LUKE SKYWALKER

Daniel Cohen: This is the big one.  For a long time I always felt Luke would kick the bucket in the first film, but return as a force ghost.  No matter what happens, we’re getting Mark Hamill for more Star Wars films.  He’s the only character who’s not on the poster, and the only potential image we’ve seen of Luke is a hand petting R2.  The expectations for what this character does in the movie is high based on his absence from every marketing material out there.  Let’s also not forget it was his voice over that opened the first full trailer, so I have no doubt Luke is the essential piece to this movie.  Does that mean he dies?  Not necessarily.

Unless there’s a huge curveball, we’re going to need someone in this universe to train more Jedi.  Whether it’s John Boyega’s Finn, Daisy Ridley’s Rey, or even Leia, Luke may be the only person with knowledge of the force, other than the villains.  While he could still theoretically train Jedi as a force ghost, that’s not how it’s been done in the past.  If we’re to assume Luke is only in this film towards the end, I can’t imagine him doing something awesome and then calling it a franchise.  Luke seems destined to return, and play a larger role in the upcoming films, setting up his grand death in Episode IX.

Prediction: Lives

Luke Kalamar: A lot of people are theorizing that Luke will die. I adamantly believe he won’t, and for good reason. First off, and probably most importantly, we already know Mark Hamill is coming back for Episode VIII. Could he be a Force Ghost? Sure, that’s possible, but why would Abrams go this direction? It would fall dangerously close to the exact same role Obi-Wan played in the first three movies. People want to see new material, and having the main character of the original films fill the same part as the main character from the prequel films is an awful idea.

There’s also the matter of new Jedi. If Rey really is the daughter of Han and Leia, and we take Finn’s promotion at face value that he is also Force sensitive, we have at most two new Jedi’s who need training. Who’s the only active good Force user (unless they did some serious changes to Leia)? Luke. We already know proper training is absolutely vital to Force growth. Obi-Wan couldn’t train Luke after death so Yoda filled the void. Supreme Leader Snoke is supposedly strong in the Dark Side too so he possibly trained Kylo Ren. With the truth that Force users are at an all-time low, it also wouldn’t make narrative sense to just randomly introduce an entirely new Jedi Master. To keep things simple, I expect Luke to be the new resident Master who will impart decades of experience into a whole new breed of warriors. The thought of him training people is too exciting of an opportunity for these films to pass up as well.

Prediction: Lives

Aaron Sarnecky: There have been a lot of fan theories circulating about Luke because of his notable absence in most of the promotional material for The Force Awakens. I even encountered one person who complained that he wasn’t in the movie. I was quick to correct them, of course. Don’t forget that there was one shot of him with R2-D2 in the second teaser.

I do have a feeling that he won’t be in this new film much, but I think he has a big part to play in the plot. He seems to be one of the only Jedi in the galaxy. Apparently the New Republic never rebuilt the Jedi Order. That is, if there even is a New Republic. Either way, chances are he’s going to train Finn. And since trouble appears to follow Finn and Rey, if he does meets them, he’s going to have to fight. He could die and guide Finn as a ghost like Obi-Wan did for him. But then who would complete Finn’s training?

Prediction: Lives

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