The final trailer for Rogue One is here, and with it, a ton of new peeks at the first stand-alone Star Wars film. While we still don’t know too much about just how the story goes down, it gives us some major insight into the world of Rogue One — here are all the important bits you might have missed.
The trailer opens with a shot of Director Krennic’s black shuttle flying over an unidentified planet. Wherever it is, it’s the home of Galen Erso (Mads Mikkelsen) and his family.
As Krennic (Ben Mendelsohn) and his Death Troopers march towards Erso and his homestead, Galen tells his daughter Jyn, “Whatever I do, I do it to protect you. Say you understand,” he intones, as we get a good look at the young Jyn. This is the first time footage has been widely released of her, but she was included in the trailer shown to attendees at Star Wars Celebration earlier this year.
Krennic and Galen go eye to eye. We know from details released about the upcoming prequel novel Catalyst that these two have a long history together. Also, it looks like Krennic’s swanky-as-hell uniform comes with a waterproof variant. Stylish and practical!
As Krennic sets his eyes on the young Jyn hiding in the grass, we smash-cut to the present — with Jyn (now played by Felicity Jones) in an Imperial detention facility. It’s cut to make it look like Jyn is waking up from dreaming about her past, but either way, this is definitely from early on in the film.
Jyn is busted out of captivity by some Rebels. The way this opening of the trailer is cut seems to heavily imply that they rescue Jyn on Jedha. If so, we know she comes back with Cassian later.
Speaking of which, here’s a gorgeous shot of a U-Wing flying over the planet’s surface — and it’s definitely Jedha, because of the crumbled statue of a Jedi Knight the ship flies over. Jedha is, after all, considered the galaxy’s equivalent of Mecca for Force users and the Jedi teachings.
Mon Mothma (Genevieve O’Reilly) makes an offer to Jyn, saying she can help the fledgling Rebellion — but it’s Cassian (Diego Luna) who gets to the point: They want Jyn to spill where her dad is.
Jyn bristles, but that’s when Mothma drops a bombshell — the Rebels know Galen is working on the Death Star’s superlaser. We cut to a shot of an Imperial facility, where Krennic meets up with Galen again, this time flanked by Stormtroopers and in an Imperial uniform.
We skip a little ahead with Jyn’s team formed. They depart from Yavin, with Imperial defector Bodhi Rook (Riz Ahmed) giving the team its callsign: Rogue One. See, was it so hard to say that, Gareth Edwards?
This is the shot that sent crowds wild at Star Wars Celebration earlier this year. Even Darth Vader’s reflection can cut a striking presence.
But for as fearsome as Vader is, at least one Imperial is fine with going up against him. Krennic stands defiantly against the Dark Lord, revelling in the power of his new battlestation…
…which gets another good money shot. Seriously, all these trailers have basically been Death Star porn.
The Rebels, however, are less impressed and more petrified. “If the Empire has this kind of power,” a sympathiser intones over a hologram of the Death Star, “what chance do we have?”
As if to make her point, we cut to Jedha, where a big fight has broken out — and the Empire are just slaughtering people left, right and centre. Presumably this is not during Jyn’s breakout, as she’s with Cassian this time around.
A short shot of Clone Wars veteran Saw Gerrera (Forest Whitaker) and his robot leg is played under Jyn’s simple retort. “We have hope. Rebellions are built on hope!” It’s a little cheesy, but suitably inspiring.
Now we move on from Jedha to Rogue One‘s other major planet, Scarif, where the technology for the Death Star is being developed. We see a fancy shot of the Imperial facility, as well as Rebel troopers sneaking up on it through the foliage.
We also finally learn why Jyn was wearing an Imperial uniform in the very first trailer: She’s disguised as a member of the ground crew alongside Cassian as an officer and K2-SO (Alan Tudyk) as… well, himself. He is a re-programmed Imperial droid, after all. It looks like they’re infiltrating the base on Scarif.
It’s not just Jyn who gets to be hopeful, as Chirrut Imwe (Donnie Yen) shows. “Take hold of this moment” he says, as we see him thwack some Stormtroopers with his staff (and get a shot of the alien revealed at San Diego Comic-Con earlier this year, Edrio Two-Tubes). “The Force is strong.” Chirrut gets surrounded by Stormtroopers, but saved by a few blaster shots from Baze Malbus (Jiang Wen). That hope he and Jyn keeping referencing can make “10 men feel like a hundred,” according to Cassian.
We get a few more shots of X-Wings and Y-Wings battling in a dark canyon, an extended look at a scene from the last trailer. It’s hard to tell if this is simply Jedha at night or a different planet. We know there’s at least one other big location, a planet called Eadu (thanks to Jyn’s action figure designating her appearance as being on that planet). Is this where the facility Galen Erso is working at is based?
Bodhi makes a run for a ship on Scarif, surrounded by Rebels and Imperials fighting it out.
Meanwhile, it looks like we’re getting at least a little bit of a space battle in Rogue One. X-Wings launch an attack on a facility (which looks like it’s in orbit above Scarif, considering the amount of water on the planet below). It’s not the Death Star, but some kind of other Imperial station.
Jyn calls out the Alliance operatives on Yavin. “You’re all rebels, aren’t you?” This is the most optimism we’ve seen from Rogue One, which previously was very doom and gloom about our heroes’ chances.
A massive explosion tears apart the surface of Jedha while a figure looks on — the goggles and hair make it look like it’s Bohdi. This looks like part of a sequence we saw in the last trailer of Cassian and Jyn’s U-Wing fleeing a huge blast. Is it the Death Star testing its superlaser?
Darth Vader stomps towards Director Krennic. If you’ve ever done something that made Darth Vader feel like he needed to respond by moving quickly, you’ve really messed up.
As we finish on a shot of the battle on Scarif — U-Wings flying in, Baze and Chirrut dodging the massive feet of Imperial Walkers — Saw Gerrera gives one final rallying cry: “Save the Rebellion! Save the dream.”
We know they succeed, mainly because A New Hope happens. But how many will live to see that dream? We’ll find out December 15, when Rogue One: A Star Wars Story hits theatres.