Star Wars: Episode 7

The new Star Wars: Episode 7 trailer will debut at Star Wars Celebration on April 16 as director J.J. Abrams and producer Kathleen Kennedy meet the fans to kickoff the festival “in a big way.” We’ll be there to report on all the details, but if you can’t wait until then, a new report has been posted online that details what new footage we’ll see when the new Star Wars trailer finally arrives.

Since Star Wars: Episode 7 is probably the most anticipated movie of the past decade or so, Disney and Lucasfilm were wise to turn the premiere of the first trailer into a bonafide event. Fans flocked to theaters early in the morning just to catch a glimpse of the first footage from the film. Some crazy people (including yours truly) went to a special event where it was screened 40 times in a row. So how do you follow that up? By premiering the next trailer at the world’s biggest Star Wars fan convention and then attaching the preview to the second most anticipated movie of the year.

When Rian Johnson was officially announced as the Star Wars: Episode 8 director last week, one name was conspicuously absent from the initial press release: J.J. Abrams. Among the producers listed — Kathleen Kennedy, Ram Bergman (Looper) and Johnson — Abrams was nowhere to be found. An updated release was later sent with Abrams noted as an Executive Producer, but it only fueled the flames that J.J. Abrams may be one-and-done with the Star Wars franchise. Not so fast.

With Star Wars: Episode 7 less than a year away, Disney and Lucasfilm are facing a conundrum: just how many billions do they want to make from ancillary merchandise? Get ready for Star Wars bedsheets and Star Wars lunch boxes and, of course, countless new Star Wars action figures. You will be able to fight other adults in the toy aisle at Target like never before! However, Star Wars aficionados hoping to celebrate their fandom in a quieter way will also have their fair share of options, namely 20 new books bridging the 30-year gap between Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens.

As we all breathe a sigh of relief that Harrison Ford appears to have suffered no life-threatening injuries in yesterday's plane crash, we can turn our attention to more trivial Star Wars matters: namely the new Star Wars: Episode 7 trailer. We had previously reported that the new Star Wars trailer will be in theaters with Avengers 2 and will make it's public premiere at Star Wars Celebration in mid-April. Now comes word that the new trailer is ready and a lucky few have reportedly already seen it. The good news is they were kind enough to pass along a brief description.

The new Star Wars: Episode 7 lightsaber was the most hotly debated topic that came out of the first teaser trailer. What is this thing? Where did it come from? It turns out those answers might come from a very unlikely source: Apple.

Star Wars illustrator and designer Ralph McQuarrie is responsible for some of the most iconic imagery in the pop culture and the history of movies. McQuarrie designed the look of many of the Star Wars characters including Darth Vader, C-3PO, R2-D2 and the Stormtroopers, as well as locations like the Death Star and Tattooine. In fact, it was McQuarrie's artwork that eventually sold 20th Century Fox on the idea of letting George Lucas actually make a Star Wars movie.

Remember how so many Star Wars fans lost their minds when we first saw Kylo Ren’s bizarre hilted lightsaber in the trailer for Star Wars: Episode 7? Well, they’re about to lose ‘em all over again. Hasbro is introducing a new line of toys that will allow children (and their parents) to customize their own Jedi weapons. If you should a little hilt was crazy, then you probably aren’t prepared for what people will soon be able to create in their homes.

If you’re one of those people who can’t get enough ‘Star Wars: Episode 7’ spoilers, first, might we recommend our weekly Wookieepedia ‘Star Wars’ round up? With that shameless plug out of the way, let us now offer you ‘Star Wars’ spoiler addicts some advice from Luke Skywalker himself, Mark Hamill. CHILL OUT.

The only official release plans for ‘Star Wars’ so far include ‘The Force Awakens’ on December 18, and the first spinoff/standalone film, which will hit theaters on December 16, 2016. As for the rest of the new ‘Star Wars’ films: it’s been reported for a while that Disney plans on releasing a new film each year for the next several years, but the studio hasn’t made anything publicly official…until now.