Much has been said about Kylo Ren’s roiling internal conflict in The Force Awakens—mostly about the fateful moment he steps further into the dark side by murdering his own father. But was the young Solo really so far gone before he killed Han? J.J. Abrams’ new commentary track for the film tells all.
Abram’s commentary is included for the first time on The Force Awakens’ 3D re-release, available next month—and while the new snippet from it, released through USA Today, isn’t the first time we’ve heard Abrams discuss Han Solo’s death, it’s some rare insight into how the director actually wanted the moment to come across to audiences.
As he states in the snippet above, Abrams never thought of Kylo Ren as always intending to murder his father the moment Han walks out onto the gangway—although he does acknowledge that usually, when someone in Star Wars meets another person on a tight gangway miles above a giant chasm, it usually ends poorly. But interestingly he notes that it was intended that Ren is nearly convinced by his father’s pleas to turn back on Snoke, it’s just that he’s too afraid to admit to himself that he’s made a bad decision, so he chooses to kill Han in an attempt to re-convince himself. As The Force Awakens’ novelization revealed last year, it didn’t exactly help the young man too much:
Following through on the act ought to have made him stronger, a part of him believed. Instead, he found himself weakened.
The Force Awakens’ 3D re-release hits shelves November 15th.