Star Wars: Episode VIII Bringing Back Classic Rebel Starship
Star Wars: The Force Awakens brought backmany familiar elements from the previous Star Wars movies – some were subtle,say the appearance of Admiral Needa; some were slightly less subtle, say, nearlyall of A New Hope.
In its effort to recreate A New Hope’sclimactic battle with an even bigger Death Star, the Starkiller, the Resistance
(the new Rebel Alliance) used iconic X-Wing starfighters and the Millennium
Falcon to attack the First Order’s (the new Empire) weapon of mass destruction
which was defended by only a solo Star Destroyer and its TIE Fighters.
However, Episode VII was set some 30 yearsafter the events of the original trilogy and even though we’ve seen some technological
advancement with a familiar crop of ships, we haven’t seen some of the other
crafts used in say, the final Death Star assault in Return of the Jedi.
Until now…
For how can the Resistance plan a bombingon the Starkiller base without it’s bombers? Are there not new Y-Wings to goalong with the new X-Wings? Even those (the Y-Wings) were featured in A New
Hope! And what about its successor, the B-Wing, as featured in Star Wars:
Rebels and Return of the Jedi?
Well addressing this discrepancy in the force,it appears Rian Johnson’s still-untitled Star Wars: Episode VIII is bringingback the A-Wing!
While visiting Pinewood Studios The Duke ofCambridge and Prince Harry were pictured hanging out with cast, crew and wookiesand, lurking in the background, was a very familiar craft…(thanks to Nick LaBate)
And as Screen Rant discus, the new modelfollows in the design footsteps of The Force Awakens:
“Just like the Incom-FreiTek T-70 X-wing
starfighter was a newer variant of the original Star Wars Trilogy T-65
starfighters, so too is this A-Wing a new model of its predecessors. Notice the
roundness of the main hull, and the colouring of lower part of the vertical
wings, as well as the cannons on each side. It’s slightly different but
pleasantly similar.”
The A Wing is the fastest ship in fleetand, in canon, its introduced in Star Wars Rebels. It has featured in several
Star Wars games including X-Wing, X-Wing vs. Tie Fighter and X-Wing Alliance
games before it was made even more popular in the Rogue Squadron series and
even the new Star Wars Battlefront released last year.
Fact fans; the original design of theA-Wing was pitched as a blue-painted vehicle but its colouring didn't work withblue screen photography in Return of the Jedi so its colours were changed tored.
Star Wars: Episode VIII is released onDecember 15th, 2017.
