Star Wars Celebration Europe: Rogue One Panel Recap

The Rogue One: A Star Wars Story panel at Star Wars Celebration Europe, hosted by Gwendoline Christie, debuted a sizzle reel, character trivia, and more.

The Rogue One: A Star Wars Story panel may not have delivered the trailer we were expecting, but the behind the scenes sizzle reel it showed, added together with new trivia about the locations and characters in the film, made it an exciting event.

Below is a list of everything we learned about Rogue One from the panel.

• Lucasfilm director Kathleen Kennedy, Rogue One director Gareth Edwards, Lucasfilm Story Group head Kiri Hart, and Industrial Light & Magic visual effects supervisor John Knoll were the first out on the stage, which was hosted by Gwendoline Christie (Captain Phasma in The Force Awakens).
• Knoll showed the audience one of the first pieces of concept art for Rogue One, which featured a workup of the main cast.

via YouTube

• Two new planets will debut in Rogue One: Scarif, where the Death Star plans are located and the rebels will have to face down the Empire’s might to get them; and Jedha, a mecca for Force believers which also happens to be occupied by the Empire. It is on Jedha we meet Donnie Yen’s Chirrut Imwe, Jiang Wen’s Baze Malgus, and Riz Ahmed’s Bodhi Rook.
• Gareth Edwards unveiled the official Rogue One poster.

• Several members of the Rogue One cast were then brought out onto the stage: Diego Luna, Riz Ahmed, Felicity Jones, Donnie Yen, Jiang Wen, Alan Tudyk, Mads Mikkelsen, and Forest Whitaker.
• Bodhi Rook is a cargo pilot for the Empire, but his actor Riz Ahmed says Rook sees flying for the Empire more as a job than a reflection of his convictions. It’s through seeing the Empire’s cruel acts that he comes to reconsider where he stands in the galaxy.
• K-2SO, played in motion capture suit by Alan Tudyk, belongs to Cassian Andor, who is played by Diego Luna. Luna described K-2 as being Andor’s best, and really only friend in the Rebel Alliance. Despite that lone wold imagery, Andor was also described as the glue that has to hold the misfit Rogue One group of heroes together.
• K-2 was described by Tudyk as apt to say unpleasant things, but really he’s just “honest.” Cassian Andor did a data wipe on K-2 and then reprogrammed him, and when he did the droid developed an odd personality of his own deviant from the typical obedient prototype.
• Felicity Jones said her character Jyn Erso was unique from other Star Wars heroes like Luke Skywalker and Rey in that Jyn knows where she comes from. She isn’t on a quest of self-discovery in Rogue One.
• The panel revealed our first look at Galen Erso, Jyn’s father, played by Mads Mikkelsen. The actor said Galen is a scientist who is very much at the middle of the story’s conflict, and who once invented something “beautiful” that could have changed the galaxy. But from Galen’s rough and impoverished look, it doesn’t appear he had much success with whatever he was working on.

via YouTube

• Donnie Yen said Chirrut was spiritual and believed in the Force, though he did not confirm if he was Force sensitive. Baze Malgus, Chirrut’s best friend, has one defining feature according to Jiang Wen: he has a big gun. Baze is the doer, he says, while Chirrut is the thinker, and they balance each other out even while Baze has no faith in the Force whatsoever.
• Ben Mendelsohn came on the Celebration stage twice: the first time in his Director Krennic costume and flanked by Imperial deathtroopers, for a quick walk around the stage, then in a real world pantsuit to sit down with the rest of the cast. He didn’t say much about his character, except he was smart and sexier than some Imperial villains, but not as sexy as others (here he looks at Christie, who is sitting next to him).

• Three times throughout the panel’s livestream on the official Star Wars YouTube channel, a behind the scenes sizzle reel was shown, giving us a glimpse at new footage and the gorgeous photography in Rogue One. We have it for you below.

• A teaser of Rogue One was also shown, but it was not livestreamed and remains exclusive to Celebration attendees.

And that’s it! It was a surprise that we didn’t get to see a trailer or any footage other than the sizzle reel, but the latter contained enough new footage to make it practically a trailer in and of itself. We have no idea when the exclusive teaser will come online, but there’s a chance it will premiere tonight on ABC during The Force Awakens Behind the Scenes special at 8:00 pm EDT.

Next: SWCE: Ahsoka's Untold Tales Panel Recap

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