Image: Disney/Lucasfilm
After three seasons telling the story of the burgeoning Rebel Alliance, the fourth and final season of Star Wars Rebels is finally going to show that central piece of rebel iconography: the X-Wing itself.
Yesterday, attendees to DragonCon’s Star Wars Rebels fan panel got a fabulous surprise: Henry Gilroy, co-executive producer of the show, made an appearance, chatting with fans and dropping some new tidbits on the upcoming season of the show. Chief among them is the revelation that, finally, after three seasons of conspicuous absence, X-Wings will finally open their S-foils and swoop into Rebels.
The news comes via Star Wars Insider’s Bryan Young, who tweeted the panel.
Gilroy: “When we see X-Wings on Rebels, we want it to be special.”
— Bryan Young (@swankmotron) September 1, 2017
I kind of love that it’s taken this long, to be honest. One of the interesting things to note about Rebels over its four seasons has been the way it’s slowly evolved its art direction. The first season, focused mostly on the planet of Lothal, avoided the imagery traditionally associated with the Rebellion in the Original Trilogy almost entirely. Kanan, Hera, and their crew weren’t Rebels, not officially; they were an isolated cell taking orders by proxy, with no ambition toward making change on a galactic scale. The look of the show followed suit; it was more Tatooine than Yavin IV.
Then, as the Rebel Alliance the audience is more familiar with has begun to coalesce, that’s started to shift. The second and third seasons introduce the traditional rebel flight suits, with B-Wings and Y-Wings and early looks at Rebel bases and troopers. You even see this reflected in Ezra, whose look in season three more closely conforms with what the main story has trained us to expect from a Jedi, ageing up a little and trading out his stun-gun/lightsaber combo for a more traditional green blade.
Now the final season, from what we’ve seen, looks to continue the trend. We’ve seen glimpses of the base on Yavin IV, camo fatigues like those worn in Return of the Jedi, and now we know we’ll see X-Wings, perhaps the most iconic and obvious symbol of the Rebel Alliance and Star Wars as a whole. It’s a visual shorthand for the evolution of the Rebellion across the series, from a fledgling guerrilla cabal to the uncertain but formidable movement seen in Rogue One and A New Hope.
It’s a fitting move for the ending of the series, a sort of symbolic passing of the torch. The final season of Star Wars Rebels premieres this fall. Any other traditional Star Wars touches you hope Rebels pulls off before its swan song?
[Twitter, via ScreenRant]