This weekend at D23 there was some crazy exciting new footage that was shared for Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. That footage revealed a shocking drastic dark turn of a character. That character was Daisy Ridley’s Rey. That footage was recently released online and as you saw, she was all decked out in a black robe wielding a double-edge lightsaber and looking evil as hell.

A lot of fans think that this isn’t what it seems to be. I’m not convinced it’s just a vision of sorts, though. I think there’s more to it than that, and I have a theory that I’ve shared in this post.

After the footage was screen the cast of the film commented on this aspect of the film that was revealed. Ridley talked to CinemaBlend saying:

“I went to Bad Robot yesterday and I was like, ‘Hey, can I see the teaser’? They were like, ‘Yeah, yeah.’ No warning. And I watch, and went [inhales deeply] ‘Oh my god, are you really putting that in there?’ That was my reaction. And then watching it today, it was weird because I felt nervous with it coming because I knew it was going to be. And then hearing the audience reaction was amazing.”

In a separate interview with IGN she added:

“I think that it should hopefully show people that we did a big old journey and we explored some things. So just you wait until the film.”

I’m really excited to see how this comes about and how it fits in with the context of the story. But if Rey goes evil… I’m all for it! Kelly Marie Tran, who is reprising her role as Rose Tico in the film added:

“I think the most important thing to take from that whole snippet is just that the ending of this whole film is going to be really, really groundbreaking, in a good way. I think there are a lot of little pieces from the older films and everyone’s together in this one. We’re gonna go out with a bang.”

A groundbreaking ending, huh… well, it’ll be awesome to see what that actually ends up being! Franchise newcomer Naomi Ackie also said that the film serves as a fitting conclusion and that she cried when she read the script: 

“When I had the privilege of reading the script, I cried. I think it reaches and tries to ask a question that we need to answer in ourselves. I’m super excited for people to see that.”

One of the other big questions on peoples minds is how is Plapatine going to play into the story? How does he come back? There’s been a theory going around of possession. So here’s my theory on Rey… if that’s true, what if the spirit of Palpatine ends up possessing Rey and that’s why she goes bad? 

When asked about Palpatine, Ridley explains that there’s a reason he’s back:

“He’s the biggest baddie in Star Wars history. Now that we’ve done the story, I’m like, it couldn’t have happened any other way. It had to be that. But he’s very instrumental to the plot of the film. It’s not just like he appears again; it’s all explained.”

Well, we’re just going to have to be patient and wait and see what happens when the movie is released.