yen), Baze Malbuz (Jiang wen) and Bodhi Rook (Riz Ahemd).
ROGUE ONE: A STAR WARS STORY, is the first film in the new standalone movies from Lucasfilm. It tells the story of how a group of unlikely heroes unite to undertake a daring and seemingly impossible mission to steal the plans for the Death Star.
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Rogue One: A Star Wars Story is set for release on December 16th 2016, with a cast that includes Felicity Jones (The Theory of Everything), Diego Luna (Milk), Ben Mendelsohn (The Dark Knight Rises), Donnie Yen (Ip Man), Jiang Wen (Let the Bullets Fly), Forest Whitaker (The Last King of Scotland), Alan Tudyk (Con Man), Riz Ahmed (Nightcrawler), Genevieve O’Reilly (Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith), Jimmy Smits (Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones) and Jonathan Aris (Sherlock).
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