Well ladies and gentlemen, as I write this, it’s about 3 weeks ago on a mild December morning.  The latest and last of the Skywalker Saga was released the other day, and at the time I found myself in an aisle seat with 32 ounces of root beer, a box of candy (sadly, not Hot Tamales), and the constant urge driven by my obsessive compulsive disorder to pee, all the while hoping this one wouldn’t suck.

Save for a few issues I had with the opening crawl, the incessant grousing amongst the players, and the infiltration of wokeness at the end, I was pleasantly surprised that the strategy of the ad campaign leading up to the film’s release foreshadowed a more significant suckfest in Episode IX (pronounced [iks]) than the film itself could actually produce.

But I’m not here today to review the film.  By the time this particular post has published, you can safely assume I will have already seen it several times, and on several of those occasions I will have smuggled in the requisite candy for eating when watching Star Wars, which is Hot Tamales.

Instead, I’m here today to revisit the predictions I made about this trilogy after Episode VII was released in 2015.

In that post I penned four years ago, I asked and answered 7 questions and then made 4 additional predictions.

Let’s see how I did.

Questions:

Question 1:  Who is Rey?

My answer:  Luke’s daughter, most likely a clone.  I read that in a book once.

Survey says:  Wrong.  Rey was the granddaughter of a character introduced in Episode I.  *cough* Jar-Jar *cough*

Question 2:  How did Rey end up on Jakku?

My answer:  She was left there to remain safely anonymous, just like Luke was left on Tatooine.

Survey says:  Correct.  She was being hidden from her grandfather.

Question 3:  What’s with Max Von Sydow?

My answer:  He was there to watch over Rey, much like Obi-Wan watched over Luke.

Survey says:  Unconfirmed.  At the same time, he seems to have been a friend of Leia, who knew of Rey’s existence. 

Question 4:  What’s with Threepio’s red arm?

My answer:  Who cares?

Survey says:  It never came out in the movies, so I’m guessing no one cared, save for when the internet initially blew up for a hot minute over the subject.

Question 5:  How did Kylo Ren get a hold of Darth Vader’s mask?

My answer:  ebay

Survey says:  Unconfirmed

Question 6:  How did Maz get Luke’s light saber?

My answer:  Some bullshit story likening it to how a Def Leppard union jack t-shirt got back to its original owner.

Survey says:  Union Jack is back with a hole in his head.

Question 7:  Could the Millennium Falcon be any cooler?

My answer:  No

Survey says:  Wrong.  It was made a lot cooler when we got to see it do the Kessel Run in Solo, and light speed skipping in the latest flick.  I’m so glad I was wrong on that one.

So far, I was only right on one of those questions about Rey’s anonymity.  Check out my track record on the predictions though:

Predictions:

Prediction 1-

“Supreme leader Snoke and his origins will need to be revealed. Where did he come from? Did he ever deal with Palpatine? My guess is that he’s no bigger or cuter than an Ewok.”

What actually happened –

Snoke had no real backstory, but we did learn that Palpatine made him.  Sadly, the dude was a little bigger than an Ewok.

Prediction 2 –

“Kylo Ren will turn to the good side. My guess is that it will be near the end of his life, much like what happened with his grandfather. I’m thinking Leia will be there when it happens.”

What actually happened –

Leia, in the moment of becoming one with the Force, reaches out to Kylo as he’s dueling Rey for the umpteenth time.  Kylo gets distracted by Leia’s presence, and subsequently gets his light saber in his torso much like the Knight King got the Valyrian Steel dagger.  Rey then does some of that Mr. Miyagi healing stuff on him and takes off.   Kilo shucks his moniker and returns to being Ben Solo.

Prediction 3 –

“Luke is gonna die y’all. How? Will he do it Obi-Wan style where he sacrifices himself to help further Rey’s training and efficacy? Or will it be a poorly calculated step in the vein of Qui-Gon Jinn that will leave him impaled with a flickering blade like his old buddy Han? Qui-Gon was such a shitty Jedi that I have a hard time believing that Luke’s death would be anything but sacrificial.”

What actually happened –

In Episode Ocho, Luke used the Force to distract the bad guys so that the good guys could get away.  It took so much effort on his part, that he became one with the Force shortly thereafter.

Prediction 4 –

“There’s still hope for Star Wars: Return of the Gold Bikini.”