Being a Star Wars director these days seems to have 50/50 odds; while The Last Jedi director Rian Johnson was recently just given his own separate trilogy to direct, others haven't fared as well. Directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller "left" the Han Solo spinoff back in June, and in September, Episode IX director Colin Trevorrow also parted ways with Lucasfilm, with J.J. Abrams being announced as his replacement. Abrams, who directed the first installment of the new trilogy, recently revealed that while he never intended to return after The Force Awakens, the opportunity to finish the story he started was too good to pass up.
"I had no intention to return," Abrams told Rolling Stone. "But when the opportunity presented itself to finish a story that we had begun with these new characters, to tell the last chapter of their story, it felt like there was a chance to do it in a way where we could go beyond, and do better than we did in VII. I learned so much in that movie and I saw that this was a chance to sort of realize something that we hadn't quite achieved – and part of that was it was simply the beginning of these new characters and their story. The opportunity to sort of take what we had learned, to take the feeling of who these characters are and what they are and give them a final chapter that felt in the spirit of what we begun? It was too delicious of an opportunity to pass up."
One person who was all too happy to have Abrams back was Daisy Ridley, whom Abrams cast as Rey. Ridley told Rolling Stone that after Trevorrow's exit, she believed Rian Johnson would be helming the next installment. "Everyone was saying it was going to be Rian and everything, so I was genuinely quite surprised," Ridley said, "and was like 'Oh my God!' and I started crying immediately with three people in the office. And they were like, 'What the f**k just happened?' So I emailed J.J. saying, 'Oh my God I am crying.' And he goes, 'Oh my God, me too.' And then we had a conversation a few days later and we stay in touch. But we stayed in touch the whole time anyway."
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