Star Wars: Episode VIII is more than a year away, but Adam Driver (Kylo Ren) has already started teasing Rian Johnson’s “clever” sequel.
Last Christmas, The Force Awakens blew the world away. While some deemed it too similar to A New Hope, most audiences seemed to applaud J.J. Abrams’ strong re-introduction to the world of Star Wars, with a new set of heroes for a new generation of fans.
Will the follow-up, the still untitled Episode VIII, be able to live up to the hype?
Adam Driver, at least, seems convinced that director Rian Johnson is more than up for the challenge. In a recent interview with Collider, the Kylo Ren actor praised the script, and Johnson’s approach to his character.
“It’s great,” says Driver. “It’s similar to how The Empire Strikes Back has a different tone. For that people always go, ‘Oooh, it’s dark,’ but I don’t know that it necessarily is. It’s just different in tone in a way that I think is great and necessary but also very clear. He trusts [that] his audience is ready for nuance and ambiguity. He’s not dumbing anything down for someone and that’s really fun to play.”
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Driver, perhaps most especially, has cause to be happy about a director who truly understands the complexity of the story and characters. Because if there was one weak spot in The Force Awakens it would be its villain, Driver’s Kylo Ren, whose angst was borderline comedic (even being explicitly played for laughs in one instance).
“Rian’s writing is so clear,” Driver enthuses. “I learned a lot of things about my character through his writing. Some things we talked about before and some things we didn’t. He was working on [the script] while we were still working on the first one. To understand what J.J. was doing and take ownership from there is kind of a remarkable thing.”
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