Star Wars: Episode VIII has wrapped principal photography. Everyone’s expecting to learn the official title at Star Wars Celebration Europe. It’s not out until Dec. 15, 2017, but slowly the curtain is coming up on Episode 8.
Some of the earliest leaks from the set of Episode 8 involved the location shoots in Dubrovnik, Croatia. The medieval city stood in for some yet unnamed, civilized region of the Star Wars galaxy, the streets of the ancient walled city bedecked in alien light and sci-fi control panels.
On Tuesday Making Star Wars got their hands on a bunch of new photos from the Dubrovnik set. And while they don’t tell us the name of planet Dubrovnik, or what the hell Finn is doing riding a horsey Falkor lookalike, the set photos emphasize the radically different aesthetic of Star Wars: Episode 8 compared to The Force Awakens , a look we haven’t seen since the dark days of the Star Wars Prequel Trilogy.
In Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi we never see the more civilized corners of the Star Wars galaxy. Instead we get frontier planets, military installations, jungles and deserts. The nearest the Star Wars Original Trilogy comes to civilization is the illegal Tibanna mining operations of Lando Calrissian.
Whereas these new photos from the set of Star Wars: Episode 8 look urban and Old World. It’s an aesthetic we haven’t seen since the Prequel Trilogy, which took us to civilized planets like Naboo and the megalopolis city-planet of Coruscant.
It looks like Star Wars: Episode 8 will take us back into the Galactic core planets. Not only do these pictures show city streets that evoke Naboo, but elevated fashion closer in style to Princess Amidala than the rough-spun woolen robes we’ve come to associate with Star Wars characters.
It should make for a fascinating visual contrast with The Force Awakens, which largely took up the original Star Wars trilogy’s palette of natural landscapes and sterile spaceship corridors.
So will Star Wars: Episode 8 get sci-fi urbanity right this time, in contrast with the muddled, bureaucratic vision of the Prequel Trilogy? We’ll find out Dec. 15, 2017, when Star Wars: Episode VIII comes out in theaters.
