While Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker won’t be in attendance at SDCC 2019 this weekend – Disney tends to reserve its heavy-hitters for the annual D23 event in August – the hotly-anticipated sequel will still enjoy a presence at the comic book extravaganza, as the good folks at StarWars.com recently unearthed details of the Sith Trooper.
Drenched in a blood-red armor not dissimilar to the one worn by Snoke’s Praetorian Guards, these troopers look like the real deal, and while it’s unclear how much screentime they’ll enjoy during The Rise of Skywalker, writer-director J.J. Abrams is confident that fans will love their design and overall aesthetic once it’s projected onto the big screen.
Expect further details to be shown once Lucasfilm drops some behind-the-scenes footage later this weekend, but for now, here’s a tantalizing tease from Abrams himself:
The materials, the color, the lines, there was something about the aesthetic of it that just felt absolutely right. I cannot wait for people to see the work that everyone’s done.
So far, Lucasfilm’s new wave of Star Wars movies – both the Sequel Trilogy and the Anthology saga – has introduced Death Troopers, a redesigned Stormtrooper, and the aforementioned Praetorian Guards that flanked Snoke during The Last Jedi. But this Christmas, it’s all about the Sith Troopers, and they’re dressed to, ahem, kill.
As Abrams so rightly says, the suit itself combines the old-school design of the Original Trilogy with a much more aggressive color palette, resulting in a truly formidable appearance. The question, really, is whether these Sith Troopers will be able to go toe-to-toe with Rey, whose training has clearly taken her Jedi skills to new heights after she successfully dodged Kylo’s ship in the initial teaser.
We’ll find out for sure once Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker opens big on December 20th.
