Star Wars: Colin Trevorrow’s Episode IX wouldn’t be better than ‘The Rise of Skywalker’

Colin Trevorrow’s script has leaked online causing fans to debate whether or not his version of Episode IX is better than what we got.

Colin Trevorrow, of Jurassic World fame, was originally slated to direct Episode IX but was taken off the project due to creative differences. Now, a script from his movie has leaked on Reddit. While Disney and Trevorrow haven’t confirmed the legitimacy of the script, A.V. Club and Slash Film have confirmed with sources that the details in the leak are true.

You can look at the details either on Reddit, A.V. Club or Slash Film. What this writer wants to answer is whether or not Star Wars: Duel of the Fates is better than Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. In short, not really. To be honest, there were a lot of things to like about The Rise of Skywalker but, ultimately, the movie was a disappointment.

And the ideas brought up in Duel of the Fates, to me, aren’t much better. The big element Trevorrow has confirmed is that Emperor Palpatine did not play a major role in his movie, which is true as he only as a minor appearance as a hologram in the script.

Palpatine’s appearance raised more questions than answers, and the reveal of Rey being his granddaughter seemingly ignored her “she comes from nothing” origin from The Last Jedi.

The movie sounds like it opens the same way Return of the Jedi does, with Rey in disguise where she shows off a new weapon. The group’s plan goes wrong and shenanigans ensue.

The one positive from Trevorrow’s script is that it at least follows continuity from The Last Jedi, something that J.J. Abrams and Chris Terrio ostensibly did not do.

Another thing that should be addressed is that the script was written before the passing of Carrie Fisher, meaning there is a lot of Leia in the script. This point should not be used against The Rise of Skywalker since they had to work around this, and we do not know how Trevorrow would have changed his script to account for Fisher’s passing.

Rose Tico does have more to do in Duel of the Fates, but the team is still looking for a MacGuffin, this time a “Force Beacon” rather than a Sith dagger. The team is also separated like in The Last Jedi.

One can appreciate that the core group of Rey, Finn and Poe got to go on an adventure together in The Rise of Skywalker. It showed a strong connection among the main characters that was similar to that of the Original Trilogy’s heroes.

Kylo Ren also dies in Duel of the Fates, but in a battle with Rey instead of him being redeemed as Ben Solo and sacrificing himself to save Rey.

There is apparently a scene with Han Solo and Kylo Ren, which is nice since the scene where Kylo is confronted by Han is one of the best moments in The Rise of Skywalker.

I liked the redemption story of Kylo Ren into Ben Solo, but Trevorrow opts to keep Kylo as the big bad of the movie where he is revealed to have killed Rey’s parents. This is honestly a very strange detail and is overkill to bring the point home that Kylo has done bad things. It feels unnecessary to have that detail in there, but he is “extinguished” by Rey helping the Resistance beat the First Order.

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Also, Rey is the one who fights the Knights of Ren, but there still aren’t any details on who they are. This has to be something that will be revealed in a novel or comic book because there don’t appear to be any details on who they are. It’s semantics on who actually fights the Knights of Ren, but the scene where Ben fights them is great because it shows more of his redemption as he fights alongside Rey.

Apparently, the Force Ghosts of Luke, Obi-Wan and Yoda show up, which sounds like fan service that isn’t really needed. Rey hearing all of the former Jedi was a good way to honor the past without looking too cliche.

There’s also apparently a lot more of Luke Skywalker showing up as a Force Ghost. Trevorrow and Abrams go to two different extremes with the amount of Luke there is in their movies. Trevorrow has way too much Luke, while Abrams did not have enough.

This is Rey’s journey, and she should be able to find her own path with characters like Leia and Luke guiding her, which inspires her to take the name Skywalker. Trevorrow does not have this detail, which is neither a good thing or a bad thing. And to be honest, the idea of Rey Skywalker does not bother me as much as it does other people.

Trevorrow removes some of the problematic aspects of Abrams and Terrio’s version of Episode IX like the vague return of Palpatine, but there are no major improvements that would have made it a satisfying conclusion to the Sequel Trilogy.