Rian Johnson reveals why Luke was using Anakin’s lightsaber in The Last Jedi

Last Updated on July 30, 2021

STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI has potentially sparked the most debate among fans of any STAR WARS movie to date. There’s been a ton of discussion around what Rian Johnson decided to do with his movie – especially regarding the use of Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill). One pivotal scene in the movie had many fans dusting off their theory journals and jotting down their thoughts, and now Johnson is here to shed some light.

During an interview with IGN, Johnson spoke about the climactic final showdown between Skywalker and Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) in which – spoiler – Skywalker force-projected himself onto Crait to challenge Ren. Skywalker projected a much more youthful version of himself, and also wielded his father Anakin/Darth Vader’s old blue lightsaber, instead of his own green one. People have been wondering why that is, and Johnson said it all has to do with pushing Ren’s buttons:

[Luke] is basically tailoring this projection to have maximum effect on Kylo. He knows that Kylo’s Achilles heel is his rage, and so that’s why he kind of makes himself look younger, the way Kylo would’ve last seen him in their confrontation at the temple, and that’s why he decided to bring Kylo’s grandfather’s lightsaber down there — the lightsaber that Kylo screamed at Rey, “that’s mine, that belongs to me."

That very blue lightsaber is the one Rey (Daisy Ridley) had been carrying around the whole movie and used to fight alongside Ren against the Praetorian guards. However, the lightsaber was split in two when Rey and Ren had an epic battle of tug-of-war. Hearing Johnson’s answer may lead some to ask then why didn’t Ren know it was a trick after seeing Skywalker using it as if nothing happened. Well, Johnson answers that with some honest logic:

We as an audience saw that… The truth is, we see the lightsaber split in half — Kylo sees a blinding flash of light and is knocked unconscious, and then Rey takes the lightsaber away before he wakes up. So if you really want to dig into it and get an explanation, you can say that he doesn’t 100 percent know what happened to the lightsaber.

Like many a’ fan I have been wondering about the blue lightsaber bit myself, but I won’t share my old theory before because now I feel silly. But Johnson’s reasoning makes total sense in the context of things, and make Skywalker look like an even bigger genius/badass.

STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI is in theaters now.