The strangest part of the Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker footage from D23 was seeing Rey wielding a double-bladed red lightsaber and looking like she’d crossed over to the Dark Side. Arguably the second strangest part of that preview was C-3PO also looking sinister, as his eyes were colored red. What’s with the deal with that?
We may finally have an explanation for the droid’s crimson-colored peepers. A new character has been revealed for Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker; his name is Babu Frik, and while you can head over to StarWars.com to see what the adorable alien looks like, here’s the provided description about him:
The tiny Anzellan droidsmith, first glimpsed in toy form during the Triple Force Friday livestream event, works among the Spice Runners of Kijimi and can reprogram or modify virtually any droid — regardless of the security measures protecting its systems.
Being reprogrammed certainly sounds like a plausible reason for why C-3PO would have red eyes. The question is why he would be reprogrammed. While Babu Frik’s allegiance wasn’t spelled out, one would imagine that a Spice Runner of Kijimi is more likely to work with The Resistance rather than The First Order. If that’s the case, then we can rule out Babu using C-3PO to try to attack some of the protagonists. Regardless, whichever side Babu’s working for is lucky to have his talents available.
Again, we don’t know for sure if Babu Frik and C-3PO are connected to each other in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, but it’s hard to imagine C-3PO’s eyes turning red not leading to him behaving out of character. This wouldn’t be the first that’s happened, because during Attack of the Clones, C-3PO’s head was inserted onto a battle droid’s body, leading to him firing on the Jedi during the Battle of Geonosis and shouting “Die, Jedi dogs!”
Anthony Daniels, the man who’s played C-3PO since the beginning, is keeping mum on the specifics surrounding C-3PO’s red eyes, but he did call it a “magnificent piece of storytelling.” Along with R2-D2, C-3PO appeared across all three Star Wars trilogies, so it’s nice to hear that Daniels approves of his character going through something so unusual, yet so interesting in the final chapter of the Skywalker Saga.
It seems as though C-3PO has more to do in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker compared to The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi. In the former movie, the only notable part of his appearance was that he had a red arm for a reason that was explained in a one-shot comic book. In the latter movie, he just hung around with Leia Organa and Poe Dameron.
We’ll find out what’s in store for C-3PO and Babu Frik when Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker opens in theaters on December 20. Look through our 2019 release schedule to learn when the rest of this year’s movies are arriving.
