Star Wars director JJ Abrams explains why Episode 9 is called The Rise of Skywalker

Lucasfilm and Disney finally gifted Star Wars with not only the first lot of footage from Episode IX, but also revealed that its title is The Rise of Skywalker.

It's definitely a title that's raised more questions than it answers. How can Skywalker rise in Episode 9 when it's the end of the Skywalker Saga? Is Skywalker going to be the name of a new Force-using group set up by Rey and/or Kylo Ren? Maybe it's Lando Calrissian's new food delivery app?

Director JJ Abrams sat down with ET Live, and said: "The title feels like it’s the right title for this movie. I know it’s provocative and asks a bunch of questions, but I think when you see the movie, you’ll see how it’s intended and what it means.

"But in the flow of titles, this movie had a very weird responsibility. It had to be the end of not just three movies, but nine movies, and the idea of having to incorporate the stories that have come before, strangely, is the story of the movie."

Teasing the themes of the movie, Abrams added: "Whether it’s sins of the father, the wisdom they’ve acquired, and the question is, can this new generation — are they up to the task? Can they stand up to what they have to?

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"And so in a way I feel like we, coming into this movie, have inherited a lot and the question is can we do it, and that’s a question we ask ourselves every day."

Sins of the father, eh? Does that mean the film is going to reveal that Rey's dad is Palpatine/Anakin/Jar Jar Binks after all?

Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker is released in UK cinemas on December 19 and US cinemas on December 20.

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Joe Anderton

Joe Anderton is a freelance news writer at Digital Spy, having worked there since 2016. In his time, he's covered a host of live events and interviewed celebrities big and small. A big fan of TV and movies both mainstream and obscure, Joe also enjoys video games and in particular PlayStation. Joe currently does not use Twitter, but he only ever used it to tell people to watch the film Help! I'm a Fish.