Kathleen Kennedy is making a promise. The President of Lucasfilm took the stage at Disney’s D23 Expo this past weekend, attended by CinemaBlend’s own Eric Eisenberg, and spoke about, among other things, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. The final film in the Skywalker Saga hits theaters in December and needless to say, there’s a lot riding on it. There are a lot of unknowns about the J.J. Abrams film but Kathleen Kennedy was confident enough to make one promise, saying:
I want to take just a brief moment because I know that we are gonna spend a little bit of time with you talking about the end of the saga, in a very exciting way I might add. But I just want to talk about the person to my left, J.J. Abrams. I’ve known J.J. actually since he was about 15 years old, when he started making movies – which is pretty amazing. But I have to say with bringing J.J. Abrams into Star Wars and what he has done for this franchise and the fact he is such a fan himself—he makes the entire experience an amazing good time. So, that I can promise you when you see this movie. It’s an incredibly good time.
Kathleen Kennedy is promising that Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker will be ‘an incredibly good time.’ She’s not promising that it will deliver satisfying answers to lingering questions or that it will perfectly wrap up the saga or that it will please everyone and unite the fractured fanbase, those are promises that she can’t make. She is simply promising that Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker will be a good time at the movies.
Some may take issue with her ability to promise that but Kathleen Kennedy seems confident in her belief about the film and that has a lot to do with director J.J. Abrams.
Kathleen Kennedy has known J.J. Abrams for a long time and brought him onboard to resurrect the Star Wars franchise with Star Wars: The Force Awakens. She saw what he did with that film and she has seen what he has done with the trilogy-capper and feels that J.J. brings the Skywalker Saga to a close in an exciting way that will if nothing else, be a good time.
Another thing that Kathleen Kennedy highlights is the fact that J.J. Abrams is a true, dyed in the wool, Star Wars fan. We all know that and that fact was plainly evident in The Force Awakens. She is framing J.J. Abrams’ Star Wars fandom as one of his bona fides and part of why he has been able to make The Rise of Skywalker such a fun and exciting movie.
Anecdotally, it’s part of why I think many fans have faith in J.J. Abrams returning for Episode IX, because there is a sense that he knows what Star Wars is and what it is supposed to be.
This all leads Kathleen Kennedy to make the promise that Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker will be a good time. And let’s be real, she is the President of Lucasfilm, it is her job to help make this movie successful and she is of course going to sing its praises. But just because she would say it is good regardless, doesn’t make it untrue.
While there may be a lot of question marks and apprehension about The Rise of Skywalker, particularly regarding how it will handle certain character arcs, mythology, tie up the saga, etc., I don’t think there is much doubt that it will be a fun movie. Rehash of A New Hope or not, The Force Awakens was a fun movie and there is no reason to think J.J. Abrams can’t accomplish that again. So this is a relatively safe guarantee for Kathleen Kennedy to make.
If the new D23 footage from The Rise of Skywalker is any indication, Kathleen Kennedy is probably right because the film looks like a blast. We’ll find out for sure when Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker opens in theaters on December 20.
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