'Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker' Leaks Reveal Rey's Shocking New Jedi Master

Who will train Rey in the ways of the Force now that Luke Skywalker is a ghost and all the other available teachers are evil? The answer might be staring us in the face, and a new leak could confirm the best twist nobody saw coming for Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. If one rumor turns out to be true, Rey has a new Jedi master in The Rise of Skywalker, and it’s easily the coolest thing you can possibly imagine.

The following contains a possible spoiler for The Rise of Skywalker. This is based on alleged leaks. Inverse has no inside knowledge of said rumor. That said, this could be a real spoiler and not just a theory, so proceed with caution.

The reason why I put that heavy-duty spoiler warning above is that though I love speculating about this kind of stuff — and I love fan theories of all kinds — sometimes when we inch closer to a Star Wars movie coming out, certain theories and “leaks” start to seem close to the truth simply because we’ve exhausted all our options. Are geek journalists, fans, and pundits kind of like infinite numbers of Ewoks hammering away randomly on keyboards and eventually creating the script for Return of the Jedi? Maybe. The point is, even purveyors of obvious fake Star Wars news (cough, cough, Mike Zeroh) can occasionally be right — even by accident. And something tells me this next “leak” might be legit. Ready? Yep, this is your actual final possible spoiler warning.

Okay. According to a “leak” video posted by Making Star Wars on Monday, Rey is trained by none other than General Leia Organa near the opening moments of The Rise of Skywalker. That’s right, Leia is straight-up Rey’s new pseudo-Jedi Master, and that scene in the D23 trailer where Rey throws her lightsaber and then catches it Thor-style is, in fact, a scene from Rey training with Leia.

Does this make sense? Does this seem real? If I search my feelings in terms of what would be good in the movie, and what I think J.J. Abrams would do, the specific idea of Leia training Rey scans as real to me. It feels right based on what we saw at the end of The Last Jedi, and it makes sense relative to Leia’s amazing Force powers at the beginning of that film, too. Naysayers might point out that Leia training Rey doesn’t make sense, because the new films haven’t demonstrated that Leia is formally trained as a Jedi, but that’s bullshit. Leia could have learned to focus and harness her powers in all sorts of ways in between Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens. The biggest difference is that Leia was probably fairly secretive about all that — at least, in contrast with Luke.

In 2016, an in-canon novel called Bloodline by Claudia Gray made pretty clear that Leia’s status as Darth Vader’s daughter caused her all sorts of political headaches, meaning, it totally makes sense that Leia’s amazing Force powers were something she kept a closely guarded secret. But what it also means is that, on some level, Leia could be a full-fledged Jedi, which means the idea that she is helping to train Rey in this new film fits. Plus, let’s get real, it would just be cool as hell to see Leia showing Rey how to throw that lightsaber. How will Abrams pull this off using archival footage of Carrie Fisher? I guess we’ll see, but if it does happen, I’m guessing it will rock.

To be fair, there’s a lot of other stuff in this particular leak, including the implication that Rey, Finn, and Poe are trying to solve a murder mystery, a weird twist involving Rey’s parents, and even a half-assed explanation for C-3PO’s red eyes.

Briefly, here’s the big takeaways from this specific Making Star Wars “leak:”

• Leia trains Rey.
• The double-bladed lightsaber from the trailer first appears as a mysterious murder weapon and Rey, Finn, and Poe are sent on a mission to figure it out.
• C-3PO’s program forbids him from reading the writing on the saber at first. (But then he does and his eyes get red?)
• When Rey touches it she has the vision of Dark Rey.
• Kylo Ren implies Rey’s parents sold her to servitude to protect her from … something.
• The double-bladed saber was the murder weapon that killed Rey’s parents.

So, does all of this sound real? Maybe not. But enough of it has a ring of truth to make you think we’re getting some real spoilers at this point. I’m not sure I buy the idea that a murder mystery involving an old Sith-saber will set up the plot of Rise of Skywalker, but maybe? I’m also not sure Rey’s parents will matter as much to the plot, but again, Abrams has said there will be “more” about them, so who knows.

All in all, every single leak from Rise of Skywalker should be treated kind of like a statement from Obi-Wan Kenobi in A New Hope. It could be true, but then again, it could be a lie that disguises another truth. If Leia trains Rey at the beginning of The Rise of Skywalker, that would be amazing. But it doesn’t necessarily mean Leia will be the only teacher Rey seeks out. After all, Palpatine has pretty amazing master apprentice credentials, from a certain point of view.

Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker is out everywhere on December 20, 2019.